SDF try to piece together what happened to ISIS captives

AL-OMAR OIL FIELD, Syria – Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), who are holding thousands of Islamic State (ISIS) members, are trying to piece together a picture of what happened to the people who were held captive by the terror group.

“We rescued some of them, but not many in the past five years,” Redur Khalil, SDF spokesperson and senior official, told Rudaw at the ceremony to mark the territorial defeat of the group’s so-called caliphate on Saturday.

When ISIS swept across northern Iraq in the summer of 2014, they abducted 6,417 Yezidi women and youth. As of early March this year, 3,371 have been rescued and the whereabouts of 3,046 remains unknown, according to figures from the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).

The Yezidis were not the only ones who had their children abducted by the militants and subjected to the group’s brutal ideology. Four Turkmen boys from Tal Afar were among 13 children rescued during the battle to defeat ISIS in Baghouz, eastern Syria this month.

Hope has dwindled for the families who have waited years for news of their missing loved ones as they watched the SDF and the global coalition slowly tighten the noose on ISIS in Syria until their ultimate defeat, announced on Saturday.

Wadiha Ibrahim’s husband, three sons, and one daughter have been missing for more than four and a half years.

“We had hoped they [would] return. We were waiting. But they never returned,” she told Rudaw earlier this month, sitting outside the tent that is her temporary home in a camp in Kurdistan Region’s Duhok province.

The world is also waiting for news of hostages from around the globe who disappeared into the black ISIS void.

There was a brief flicker of hope in January that British journalist John Cantlie might still be alive. Used as a mouthpiece by ISIS, he was last heard from in 2016 until there were rumours he had been spotted in Hajin, Syria in January.

As the battle raged, the SDF said they could not confirm whether hostages like Italian priest Paolo Dall’Oglio or Lebanese journalist Samir Kassab were alive or dead.

The SDF is holding at least 10,000 ISIS jihadists – mainly Iraqis and Syrians as well as foreign fighters. They have also screened tens of thousands of family members of the militants.

“We interrogate [them] about what happened to those they held captive. Where did they go? What is their fate and whereabouts? These investigations continue, but unfortunately, we have not reached a clear result yet,” explained Khalil.

“It is very painful and saddening,” he said.

Reporting by Viviyen Fatah in al-Omar

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