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US Scrambles to Contain Growing ISIS Threat in Libya
New York Times-Feb 21, 2016
THIES, Senegal — The Islamic State's branch in Libya is deepening its reach across a wide area of Africa, attracting new recruits from countries ...
US Bombs ISIS in Libya, Allies Support ISIS in Libya
The Real News Network-Feb 24, 2016
The Real News Network-Feb 24, 2016
Explore in depth (23 more articles)
Where ISIS Is Doubling
The Atlantic-Feb 24, 2016
One harrowing possibility for Western countries is the growth of ISIS in ... to allow U.S. drones operating in Libya and North Africa to launch from ...
A Swedish Girl, ISIS and a Cautionary Tale of Global Terrorism
New York Times-20 hours ago
... and fell for her boyfriend, a Muslim from North Africa who was five years older and ... The number and activities of extremists in Sweden have grown ... fight for extremist groups than any European country other than Belgium, ...
MARK MUNICIPALITY, Sweden — It was a running-away-from-home nightmare for the age of global terrorism. Marilyn Nevalainen,
a pregnant teenager, decided to follow her boyfriend last year when he
set out to wage jihad, leaving the lakes and forests of southwest Sweden for life under the Islamic State in the desert heat of Iraq.
Apparently
lacking any clear idea of what she was getting herself into, she ended
up with militants near Mosul, with a new baby to care for and her
boyfriend dead on an Iraqi battlefield.
Remarkably,
Ms. Nevalainen, now 16, and her infant son made it out alive. Much
remains unknown about how she turned up two weeks ago in
Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq, and she has not spoken publicly beyond a brief television interview in which she contended that she had followed her boyfriend without knowing “what ISIS means, what Islam is, nothing.” She is now back in Sweden.
Europe
has been troubled for several years by the number of its young people
who have run off to join the Islamic State, and is increasingly
concerned about the potential for them to come home to carry out
terrorist acts in their native countries. Ms. Nevalainen stands out as a
rare case in which a young European went unwittingly into the heart of
jihadist territory, ending up with the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, and was freed.
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Her
story seems less one of ideology than of teenage rebelliousness and
naïveté gone awry in a world where, with a bit of determination, a young
woman can travel unchallenged from Sweden to the war zones of the
Middle East.
The
second of at least four daughters of Pasi and Ann-Kristin Nevalainen,
Marilyn grew up in a village in Sweden’s rural Mark Municipality. It was
a childhood troubled enough that her family voluntarily placed her in
the care of a foster family, according to neighbors and social services
officials.
“She
was a problem girl,” said a longtime neighbor, who spoke on the
condition that she be identified only as Annika. “She didn’t like to go
to school and the parents tried to help her, but they were too late and
she went away. If she didn’t get to do what she wanted, she rebelled.”
Annika
knew the Nevalainen family from when they lived in Lekvad, a hamlet of
winding gravel roads, vast fields and few people. When night falls, the
only lights are from the lanterns on distant farm porches.
By
Ms. Nevalainen’s account, given on Kurdish television once she was out
of the Islamic State’s territory, she dropped out of school when she was
14 and fell for her boyfriend, a Muslim from North Africa who was five
years older and had immigrated to Sweden on his own by 2012, according
to records from the Swedish migration board.
It was a little less than a year after they met that the pair left for Syria, in the summer of 2015.
In a jarring video
that appears to be addressed to her parents and was obtained by a
Swedish tabloid, the Aftonbladet, a bearded young man who seems to be
her boyfriend and identifies himself as Mokhtar Mohammed Ahmed speaks
into the camera in Swedish, saying, “You can just forget about this
little girl, because she is never coming back.”
The
circumstances of how she eventually did come back remain unclear.
Senior Kurdish officials say she was rescued on Feb. 17 by Kurdish
special forces without a shot being fired. The officials said they were
able to locate her using information derived from her occasional use of
the Internet, but they offered no details.
A
sheikh interviewed in the Kurdish city of Erbil said he had been
approached by the girl’s uncle, who he said worked for Unicef, to try to
get her out. The sheikh said he had received photos of landmarks from
Tel Keif, a village near Mosul, that Ms. Nevalainen was able to send to
identify her whereabouts. He claimed he had been able to arrange her
escape with smugglers and was supposed to be paid $35,000. He said that
the next thing he knew, he saw the girl on television — and that he had
never been paid.
The
release of foreigners by the Islamic State is rare; most cases have
involved ransoms. Kurdish officials denied that any ransom was paid, and
the Swedish government and the girl’s parents have declined to provide
any details.
Ms.
Nevalainen’s case highlights how even villages in the heart of rural
Sweden are grappling with the presence of increasing numbers of Muslim
refugees, some of whom may bring with them preconceptions about the West
and even allegiances to groups in fiery Middle East conflicts.
In his video, the young man believed to be Ms. Nevalainen’s boyfriend says the reason he and Marilyn left Sweden was racism.
“You
have forced me to leave because you would not let the two of us live in
peace,” he said. He says with anger: “I can’t live there because they
are racists. I can’t live with racist people. Damn racists.”
Kurdish
officials said he was killed fighting in Ramadi, in western Iraq,
sometime last fall. It is not clear if Ms. Nevalainen was forced to
marry another fighter or lived with other women.
The
number and activities of extremists in Sweden have grown greatly over
the past 15 years, according to terrorism experts. Sweden now has more
would-be jihadists per capita going to fight for extremist groups than
any European country other than Belgium, according to a 2015 study by
the International Center for the Study of Radicalization and Political
Violence.
Recruiters for the Islamic State and for Al Qaeda affiliates active in Syria and other groups, including the Shabab, target the second generation of immigrants, terrorism experts said.
“The
issue of the foreign fighters is quite serious given the numbers, but
until last year there were very few barriers to people going,” said
Magnus Ranstorp, the research director at the Center for Asymmetric
Threat Studies at the Swedish Defense University.
Ms.
Nevalainen’s grandfather, Tenho Nevalainen, told a local newspaper that
her parents were worried about her liaison with Mr. Ahmed.
“The family tried to keep her away from him,” he said.
In
her interview on Kurdish television, Ms. Nevalainen said, “At first we
were good together, but then he started to look at ISIS videos and start
to speak about them and stuff like that, and I don’t know anything
about Islam, or ISIS, or something, so I didn’t know what he meant.”
When
her boyfriend said he wanted to go fight for ISIS, “I say to him,
‘O.K., no problem,’ because I didn’t know what ISIS means, what Islam
is, nothing.”
Soon
after she arrived in Mosul she began to reach out to her mother,
according to her own account. In the television interview, she said it
“was a really hard life” there.
“In
the house we didn’t have anything — no electricity, no water — and it
was totally different from our life in Sweden,” she said. (The man
believed to be her boyfriend, in his video, said she lacked for
nothing.)
An
initial effort to rescue her, in October, failed, according to several
people close to the family. Her grandfather described that rescue
attempt as “botched.”
Those who know her and her family said they wanted her homecoming to bode well, but they sounded unsure.
“You
have to hope that it goes well for her in the future,” said Lisbeth
Pehrsson, who lived across the street from the family for many years.
“And for her little boy, I hope so.”
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