An Australian teenager who was taken to Syria as a toddler has died after spending greater than three years in a infamous jail for ISIS jihadists in northeast Syria, in keeping with the New York-based group Human Rights Watch.
A authorities official notified the household on Sunday that their son had died in Syria from "unsure causes," HRW mentioned, citing a household consultant.
"We're devastated to study of the passing of our beloved Yusuf Zahab," the household mentioned in an announcement Monday, including that he was a "blissful baby who confirmed care and compassion to these round him."
Born in Sydney, Zahab was solely 11 when he was dropped at Syria by his mother and father in 2015 to affix the group's self-declared Islamic "caliphate."
Zahab's older brother Muhammad — a identified ISIS recruiter — drew a minimum of a dozen members of the family into the group's territory in Syria in these early days, together with the boy's mother and father Hicham and Aminah Zahab, his sister Sumaya and his brother Khaled.
After ISIS was largely defeated in Syria in March 2019, on the age of simply 14, Zahab was separated from his mom and sister and positioned within the Sina'a jail in al-Hasaka, Syria. He would have turned 18 in April of 2023.
The household informed HRW that the boy's father died in a jail for ISIS detainees in 2020, presumably of tuberculosis.
The Sina'a facility, often known as Gweiran jail, is run by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a coalition of largely Kurdish militias that had been backed by the U.S. and different Western governments throughout Syria's vicious civil conflict.
The jail homes 1000's of ISIS detainees who had been scooped up by the Western-backed Syrian rebels within the final months and weeks of the bottom conflict with the Islamic extremist group, together with many Westerners.
In January this 12 months, ISIS cells that had been laying low in Syria staged a fancy assault on the power in a bid to free fellow fighters. The battle in and across the jail lasted weeks and left tons of of guards and detainees lifeless.
Zahab witnessed the assault and despatched an audio recording to HRW describing the carnage - and pleading for assist.
"My buddies acquired killed in entrance of me, a 14-year-old, a 15-year-old. I stored operating, however I acquired injured in my head and my hand. I misplaced a whole lot of blood," he says within the audio, which was transcribed however not launched by HRW. "I noticed a whole lot of our bodies, lifeless our bodies, and there is a whole lot of injured folks screaming from ache."
"There is not any medical doctors right here, there is not any one who can assist me. I am very scared. I need assistance. Please," he pleaded in keeping with the rights group.
It isn't clear whether or not Zahab ever acquired any therapy for the accidents he sustained, which he mentioned had been attributable to a U.S. helicopter airstrike on the jail. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby confirmed on the time that the U.S.-led coalition in Syria had "offered some airstrikes to assist them [SDF] as they cope with this jail break."
HRW affiliate disaster and battle director Letta Tayler mentioned Monday that Zahab's household, who lobbied for years to ger him introduced again to Australia, "deserves solutions" on how and when their son died and what grew to become of his stays.
Of their assertion, offered by a consultant, the household mentioned they had been "heartbroken and offended," and urged the present Australian Authorities to behave swiftly to repatriate the remaining Australian girls and youngsters nonetheless stranded in Syria.
"Please act earlier than one other life is misplaced," the assertion mentioned.
"The Australian authorities stays deeply involved in regards to the scenario of Australians in north-east Syria, together with the welfare of these detained in prisons and different detention facilities," a international division consultant mentioned in an announcement.
CBS Information senior international correspondent Holly Williams visited the jail in 2019 and located it bursting on the seams with international ISIS fighters, together with 22-year-old Abdelhamid Al-Madioum, from Minneapolis. Whereas CBS Information couldn't independently confirm his story, he informed Williams he'd been recruited to ISIS by a contact on Twitter and was then bombarded with ISIS propaganda movies claiming that ISIS was serving to Muslims.
Like many within the jail, he claimed he was by no means an ISIS fighter, however was as a substitute a sufferer himself of the group's lies. He mentioned he misplaced an arm in a U.S. airstrike. Williams noticed many others on the jail with horrible accidents, together with some kids.
All of them, she mentioned, had been determined to get again to their residence nations, however few international locations, together with the U.S. and Australia, have repatriated many ISIS detainees in any respect, even to face justice again residence.
The SDF is believed to be holding between 69 and 80 Australian nationals, together with 19 girls and 39 kids.
The earlier Australian authorities repatriated solely eight residents in 2019, all unaccompanied kids.
"Tragically, the reported demise of teenage Yusuf Zahab ought to be no shock to Australia and different governments which have outsourced accountability for his or her nationals held in horrific situations in northeast Syria," mentioned Tayler of HRW.
HRW says greater than 41,000 folks from dozens of nations have been held for a number of years "in life-threatening and infrequently inhuman situations in camps and prisons by authorities in northeast Syria."
In line with the rights group, lots of these detainees are kids beneath the age of 12, and none have been given an opportunity in a court docket to argue for his or her launch or repatriation.