BEING escorted around the desolate and foreboding al-Roj camp in northern Syria, filmmaker Alan Duncan is led into a tented off courtyard – the home of notorious ISIS bride Shamima Begum.
He is then starts to ask a question before being told to “get the f*** out” in a spikey interaction that Duncan says shows the face of the “real” Shamima.
GettyShamima Begum fled the UK when she was 15 to join ISIS – now she wants to come home[/caption]
Daily ExpressBegum walked out of an interview with a British newspaper[/caption]
Former soldier Alan Duncan has interviewed Begum three times and has never been taken in by her quest for pityJAMES GLOSSOP/THE TIMES
AFPKurdish fighters act as jailers at the camps of ISIS fighters and the families in Syria[/caption]
Duncan – an ex-squaddie turned documentarian – has tried to interview the infamous ISIS bride three times.
And all three times she has angrily refused, twice with her telling him to “eff off”.
But there are few people who have visited the camps of al-Hol and al-Roj in Syria more than Duncan.
The two sprawling sites hold nearly 60,000 refugees, including ISIS fighters, families, children and at least 6,000 Westerners – including Begum.
The now 26-year-old fled London aged 15 to join the bloodthirsty cult a decade ago – and has been repeatedly refused in her pleading requests to come home.
Duncan – who previously fought against ISIS as part of the Kurdish Peshmarga – has visited the camps at least 40 times since 2019.
His most recent visit was last Christmas, where he provided a chilling dispatch to The Sun about the rampant radicalisation infecting the camps – especially the children.
But still one of the most memorable moments was his interaction with Begum – who broke cover again this week, once again refusing an interview from a British journalist in a testy exchange.
On meeting her on Christmas Day last year, Duncan asked if she missed life in the UK and she told him to “get the f** out”.
Duncan – who has also interviewed Begum’s husband Yago Riedijk and multiple witnesses who have ID’d the bride as being intimately involved with ISIS’s vile crimes – says he is not surprised.
And in no uncertain terms, he told The Sun: “Shamima is not a victim – she is a perpetrator.”
Begum has claimed she was a stay-at-home housewife while living under ISIS – but others have claimed she was a member of the jihadi terror group’s “morality police“.
Duncan, 58, told The Sun: “Of course they (the Express) got nothing from her, she will only agree to an interview if it is all pre-agreed beforehand with pre-loaded questions and answers.
“Again we saw a tiny side of the real her – without her being able to put on the ‘pity me, I’m an innocent kid’ act.”
Alan now uses his camera to expose ISIS’ crimes
Fanatic ISIS brides during the height of the evil caliphate
He added: “We know she was involved in ISIS training camps, her friends were selling Yazidi women and children, and her husband confirmed she was getting a wage from ISIS – which you don’t get if you were sitting around as a ‘housewife’ like she claims.”
Begum last openly spoke in a controversial BBC podcast and documentary in 2023 – which sparked backlash.
Duncan was also told to “f*** off” by Shamima back in 2021 when he approached her at the camp.
He told her he had spoken to her husband Riedijk – and she quickly cursed at him.
“It would show you can join the most evil terrorist organisation in the world – and be rewarded by coming back to Britain
Alan Duncan
Duncan also knows the American ISIS bride seen with Begum during her most recent appearance, Hoda Muthana.
Hoda, now 30, left her home in Alabama to join ISIS in 2014 – using the money her parents had given her to go to university to pay for her travel to Syria.
She married an Australian ISIS fighter – and Donald Trump withdrew her citizenship in 2019.
Begum has worked to reinvent herself since first being rediscovered in SyriaBBC
AFPPictured on CCTV has she fled the UK to join ISIS[/caption]
AP:Associated PressHer friend Hoda Muthana fled the US to join ISIS[/caption]
Duncan said she and Shamima are the “best of friends” – and added: “She actually comes across as quite nice.”
The filmmaker explained what would have gone wrong in the most recent interview with Begum, explaining that when journalists visit the camp they can ask for specific residents who the guards will then go fetch.
“If she had been told it was for the press, I can guarantee that she wouldn’t have even gone to the office,” Duncan told The Sun.
“She is very media savvy.”
Duncan’s interview with Begum’s husband Yago saw him admit that they both received “salaries” from ISIS – which were only given to people actively working for the terror group.
Suicide belts and shotguns
And separate testimony obtained by Duncan and shared with The Sun saw one former slave – named only as Dila – reveal how Shamima was pals with a slave master who oversaw the kidnap and rape of girls as young as 14.
Dila – a Yazidi woman – also revealed how she saw Begum at a terror training camp in Deir ez-Zor, Syria, were fighters we taunt how to use weapons such as shotguns and make suicide belts.
Begum fled her Bethanal Green home with two friends to join ISIS back in 2015 as the horrifying cult was surging across the Middle East.
Seizing huge swathes of Iraq and Syria, the group brutalised its victims and imposed an ultra-strict and barbaric version of Islam.
Snuff films of their atrocities – such as beheadings and ritual burnings – horrified the world. And yet Begum and pals signed up.
