Shamima Begum was a London schoolgirl until Scotland Yard raised concerns she and two of her fellow pupils had travelled to Syria in February 2015. The now 23-year-old was just 15 when she travelled to Istanbul in Turkey from Gatwick Airport to join the so-called Islamic State (IS) with her close friends at Bethnal Green […]
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Shamima Begum’s decision to go to the Islamic State was made when she was 15. No doubt, she was a young person who was influenced by what she consumed through slick Islamic State propaganda online. She was vulnerable to being drawn into the propaganda and those working on extremism realise that those personal vulnerabilities involve […]
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The man nicknamed Jihadi Jack has said that he wants to return to Britain, but he thinks it unlikely he will be allowed back. Jack Letts, 23, speaking from the Kurdish jail where he has been held for two years on suspicion of joining IS after he ran away to Syria in 2014, said he […]
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An east London schoolgirl who left Britain as a 15-year-old to join the Islamic State group is now heavily pregnant and wants to come home. Shamima Begum was tracked down by The Times to a refugee camp in northern Syria where she is now 19-years-old, the bride of an Islamic State fighter, nine months pregnant […]
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Moscow said on Friday its forces may have killed Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in an air strike in Syria last month, but Washington said it could not corroborate the death and Western and Iraqi officials were sceptical. The secretive Islamic State leader has frequently been reported killed or wounded since he declared a […]
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Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is on the brink of losing the two main centres of his ‘caliphate’ but even though he is on the run, it may take years to capture or kill him, officials and experts said. Islamic State fighters are close to defeat in the twin capitals of the group’s territory, […]
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An audio message purporting to come from the spokesman of Islamic State called on followers to launch attacks in the United States, Europe, Russia, Australia, Iraq, Syria, Iran, and the Philippines during the Islamic holy month of Ramadan, which began in late May. The audio clip was distributed on Monday on Islamic State’s channel on […]
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Western-backed Syrian forces should isolate Islamic State’s de facto capital in Syria “by the spring” before an offensive on the city itself, Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said on Saturday. The Syrian Democratic Forces, which includes the powerful Syrian Kurdish YPG militia, launched the campaign on Raqqa in November. It announced this month the start of […]
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The U.S. military has confirmed the killing of Junaid Hussain, the British Citizen who had become a central player in the cyber activities of ISIS or Islamic State. Hussain was killed in a targeted drone strike on August 24th whilst travelling in Syria and was married to Sally Jones, an ex-punk rocker from Chatham who […]
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