British IS schoolgirl 'wants to return home'

[Pickman's model]

How can they actually refuse entry though if she just pitches up at Heathrow? Just leave her in limbo between the gates and security? It could end up as a bitter sweet comedy, someone should make a film like that.

people have found themselves trapped at moscow's sheremetyevo airport unable to leave the building or board another flight, and it is no laughing matter see eg A surprising number of people are getting trapped for months on end in Moscow’s busiest airport

 

[Teaboy]

people have found themselves trapped at moscow's sheremetyevo airport unable to leave the building or board another flight, and it is no laughing matter

Not even bitter sweet?

 

[8ball]

They'd have to go to Syria and sort it out before that happened. Going there is not quite like popping round the corner to the shops.

I look forward to reading the nine million page Risk Assessment for sending a mental health assessment team to an IS infested refugee camp in northern Syria....

Fair point, I was just talking about the risks if she made it back herself - I misread what you meant by "repatriating".

 

[Pickman's model]

Not even bitter sweet?

not even bitter sweet

 

[Red Cat]

I wonder how the split between people who are convinced that we can't know her mind, or should give her the benefit of the doubt, and those who feel her words should probably be taken at face value maps onto those who encountered Isis on social media at the time and those who didn't? There was a time period shortly before she went out there when Isis propoganda confronted you if you followed events in Syria on Twitter. This largely consisted of snuff movies with the production standards of a high-end music videos.

My point is that you can't say very much about people's state of mind based on descriptions of someone's actions. I said that her age doesn't protect her from being perverse or sadistic, it doesn't. I'm saying we need to look at the evidence, but that the evidence for how she was then and how she is now is limited, although not non-existent. I don't think it helps our understanding to be be saying she was groomed therefore she must have been like this, or, she has endured 4 years of this, therefore she must feel like this, that says more about how we want things to be rather than how they actually are.

 

[eoin_k]

Red Cat, thanks for the response. Out of curiosity, did you get sucked down the rabbit hole of online Isis propagaganda just over four years ago?

ETA: perhaps shouldn't be addressed to you any more than the people diagnosing PTSD or whatever.

 

[kebabking]

I've just read, but lost the link, she can be refused entry until she's agreed to a bunch of stuff, then could face legal action upon return.

The government's view would be that they simply don't want her back. As soon as she either walks on UK soil, or comes under the protection of an SIS/SF team in Syria, she becomes their problem, and that she has rights and they have obligations - and they don't end when a psychiatrist at Belmarsh signs her off as being an incurable fanatic.

In legal terms she's like cat shit trodden into your carpet: it's a lot easier if the problem doesn't arise and is 'solved' outside of your jurisdiction. Bluntly, that means dead from some disease that's rife in refugee camps, or shot by locals looking for revenge, which is also rife in the refugee camps of North East Syria.

 

[Red Cat]

Red Cat, thanks for the response. Out of curiosity, did you get sucked down the rabbit hole of online Isis propagaganda just over four years ago?

I'm sure she's extremely disturbed but we don't know more than that. Therefore we don't know in exactly what way she was vulnerable to being sucked down a rabbit hole.

Or maybe you're asking me something else. It's not clear. Maybe I'm not being clear.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

I wonder how the split between people who are convinced that we can't know her mind, or should give her the benefit of the doubt, and those who feel her words should probably be taken at face value maps onto those who encountered Isis on social media at the time and those who didn't? There was a time period shortly before she went out there when Isis propoganda confronted you if you followed events in Syria on Twitter. This largely consisted of snuff movies with the production standards of a high-end music video.

My views are certainly coloured by the first-hand accounts of life under IS that I've read. My sympathy evaporates very quickly for anyone who turned up there and wasn't scheming to get back out within weeks.

In both this case and the case of the woman just released from prison, their main concerns appear to be their own welfare. Shakila mostly talks about how she didn't like the way she was treated. Women treated like shit by Islamic State? Whodathunk? Similarly, in this case, it is only after her own life has totally fucked up that she has sought help to return. I think they are 'our problem' and we should not agree with the approach of the likes of Javid, but I have precious little sympathy for either of these women. They at the very least condoned the killing of 'non-believers'. They can go fuck themselves on most levels, regardless of the unhappiness they might have felt that led to them going there or the unhappiness they felt while there. Fuck you for making that choice.

 

[eoin_k]

I'm sure she's extremely disturbed but we don't know more than that. Therefore we don't know in exactly what way she was vulnerable to being sucked down a rabbit hole.

Or maybe you're asking me something else. It's not clear. Maybe I'm not being clear.

My initial comment was probably a bit misdirected towards you. It's more the people who are trying to speculate about what may have driven her towards Daesh, rather than the content of what she was clearly drawn towards, that I'm taking issue with.

 

[Red Cat]

My initial comment was probably a bit misdirected towards you. It's more the people who are trying to speculate about what may have driven her towards Daesh, rather than the content of what she was clearly drawn towards, that I'm taking issue with.

I don't like the speculation that describes her actions in relation to some kind of deprivation or trauma in lieu of acknowledging that a 15 year old girl might be capable of extremely destructive states of mind. And I was also trying to say that it's not necessarily easy to assess someone's state of mind based on knowledge of their external circumstances, states of mind are complex, and we don't know much about her.

But I wasn't suggesting she should be given the benefit of the doubt at all.

 

[Rob Ray]

Tbh I think a lot of people on this thread have forgotten what it's like to be a teenager, while afaik none of us have any knowledge whatsoever about how being inducted into a death cult aged 15 and not emerging for four years can affect a person.

