This post is also available in:
العربية
ISIS utilizes terror against civilians living in its held areas as a way to maintain its control.Rassif 22 contacted some correspondents and activists of Deir Ezzor24, who are working on a list about a number of weird punishments applied to Syrian civilians living under ISIS control.
1.How does ISIS force civilians to pray during Friday congregational prayer?
In August 2015, ISIS noticed the absence of many male civilians during a Friday congregational prayer in the village of al Ibriha in the eastern countryside of Deir Ezzor. After that, ISIS Hisbah(religious police) fired bullets in the air as they were circling around the village, which frightened the civilians who later went out of their homes to understand what had happened, then ISIS approached them and arrested all the men among them (they were 70).
2.Spying on women in their homes
In August 2015, a group of ISIS Hisbah, in the village of Al-Tayana in eastern rural Deir Ezzor, passed by a woman who was cleaning the yard of her home. After that, they came to her door and took her husband and forced him to dig trenches for the group in the vicinity of the Deir Ezzor military airport under charges that her wife does not wear Islamic clothing when she sits in the yard, exposing her beauty to the passersby.
3. A man lashed after a conversation with his fiancée
In August 2015, ISIS detained a civilian named Ahmed after a conversation with his fiancé, who lives in Turkey, on his mobile phone.ISIS was not convinced enough that she was his fiancée, despite the fact that Ahmed persisted on contacting her and his families to understand the situation. ISIS members claimed that he spoke to a “foreign girl”, and as a result, Ahmed was sentenced to a number of lashes.
4. She was charged with immorality after speaking to her husband who lives abroad.
In September 2015, ISIS raided one of the women-only internet cafes in the town of Albu Layl, in eastern rural Deir Ezzor. After that, two ISIS members, one of them was a Tunisian national, inspected the mobile phone of a woman, who was communicating with her husband.
The ISIS members told the woman off after they saw a picture of her underwear, which she sent to her husband. Consequently, she became angry and screamed in their faces, telling them it is none of their business to touch a private mobile phone. The Tunisian ISIS member replied that he is invincible, as he believes in the ideology of the Islamic state. They let her go after being warned not to return to the internet café.
5. She was executed after speaking to her brother
In September 2015, an ISIS patrol arrested a 22 years old girl in rural Deir Ezzor on charges of speaking to her brother who is a member of the FSA factions fighting against ISIS in rural Damascus. Speaking to anti-ISIS rebels is an act of apostasy, according to the group, consequently, the girl was executed and her body was not handed over to her family because she was considered apostate and ISIS not only does not hand over the bodies of apostates to their families but also it does not allow them to get buried in Islamic cemeteries .
6. Forcing girls to buy double-layered veils
After a girl, who was accompanied with her brother, returned from Damascus to the city of Al Mayadin, one of ISIS strongholds in rural Deir Ezzor, an ISIS Hisbah’s member along with his wife, who is also a Hisbah member, took the girl to the headquarter of ISIS Hisbah in the city. In the beginning, the girl thought that the reason of her arrest was that her brother wore a jean, as she wears hijab, which is acceptable. After that, it turned out that she was arrested because she does not wear the double-layered veil imposed by ISIS, and therefore, the girl was forced to buy one for herself. The price of the double-layered veil is 2500 Syrian liras (7 dollars).
7. A man sentenced to 1500 lashes after helping an elderly
ISIS arrested a civilian from the village of Al-Junayna in western rural Deir Ezzor, under charge of helping one of his relatives, an old woman, to escape the besieged Al-Jawra neighborhood in Deir Ezzor. Being a member of her family does not permit the man to approach the old woman, according to ISIS. On top of that, the man was sentenced to 1500 lashes
8.Charges of growing nails and hair armpit
In August 2015, a number of teenagers, wearing shorts, were standing near the Euphrates River when ISIS arrested them under charges of growing their hair armpit and nails. They were forced to dig trenches for ISIS near the military airport in Deir Ezzor as a punishment.
9. Executing a Kurdish guy because of a Kurdish flag in his mobile
On 22 December 2015, ISIS executed a 13 years-old Kurdish boy, Simand Ali Othman, after being arrested in one ISIS-run internet cafes in the town of Al-Sur in rural Deir Ezzor.After inspecting his cell phone and noticing a conversation with his uncle, who has the KRG flag on his WhatsApp profile picture as he lives in the Kurdistan region of Iraq, the 13 years old boy was accused of cooperation with the Kurdish armed forces. As a result, he was executed in the market square near the shop of his father, who had a heart attack and was taken to the hospital, in the town.
10. Wearing a high heel during her son’s marriage party was considered a violation
ISIS women police (Hisbah) raided a marriage party in the town of al Khasham in rural Deir Ezzor in June 2015, and imposed a fee of 25 Syrian liras upon the family of the groom under charges that his mother wore a high heel during the party.
