Tunisia Shuts Down Jihadi Wife Recruitment Cell

REUTERS/TOUSSAINT KLUITERS
REUTERS/TOUSSAINT KLUITERS

The Tunisian government shut down a jihadist cell that recruited females to marry terrorists in Syria.

Authorities arrested four people but did not specify when they raided the Sunni Muslim network. Those arrested reportedly recruited “young people, especially girls, to send them to conflict zones for marriage to terrorist elements there.”

In 2013, a Wahhabi edict asked Sunni women to offer themselves as comfort women “to boost the morale of fighters” in Syria who fight against President Bashar al-Assad. Many women from Tunisia traveled to Syria in the name of sexual jihad after the fatwas were issued. Wahhabism is a conservative school of Islam, in which there are some who view jihad al-nikah as a legitimate form of holy war. Some of the fatwas on the Internet called on women as young as 14 years old to help those fighting the war.

Interior Minister Lofti Bin Jeddo demanded better border control to stop people from leaving:

Tunisian newspapers reported that a young Tunisian man divorced his wife, and that they both headed to Syria almost a month ago to “allow her to engage in sexual jihad with the mujahideen” there.

This report followed earlier ones of a video widely circulated on the internet and social websites in Tunisia shows the parents of a veiled girl called Rahmah, 17.

They said Rahmahat disappeared from home one morning and they “later learned that she had headed to Syria to carry out sexual jihad.”

The young girl has since returned to her family, who have kept her out of sight, and said that their daughter is not a religious fanatic “but was influenced by her fellow students who are known for their affiliation with the jihadist Salafist.”

Her parents said these fellow students may have brainwashed her and convinced her to travel to Syria “to support the mujahideen there.”

The Tunisian Interior Ministry stated that not many Tunisian women traveled abroad to participate in “sexual jihad.”

“At most about 15 Tunisian women went to Syria, most to care for fighters or to do social work,” explained the official.

A year later, sexual jihad became more prominent with the rise of the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL). Records show that Australian, British, and Malaysian women have traveled to Iraq and Syria to participate in jihad al-nikah, or sexual jihad, for the Islamic State (ISIS) terrorists. They intend to become comfort women for the jihadists as the men continue to establish a caliphate in Iraq and Syria.

“These women are believed to have offered themselves in sexual comfort roles to ISIS fighters who are attempting to establish Islamic rule in the Middle East,” said one source in Malaysia, adding, “This concept may seem controversial but it has arisen as certain Muslim women here are showing sympathy for the ISIS struggle.”

“Checks with our foreign counterparts and intelligence disseminated reveal that there may be up to 50 Malaysians in the Middle East,” he said.

ISIS, which identifies as Wahhabi, executed its own sexual jihad edict in June after the terrorists took over Mosul, Iraq. Many women were forced into the sexual jihad against their will. The terrorists demanded residents bring all unmarried girls to perform their duty in jihad by providing sex to the militants.

Posters in Mosul read, “We call upon the people of this county to bring their unmarried girls so they can fulfill their duty in sex jihad for their warrior brothers in the city and anyone who will not appear will feel the full force of the sharia [Islamic law] upon him.”

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