'From ISIS With Love' - IS Jihadis get paid honeymoon in Islamic State's 'New York'

'From ISIS With Love' - Islamic State Jihadis get paid honeymoon in Islamic State's 'New York'. (JT).

BEIRUT – The honeymoon was a brief moment for love, away from the front lines of Syria’s war. In the capital of the Islamic State group’s self-proclaimed caliphate, Syrian fighter Abu Bilal al-Homsi was united with his Tunisian bride for the first time after months chatting online. They married, then passed the days dining on grilled meats in Raqqa’s restaurants, strolling along the Euphrates River and eating ice cream.

It was all made possible by the marriage bonus he received from the Islamic State group: $1,500 for him and his wife to get started on a new home, a family — and a honeymoon.

“It has everything one would want for a wedding,” al-Homsi said of Raqqa — a riverside provincial capital that in the 18 months since the extremists took control has seen the beheading of opponents and stoning of accused adulteresses in its main square. Gunmen at checkpoints in the city scrutinize passers-by for signs of anything they see as a violation of Shariah law, as slight as a hint of hair gel or an improperly kept beard. In the homes of some of the group’s commanders in the city are women and girls from the Yazidi religious sect, abducted in Iraq and now kept as sex slaves.

The Islamic State group is notorious for the atrocities it committed as it overran much of Syria and neighboring Iraq. But to its supporters, it is engaged in an ambitious project: building a new nation ruled by what radicals see as “God’s law,” made up of Muslims from around the world whose old nationalities have been erased and who have been united in the caliphate.

To do that, the group has set up a generous welfare system to help settle and create lives for the thousands of jihadis — men and women — who have flocked to Islamic State territory from the Arab world, Europe, Central Asia and the United States. From the day he declared the caliphate last summer, leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi urged not just fighters to come, but also doctors, engineers, administrators and other experts.

“It is not just fighting,” said al-Homsi, who uses a nom de guerre. “There are institutions. There are civilians (that the group) is in charge of, and wide territories . It must help the immigrants marry. These are the components of a state and it must look after its subjects.” Al-Homsi spoke in a series of interviews via Skype, giving a rare look into the personal life of an Islamic State jihadi.

Aymenn al-Tamimi, an expert on insurgent groups, said that when the Islamic State group took Iraq’s second-largest city Mosul last summer, one of the first things militants did was set up an Islamic court — not just to pass sentences under their strict version of Shariah but also “to give official Islamic State approval of marriages.”

The 28-year-old al-Homsi got a particularly large bonus because his marriage, which took place in April, brought in a useful new recruit: His wife, who goes by the nom de guerre of Umm Bilal, is a doctor and speaks four languages. He said she will be of service to the caliphate.

The 24-year-old bride-to-be traveled through Algeria to Turkey, and from there to Raqqa with a group of other women joining the Islamic State. There, they were housed in a guesthouse for women that is also used as the headquarters for the Islamic State’s female police corps known as the Khansa Squad.

“It is a luxury place, with a garden, A/C, nice furniture, like any apartment in Europe” so that immigrants don’t feel estranged, said al-Raqqawi, the anti-Islamic State media activist. Hmmmm......Pitty they blow up so fast. Read the full story here.