I'm not saying she should be absolved of guilt or trusted, but this was a child sucked in by a vast and insanely clever network of professionals exploiting her youth and faith, not a hardened veteran.

 

[Shechemite]

I joined the SWP when I was 13 (stayed for 6 years).

Teenagers are fucking daft

 

[Teaboy]

Tbh I think a lot of people on this thread have forgotten what it's like to be a teenager, while afaik none of us have any knowledge whatsoever about how being inducted into a death cult aged 15 and not emerging for four years can affect a person.

I'm not saying she should be absolved of guilt or trusted, but this was a child sucked in by a vast and insanely clever network of professionals exploiting her youth and faith, not a hardened veteran.

Yes but its not about who she was then its about who she is now. No matter how that situation came about she is what she is now, and on the face of it is a cold an utterly unrepentant adult who wishes it was still the good old days when she had a nice house and slaves.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Tbh I think a lot of people on this thread have forgotten what it's like to be a teenager, while afaik none of us have any knowledge whatsoever about how being inducted into a death cult aged 15 and not emerging for four years can affect a person.

I'm not saying she should be absolved of guilt or trusted, but this was a child sucked in by a vast and insanely clever network of professionals exploiting her youth and faith, not a hardened veteran.

She was exploited, no doubt. One of the reasons I dislike the term 'brainwashing', which is often bandied about and has been in the media in this case by people who should know better, is that it implies a passive process of conversion. Here you also use the passive voice to describe her induction. But radicalisation isn't a passive process, particularly in the case of people growing up in urban Britain, where there are a multitude of voices to potentially listen to. So this was a child, or young adult, or just young person, who was led down a path she wanted to go down. Mitigating circumstances like those you might find for child soldiers in Uganda don't really apply here, and that bit - her agency - can't and shouldn't be ignored, whatever else emerges about how she ended up where she is. If she comes back here, she will have to face the consequences for her decision aged 15 and her actions in the four years since that decision. That will have to involve some kind of a transition period, which will likely need to happen in prison. And I'm pretty hard-nosed about that bit - she joined IS ffs, she deserves a spell in prison, we owe it to her victims not to let her off. She is an accomplice to mass-murder.

 

[Athos]

I joined the SWP when I was 13 (stayed for 6 years).

You deserve to swap places with her.

 

[Shechemite]

You deserve to swap places with her.

The shame is sufficient punishment for me

 

[SpookyFrank]

And I'm pretty hard-nosed about that bit - she joined IS ffs, she deserves a spell in prison, we owe it to her victims not to let her off. She is an accomplice to mass-murder.

Do you draw the same line with returning war criminals wearing UK uniforms?

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Do you draw the same line with returning war criminals wearing UK uniforms?

I have consistently opposed British military action for decades, and the real war criminals in this country don't wear uniforms - they wear smart politician suits. But drawing an equivalence between British military action and IS? Have a look around for accounts of life under IS rule. And the misdeeds of the British state don't leave the rest of us with nothing to say about the likes of returning IS people and what needs to be done about them, for our sake more than for theirs. Do you think it's fine if she just comes back and is left to get on with things? Would that sit well with you? Would that be the right thing to do?

 

[SpookyFrank]

But drawing an equivalence between British military action and IS?

It's generally accepted that the US/UK invasion of Iraq was a key factor in the creation of ISIS. If it weren't for our heroic veterans and all that heroism that they did out there, this young woman would have probably just finished school and got a job at TK Maxx or something. So while I respect your focus on the people ultimately responsible for bad things, in this case the category of 'responsible parties' includes a large number of people who got a parade through Wooton fucking Bassett when they got home.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

It's generally accepted that the US/UK invasion of Iraq was a key factor in the creation of ISIS. If it weren't for our heroic veterans and all that heroism that they did out there, this young woman would have probably just finished school and got a job at TK Maxx or something. So while I respect your focus on the people ultimately responsible for bad things, in this case the category of 'responsible parties' includes a large number of people who got a parade through Wooton fucking Bassett when they got home.

So can you answer my question? that's the problem with whatabouttery, however much the point might be valid, it doesn't tell you much about what you should do.

 

[SpookyFrank]

So can you answer my question? that's the problem with whatabouttery, however much the point might be valid, it doesn't tell you much about what you should do.

Throw out all the squaddies to make room for refugees. Sorry I thought that was implied.

 

[Spymaster]

You deserve to swap places with her.

Who’s going to get him pregnant?

 

[Spymaster]

Throw out all the squaddies to make room for refugees. Sorry I thought that was implied.

Don’t be a plank, Frank.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Throw out all the squaddies to make room for refugees. Sorry I thought that was implied.

And Shamima Begum?

 

[Teaboy]

And Shamima Begum?

I guess she's a refugee herself now. Maybe she could claim asylum somewhere? Where are IS popular?

 

[kebabking]

I guess she's a refugee herself now. Maybe she could claim asylum somewhere? Where are IS popular?

Frank's house? At least he won't subject them to a week at Centre Parcs...

 

[Spymaster]

Frank's house?

That would come under “cruel or unusual punishment”.

 

[SpookyFrank]

And Shamima Begum?

Well the policy on this has got to be coherent and universal. If you're letting people come home after creating ISIS as adults but not after joining it as children, that's incoherent.

 

[Shechemite]

Who’s going to get him pregnant?

Where’s this going?