In this Dec. 5, 2015,
photo, Syrian refugee Nayef speaks to The Associated Press during an
interview in southeast Turkey. Under the Islamic State group, "justice
has been erratic,” said Nayef, who hails from the Islamic State
group-held eastern Syrian town of al-Shadadi and escaped to Turkey in
November with his family. "They started off good and then, gradually,
things got worse.” Nayef spoke on condition that his last name not be
printed, fearing for his safety. (AP Photo/Emrah Gurel)
GAZIANTEP, Turkey (AP) —
Mohammed Saad, a Syrian activist, was imprisoned by the Islamic State
group, hung by his arms and beaten regularly. Then one day, his jailers
quickly pulled him and other prisoners down and hid them in a bathroom.
The reason? A
senior Muslim cleric was visiting to inspect the facility. The cleric
had told the fighters running the prison that they shouldn't torture
prisoners and that anyone held without charge must be released within 30
days, Saad told The Associated Press. Once the coast was clear, the
prisoners were returned to their torment.
"It's a criminal gang
pretending to be a state," Saad said, speaking in Turkey, where he fled
in October. "All this talk about applying Shariah and Islamic values is
just propaganda, Daesh is about torture and killing," he said, using the
Arabic acronym for IS.
Syrians who have recently escaped the
Islamic State group's rule say public disillusionment is growing as IS
has failed to live up to its promises to install a utopian "Islamic"
rule of justice, equality and good governance.
Instead,
the group has come to resemble the dictatorial rule of Syrian President
Bashar Assad that many Syrians had sought to shed, with a reliance on
informers who have silenced a fearful populace. Rather than equality,
society has seen the rise of a new elite class — the jihadi fighters —
who enjoy special perks and favor in the courts, looking down on "the
commoners" and even ignoring the rulings of their own clerics.
CLICK IMAGE for slideshow: In this photo released on May 4, 2015, by a militant website, which has been verified …
Despite
the atrocities that made it notorious, the Islamic State group had
raised hopes among some fellow Sunnis when it overran their territories
across parts of Syria and Iraq and declared a "caliphate" in the summer
of 2014. It presented itself as a contrast to Assad's rule, bringing
justice through its extreme interpretation of Shariah and providing
services to residents, including loans to farmers, water and
electricity, and alms to the poor. Its propaganda machine promoting the
dream of an Islamic caliphate helped attract jihadis from around the
world.
In Istanbul and
several Turkish cities near the Syrian border, the AP spoke to more than
a dozen Syrians who fled IS-controlled territory in recent months. Most
spoke on condition they be identified only by their first names or by
the nicknames they use in their political activism for fear of IS
reprisals against themselves or family.
"Daesh justice has been
erratic," said Nayef, who hails from IS-held eastern Syrian town of
al-Shadadi and escaped to Turkey in November with his family, largely
because of Russian airstrikes. "They started off good and then,
gradually, things got worse." He insisted that his last name not be
printed, fearing for his safety.
The group has recruited informers in the towns and cities it controls to watch out for any sign of opposition.
"Like
under the (Assad) regime, we were also afraid to talk against Daesh to
anyone we don't fully trust," said Fatimah, a 33-year-old whose hometown
of Palmyra was taken over by IS early last year. She fled to Turkey in
November with her husband and five children to escape Russian and Syrian
airstrikes.
IS has also become less able to provide public
services, in large part because military reversals appear to have put
strains on its finances. U.S. and Russian airstrikes have heavily hit
its oil infrastructure — a major source of funds. Over the past year,
the group has lost 30 percent of the territory it once held in Iraq and
Syria, according to the U.S.-led anti-IS coalition. Many of those
interviewed by the AP said there are lengthier cutoffs of water and
electricity in their towns and cities and prices for oil and gas have
risen.
Abu Salem, an activist from the eastern city of Deir
el-Zour, said public acceptance of IS rule is eroding. "It has made an
enemy of almost everyone," he told the AP in the Turkish city of
Reyhanli on the Syrian border.