APSprawling camps of al-Roj and al-Hol have an uncertain future[/caption]
AFPWomen and children stand in a queue in al-Hol[/caption]
AFPSpecial forces from the Kurdish militias keep watch on the camps[/caption]
AFPAt least 60,000 people currently are held at the two sites[/caption]
She was discovered alive by the journalist Anthony Lloyd in the detention camp al-Hawl in norther Syria – before being moved to al-Roj.
Begum was stripped of her British citizenship back in 2019 by the Conservative government.
She has tried to reinvent herself and gone on a charm offensive – but has lost every legal appeal against the decision.
Begum has previously bragged severed heads do not phase her – but has also pleaded for “forgiveness” from the UK.
Her lawyers plan to take her case to the European Court of Human Rights.
Reform leader Nigel Farage earlier this year suggested that the UK should consider allowing Begum back home.
“I don’t classify her as an all-out ISIS killer”, he told ITV.
And meanwhile, US President Donald Trump’s terror chief Sebastian Gorka threatened that anyone who wants to be a “serious ally and friend” of the US should repatriate members of ISIS still in the Middle East.
AlamyNigel Farage suggested Shamima Begum could come home to the UK[/caption]
FacebookDonald Trump’s terror advisor Sebastian Gorka also said countries must take back ISIS fighters[/caption]
Duncan said Farage was “well off the mark” – and warned if she is repatriated she may never face justice.
He told The Sun: “It would show you can join the most evil terrorist organisation in the world – and be rewarded by coming back to Britain.
“It would embolden jihadists in Britain, she would become a poster girl – and I don’t feel like she can be deradicalised now.”
Duncan pointed to the the case of Samia Hussein – a remorseless bride who said the kids killed in the Manchester Arena bombing were “victims of war” before she was allowed to return to the UK.
She was given a new prosthetic arm on the NHS, a £500,000 council house, and has never been charged over her links to ISIS.
At least 400 people who fought with ISIS have returned to the UK without facing prosecution, according to a report by Parliament‘s Joint Committee on Human Rights.
But many more could return if pressure is ramped up by the US for countries such as the UK to take back their fighters.
Al-Roj and al-Hol camps in northern Syria are stark detention centres with the once US-backed Kurdish forces now acting as their defacto jailers.
But the camps are increasingly running on a skeleton crew – especially following aid cuts by the US.
Al-Roj is home to women and children who were family members of ISIS fighters who slaughtered their way across the Middle East, while the much larger al-Hol also holds mostly males.
Andy Bush – The SunAlan Duncan fought a sniper with the Kurds against ISIS[/caption]
Firebombs & cutthroat kids – inside the ISIS camps
By Henry Holloway & Alan Ducan
A CHILD no older than eight draws his hand across his neck in a chilling throat-slitting gesture – the message is clear, “You are not welcome here”.
Other kids hurl stones, shout and scream – while one exasperated camp official shows us CCTV of two youngsters hurling a firebomb.
Welcome to camps al-Hol and al-Roj in northern Syria – the fates of which remain uncertain after the fall of tyrant Bashar al-Assad.
It is warned these stark detention centres are now the breeding ground for the next generation of the bloodthirsty cult.
And much of this new wave of radicalisation is feared to be coming from the mothers inside the camps.
Senior camp official Rashid Omer said: “The reality is – they are not changing. This is not a normal camp – this a bomb.”
He went on: “They are saying it was ISIS who ‘liberated’ Damascus – and soon they will be coming here.”
“And then they want to spread to Europe, to Africa, and then to everywhere.”
The two sprawling sites hold a total of nearly 60,000 including ISIS fighters, families and children.
At least 6,000 Westerners are still held among them – including infamous jihadi bride Shamima Begum, the 25-year-old from London.
Begum was originally in al-Hol, before being moved to al-Roj.
Extremism is warned to be fomenting again – including the return of disturbing practices such as child marriages.
There is a brainwashed generation being raised who have known nothing beyond the twisted rule and warped education of ISIS.
Our exclusive video shows the camps beneath the clear and cold Syrian skies in late December.
READ MORE HERE
Duncan recalls seeing a burned out tent with three children and their mother burned alive.
And while he said al-Hol has always been a tinderbox, al-Roj is becoming increasingly dangerous.
He said: “The kids are running riot now – and it is extremism being taught by the mothers.”
Video he took of the camp showing children hurling firebombs and threatening him with cutthroat gestures was revealed by The Sun earlier this year.
Duncan, from northeast Scotland, has been recording testimonies of both victims and perpetrators since the death cult was defeated in 2019.
He formerly served with the Queen’s Own Highlanders and Royal Irish Regiment.
The Scot then fought alongside the Kurdish Peshmergas as a sniper to battle against ISIS.
And after the war was over, he decided to use his camera as his new weapon in exposing the depravity of the jihadi cult’s crimes.
His most famous story was the rescue of Naveen Rasho – a Yazidi woman who was held as a slave by ISIS in Syria.
One of Naveen’s captors – an ISIS bride known as Nadine K – has since been jailed in Germany for her role in the genocide.
His full documentary on Naveen’s ordeal can viewed on Vimeo.
News Group Newspapers LtdThe Sun has been leading the charge on reporting on Shamima Begum[/caption] Published: [#item_custom_pubDate]
