Al-Khansaa Brigade

The Al-Khansaa Brigade (Arabic: لواء الخنساء) was an all-women police or religious enforcement unit of the jihadist group Islamic State (IS), operating in its de facto capital of Raqqa and Mosul.[5]

Al-Khansaa Brigade
لواء الخنساء
LeadersFatiha el-Mejjati[1][2]
Dates of operationFebruary 2014[3]– present[4]
Active regionsIslamic State
Size60[3] (2014)
Part of Islamic State

History

The brigade was formed in early 2014 and apparently named after Al-Khansa, a female Arabic poet from the earliest days of Islam, it is unclear how widespread and sustained the group is. It was unique in the Muslim world where in other regimes with similar systems of religious police (such as Saudi Arabia) men enforce hisbah among women, and its lack of spread outside of the capital Raqqa, led at least one observer to wonder if it was a publicity "stunt" that would be “short-lived".[6]

An IS official, Abu Ahmad, said in 2014, "We have established the brigade to raise awareness of our religion among women, and to punish women who do not abide by the law."[7] The outfit has also been called IS's 'moral police'.[6][8]

Women who went out without a male chaperone or were not fully covered in public were subject to arrests and beatings by Al-Khansaa.[6]An example of crimes punished and sentences administered by al-Khansaa were those for two women in Raqqa in 2015, who received 20 lashes for wearing form-fitting abayas, five for wearing makeup underneath their abayas, and another five for "not being meek enough when detained".[9]

The brigade had its own facilities to enforce sex segregation.[6] Its members were aged between 18 and 25, receiving a monthly salary of LS 25,000.[10] According to defectors interviewed by Sky News, al-Khansa Brigade included many foreign women, and recruits were "trained for a month". Their pay is estimated to be "between £70 and £100 [ STG ] per month". Members carried guns and may be fighters (many European women who fight on the front line) or women who "police the streets and look after the city’s affairs" (generally ethnic Arabs).[11] According to one source hostile to IS, women were not allowed to drive cars or carry weapons, but women in the Khansaa Brigade "can do both".[5]

In April 2017 the group released a recruitment video for female hackers claiming to have hacked over 100 social media accounts over the previous month.[12] There have also been reports of infiltration of the group members in Iraqi refugee camps.[13]

See also

References
  1. Mekhennet, Souad; Warrick, Joby (26 November 2017). "The jihadist plan to use women to launch the next incarnation of ISIS". The Washington Post.
  2. "Donald Trump claims Baghdadi's alternative as chief of ISIS has been killed by US troops | Digital Industry Wire". 29 October 2019. Retrieved 2019-10-30.
  3. McKay, Hollie (20 October 2015). "Brutal female police enforce ISIS sharia vision on women of caliphate". Fox News.
  4. Saleh, John. "The Women of ISIS and the Al-Hol Camp". The Washington Institute. Retrieved 2023-04-04.
  5. "How the Islamic State uses women to control women". Syria Direct. 25 March 2015.
  6. Gilsinan, Kathy (25 July 2014). "The ISIS Crackdown on Women, by Women". The Atlantic.
  7. al-Bahri, Ahmad (15 July 2014). "In Raqqa, an All-Female ISIS Brigade Cracks Down on Local Women". Syria Deeply. Archived from the original on 19 April 2016. Retrieved 8 February 2015.
  8. Saleh, John. "The Women of ISIS and the Al-Hol Camp". The Washington Institute. Retrieved 2023-04-04.
  9. Moaveni, Azadeh (21 November 2015). "ISIS Women and Enforcers in Syria Recount Collaboration, Anguish and Escape". The New York Times.
  10. "Al-Khansaa Brigade (Islamic State / IS - Female Unit / ISISF)". Trac. Terrorism Research & Analysis Consortium. Retrieved 29 April 2017.
  11. Elefheriou-Smith, Loulla-Mae (23 September 2015). "Escaped Isis wives describe life in the all-female al-Khansa Brigade who punish women with 40 lashes for wearing wrong clothes". The Independent. Archived from the original on 2015-11-23.
  12. Daftari, Lisa (19 April 2017). "ISIS all-female hacking group looks to recruit more women". The Foreign Desk. Archived from the original on 5 May 2017. Retrieved 29 April 2017.
  13. Brisha, Aly (26 April 2017). "Fear of ISIS female 'biters' haunts women during night at Iraq's camps". Al Arabiya English.
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