PTI
LONDON, MARCH 6
At least 50 British children are living under Islamic State (ISIS) rule in war zones of Syria and Iraq and are in danger of becoming “future terrorists”, a London-based think tank said on Sunday.
Researchers for Quilliam found in their study, to be presented in the British Parliament on Wednesday, that the children are at risk of being indoctrinated by ISIS to become suicide bombers or killers.
The report, endorsed by the United Nations, states: “The organisation focuses a large number of its efforts on indoctrinating children through an extremism-based education curriculum, and fostering them to become future terrorists.
“The current generation of fighters sees these children as better and more lethal fighters than themselves, because rather than being converted into radical ideologies they have been indoctrinated into these extreme values from birth.
“The aim is to prepare a new, stronger, second generation of mujahideen, conditioned and taught to be a future resource for the group.”
According to the ‘Observer’, the report titled ‘Children of Islamic State’ goes onto state that ISIS have studied the Nazis, who created the Hitler Youth movement to brainwash children.
“The area of most concern is that Islamic State is preparing its army by indoctrinating young children in its schools and normalising them to violence through witnessing public executions, watching Islamic State videos in media centres and giving children toy weapons to play with,” the reports says.
Researchers for Quilliam found that children were used extensively in ISIS propaganda between 1 August last year and 9 February this year they identified a total of 254 events or statements featuring images of children to help project the impression of state-building.
ISIS also uses children to try to normalise brutality, with the group encouraging children to hold up decapitated heads or play football with them.
In the past six months Islamic State propaganda has depicted 12 child killers.
ISIS has been quick to seize control of the education system in Syria and Iraq, with indoctrination beginning in schools and intensifying in training camps.
In the camps, children between the ages of 10 and 15 are instructed in Sharia, de-sensitised to violence, and taught specific skills needed to serve the state and take up jihad.
Boys learn a rigid ISIS curriculum, from which drawing, philosophy and social studies described as the “methodology of atheism” have been removed, while girls, known as the “pearls of the caliphate”, are veiled, hidden, confined to the home and taught to look after the men, it said.
The report’s authors recommend the creation of a commission to protect future generations from radical violence and to help monitor and reintegrate children within the European Union who are at risk of radicalisation.
