BFF-27 IS teen’s wish to return stirs UK debate over jihadi brides

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IS teen’s wish to return stirs UK debate over jihadi brides

LONDON, Feb 15, 2019 (BSS/AFP) – The fate of a pregnant London schoolgirl
who wants to return to Britain after joining the Islamic State group in Syria
divided the nation on Friday as reports emerged of more UK women fleeing the
war zone.

Home Secretary Sajid Javid told The Times that people like Shamima Begum
“were full of hate for our country”.

“My message is clear – if you have supported terrorist organisations
abroad I will not hesitate to prevent your return,” Javid said in the
interview published Friday.

But former MI6 foreign intelligence service chief Richard Barrett argued
on Begum’s behalf in an opinion piece for the left-leaning The Guardian
newspaper.

“Despite the justifiable concern, governments have a responsibility to
address the problems created by their captured nationals and also to look
more closely at why they made the choices they did,” Barrett wrote.

“Like it or not, these individuals were products of our society, and it
would make sense to take a good, hard look at why they turned their backs on
it in such dramatic fashion.”

– ‘Terrible price of childish decisions’ –

CAGE, a campaign group for Muslim detainees, also said Begum should be
allowed to return.

CAGE’s outreach director Moazzam Begg, a former Guantanamo detainee, said
he had met “young teens who paid the terrible price of childish decisions”.

Begum should be “counselled in the right direction to learn and
acknowledge just how much the organisation she joined deviated from the basic
principles of Islam and brought misery to the world,” he said.

The story of Begum and two of her friends, who flew on their own to Turkey
and crossed into Syria in 2015, stunned Britain and created global headlines.

Another girl from the same school in east London had run away the year
before.

Their decisions created bitter resentment and disbelief in a country that
has been a frequent target of bloody terror strikes linked to IS.

The Times newspaper managed to find an unrepentant Begum — now 19 and
about to give birth for the third time after seeing her first two children
die — at a refugee camp in eastern Syria.

“I just could not endure any more,” she told the paper.

“I fled the caliphate. Now all I want to do is come home to Britain.”

The British government does not have the power to keep Begum out because
she still has a UK passport and has not been convicted of a crime.

But authorities could prosecute her or issue a special security notice
that would see her detained at a UK airport.

– ‘Had no choice’ –

Begum’s brother-in-law Mohammed Rahman and other relatives of the
surviving teens pleaded for mercy.

“I can understand why people in this country are angry and don’t want her
back,” Rahman told The Times.

“But she was only 15 when she went to Syria. We are appealing for
compassion and understanding on her behalf.”

Begum fled together with two friends: Kadiza Sultana and Amira Abase.

Sultana has since been reported killed. Begum said Abase stayed in a
village where IS fighters are making a final stand against US-backed
fighters.

Abase’s father Hussen asked for forgiveness for the teens.

“They should be allowed to learn from their mistakes,” he told The Daily
Telegraph.

“They are no threat to us.”

The Daily Telegraph reported from eastern Syria that seven British women
and 15 of their children are believed to have fled Baghouz — the village
where IS fighters are making their last stand — for two refugee camps.

The paper spoke to two British women at the camps who wanted to return.

A mother-of-four from London named Nassima Begum — no relation to Shamima
Begum — said she “had no choice but to follow” her husband’s decision to
leave.

“Some of the women here believe in (IS). I can promise you I am not one of
them,” she said.

But another Londoner named Reema Iqbal was more reserved.

“The security services came to speak to me and I was honest, I told them
my whole story so now it’s up to them to judge,” Iqbal said.

BSS/AFP/BZC/1915HRS