Kadiza Sultana
Kadiza Sultana was a United Kingdom schoolgirl who travelled to Daesh-occupied Syria with two school-chums when she was just 16 years old.[1] Sultana's friends Amira Abase and Shamima Begum were even younger than she was. They followed the example of another schoolfriend, Sharmeena Begum, who travelled to Syria in December 2014.[2] Kadiza and the other two girls followed in February 2015.
In a profile the The New York Times published on August 17, 2015, they said Sultana was "exceptionally bright".[3] The profile quoted the chief executive of the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, Sasha Havlicek, who characterized her and her friends as "the face of a new, troubling phenomenon ... a jihadi, girl-power subculture".
Sultana had attended her friend Sharmeena's father's second marraige.[3] Sharmeena's father was critical of what he described as the failure of UK security officials to heed his warning Sharmeena's friends might follow her example. UK Police did interview Sultana and other girls from the Bethnal Green Academy, after Sharmeena traveled to Syria -- but as witnesses, not as other potential victims.
The four friends were all married to foreigners who had volunteered to fight for Daesh, shortly after their arrival.[3] The four friends stories diverge, after their arrival. Sultana was reported to have died.[4]
Shamima said her friend and her husband were killed by a Russian missile strike.[5] The Independent reported she died in 2016, and that her husband had been killed in an earlier airstrike in 2015.[4] They described him as an American of Somali origin.
Her family said she had told them she had grown disenchanted with the Daesh regime, wanted to defect, but was prevented from doing so because of Daesh's scrutiny.[5] They thought consideration should be given to the possibilty that Daesh officials executed her for disloyalty.
References
- ↑ "London schoolgirl who travelled to Syria to join IS 'feared dead'". BBC News. 2016-08-12. https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-37053699. Retrieved 2019-03-10. "Mr Akunjee said the teenager had grown disillusioned and wanted to leave IS and return to the UK - but had decided not to risk being captured and facing a "brutal" punishment from the terror group."
- ↑ Chelsea Daymon (2018-09-05). "Alter egos: Misconceptions about religiously radicalized women". War on the rocks. https://warontherocks.com/2018/09/alter-egos-misconceptions-about-religiously-radicalized-women/. Retrieved 2019-03-10. "On February 17, 2015, Sultana and her two school friends from the Bethnal Green Academy, Shamima Begum and Amira Abase, boarded a plane from Gatwick airport to Turkey where they later joined the Islamic State."
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Katrin Bennhold (2015-08-17). "Jihad and Girl Power: How ISIS Lured 3 London Girls". The New York Times (London): p. A1. https://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/18/world/europe/jihad-and-girl-power-how-isis-lured-3-london-teenagers.html. Retrieved 2019-03-10.
- ↑ 4.0 4.1 Katie Forster (2016-08-11). "London schoolgirl who ran away to join Isis ‘killed in air strike in Syria’: Kadiza Sultana fled Britain with Shamima Begum and Amira Abase in February 2015". The Independent. Archived from the original on 2021-12-01. https://web.archive.org/web/20211201105011/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/kadiza-sultana-killed-isis-syria-air-strike-bethnal-green-london-schoolgirl-ran-away-a7185801.html. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
- ↑ 5.0 5.1 Amami Hughes (2019-02-27). "Shamima Begum: What happened to other two girls in Bethnal Green trio that joined ISIS". The Express (UK). https://www.express.co.uk/news/world/1092763/Shamima-begum-what-happened-to-other-girls-Islamic-state-isis-bride-bethnal-green. Retrieved 2019-03-10. "The now 19-year-old said one of the girls, Kadiza Sultana, married an American IS fighter and was killed after her house in Raqqa was bombed."
