“Daesh” terror group prepares indoctrinated children for suicide-bombing operations

Well-informed sources close to the Libyan security file, told “Echorouk” that the ISIS (Daesh) terror group led by “Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi” is holding secret camp sessions somewhere on Libyan territory to train children for combat purposes notably by using them, if need be, as potential suicide bombers, adding that most of these hapless and diverted children are aged between 12 and 15 years old.

Videos of teenagers and young boys being trained in the use of weapons as well as guerrilla warfare have been circulated profusely on the Internet in the last few months. These images, often released by members of the media affiliated to the self-proclaimed “Islamic State of Iraq and Syria” terror group  (“ISIS or Daesh”), underline the exploitation of children in the conflicts currently raging in Libya, Syria and Iraq.

In addition to suicide bombers or fighters, children have also been used as executioners by ISIS. A UN report published last November highlighted the terror group’s systematic use of children under the age of 18 as executioners, citing the example of a 16-year-old fighter who had cut the throats of two captured Syrian soldiers in August 2014. A video also showed a child younger than eight putting to death two men accused of being spies.

 “The forced enrollment of children by terrorist groups is nothing new in Iraq and elsewhere,” said  a UN official, “It is a most reprehensible tradition that also prevailed under Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi,” the ring-leader of ISIS’s parent terror organization, namely “Al-Qaeda” in Iraq.

According to the UN study, ISIS is using education as an indoctrination tool. The report underlined that since September 2013, the terror group had been using the Al-Bouhtri School in Al-Bab, Aleppo as a recruitment and military training facility for boys under the age of 18. It added that Al-Sharea’l youth camp near Raqqa reportedly trained over 350 boys between the ages of five and 16 for combat roles.

“The armed terrorist group also deliberately aims propaganda at children. For instance, In Raqqa city, children are gathered for screenings of videos depicting mass executions of government soldiers, desensitizing them to extreme violence,” the UN report said.

In a reaction, the chief of child protection department at UNICEF explained that the UN organization’s global position towards any military group under international laws is that children under 18 should not at all be involved in conflict.

“This includes recruitment and use of children, and by use we are not only referring directly to children fighting but also to the use of children in carrying water and doing other chores as well as to child brides and horrendous sexual exploitation of youth,” he underscored.

While it is difficult to determine just how prevalent the exploitation of children is in areas under ISIS control, this heinous practice is certainly widespread and will, no doubt, have long-lasting and disastrous effects on future generations of young Libyans, Iraqis and Syrians.