Resurgence Of ISIS Violence In Syria Reopens Old Wounds

Islamist sleeper cells assassinate leaders and terrorize locals

- Bel Trew

Five years after giving birth on death row in a prison run by Isis, Sara is scared for her life once again. The Syrian mother started receiving threatening text messages from the militant Islamists – thought to have been defeated by Russian forces and a US-led coalition nearly three years ago. “Go back to your good Islamic principles,” reads the first text she shows The Independent. “Stay away from working with the infidels. Or else.”

The militant Islamist group made its last stand in the eastern province of Deir Ezzor, where Sara lives. Following the final surrender, when Syrian and foreign Isis members were packed off to jail, the west largely forgot about this corner of the war-torn country. But the residents of Deir Ezzor fear that Daesh is making a comeback, and few people are more familiar with the horror of life under the militants than Sara.

Sara was pregnant when she was arrested in 2016, alongside her sister, for allegedly colluding with the coalition fighting Isis forces. The only reason Sara survived is because an Isis “judge” had ruled that she should give birth before being executed. Minutes after a difficult delivery on death row, her Daesh jailers prised her baby from her arms and told her the death sentence would be carried out imminently.

But a general amnesty that had been brokered by local tribal leaders was signed at the eleventh hour, and Sara was eventually reunited with her family.

Her sister was not so lucky. Sara does not know if she is dead or alive. Two of Sara’s cousins and her best friend were also killed by Daesh terrorists. And now, just as the family try to rebuild their lives and come to terms with the massive losses they have suffered, the militant Islamists are spreading fear again.