One sign of the distance between
the claims and realities is a 12-page manifesto by IS detailing its
judicial system. The document, a copy of which was obtained by the AP,
heavily emphasizes justice and tolerance. For example, it sets out the
duties of the Hisba, the "religious police" who ensure people adhere to
the group's dress codes, strict separation of genders and other rules.
A
Hisba member "must be gentle and pleasant toward those he orders or
reprimands," it says. "He must be flexible and good mannered so that his
influence is greater and the response (he gets) is stronger."
Yet,
the escaped Syrians all complained of the brutal extremes that the
Hisba resorts to. One woman who lived in Raqqa said that if a woman is
considered to have violated the dress codes, the militants flog her
husband, since he is seen as responsible for her. When her neighbor put
out the garbage without being properly covered, she said, the woman's
husband was whipped.
Abu Manaf, a 44-year-old from Deir el-Zour,
said some clerics challenged the group's enforcers over their wanton use
of strict Shariah punishments like beheadings, stoning to death,
flogging and cutting off limbs. More moderate clerics in IS argued that
such punishments can only be implemented under specific conditions. They
also complained about the jihadis' custom of displaying bodies of the
beheaded in public as an example to others, violating Islamic tenets
requiring the swift burial of the dead.
"Many of those moderate
clerics disappear, are killed or jailed for crimes they did not commit,"
said Abu Manaf, who left Deir el-Zour in November, then stayed in the
Islamic State group's de facto capital, Raqqa, for three weeks before he
reached Turkey.
Saad's account of his imprisonment in his home
city of Deir el-Zour reflected the tensions between the fighters and
some clerics.
He was arrested because of his media activism,
reporting on the anti-Assad opposition. IS suspected him of belonging to
the rebel Free Syrian Army, which is fighting the extremists. The day
the cleric came to inspect the prison — set up in a former police
station — he heard the cleric asking the guards if the prisoners were
getting enough food and water, and whether they were being beaten, Saad
said.
On another occasion, a cleric and a judge visited and spoke
to the prisoners in their cells. Saad said they told him to write on a
piece of paper his name, why he'd been jailed and whether he had been
tortured or made to confess under duress. He wrote that he had not been
beaten, because he knew the guards would punish him if he said he had
been, Saad said.
After five months in custody, Saad said he
secured his release by agreeing to do media work for IS. For three
months, he helped put together videos and other propaganda before
escaping to Turkey.
The Syrians interviewed in Turkey said that in
IS courts the judges often show a bias toward IS operatives in any
legal dispute with the general public. Judges justify the bias by
pointing to Quranic verses or sayings of the prophet Muhammad, including
"God prefers those who fight in jihad over those who sit." Often, IS
members refer to the general population by the dismissive term
"al-awam," Arabic for "the commoners."
Hossam, who owned a women's
clothes shop in Raqqa, said IS members receive perks that sharply set
them apart from everyone else. In many cases, young men join the group
to escape poverty or protect themselves from IS excesses, he and others
said. He insisted that his last name not be printed, fearing for his
safety.
"Those who join Daesh receive a step up in the social
ladder," he told the AP in Istanbul. "Daesh men drive luxury cars and
eat at the best restaurants and whoever has a friend or a relative with
Daesh has a better life."
One perk that IS members avail
themselves of is the chance to marry local women. Several of the Syrians
interviewed by the AP said families with daughters often came under
pressure to marry them off to fighters, which has led many to smuggle
daughters to Turkey.
Khatar, a 26-year-old who spoke in Lesbos,
Greece, making her way to Western Europe, said she has two younger
sisters back in Raqqa, and jihadis "have been knocking on our doors at
least once a month to ask for their hands in marriage." Her father lies
to them and tells them he doesn't have unmarried daughters, "but they
keep coming back."
But some take the opportunity to marry an IS member because the benefits lift the whole family out of the "al-awam" class.
Khatar
said a 17-year-old daughter of one of her neighbors married a Saudi
jihadi. When Khatar went to congratulate her, she found her loaded with
expensive clothes and jewelry as a dowry. "She seemed very happy with
her new, elevated social status," Khatar said.
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