Islamic State forces young Iraqi boys to ‘practise beheadings on dolls’

Across territory in Iraq and Syria held by the Islamic State group, the extremists are recruiting teens and children using gifts, threats and brainwashing.

The children had all been shown videos of beheadings and told by their trainers with the Islamic State group that they would perform one someday. First, they had to practice.

One of the captives, 14-year-old Yahya, as they called him, managed to escape and talled about everything that was going on in the camp, ‘they taught me how to hold the sword, and they told me how to hit. “They told me it was the head of the infidels”, the boy, renamed Yahya by his captors, said last week in northern Iraq, where he fled after escaping the training camp.

The ISIS is indoctrinating, re-educating dozens of young Yazidi boys, captured from northern Iraq, after forcing them to convert to Islam, as part of a concerted effort to build a new generation of militants. The boys were given Muslim Arabic names to replace their Kurdish-language names. They showed him how to shoot someone from close range.

The group has reportedly “given up” on turning adults into jihadis and have instead focused on turning out a new generation of “Ashbal”, or “lion cubs” in Arabic.

At the training camps, the children learn to fire live ammunition, fight in battles and to drive, it said. They hold outdoor events for children, distributing soft drinks and candy – and propaganda.

In an Isis video released last week, a boy was shown beheading a Syrian soldier under adult supervision.

Earlier this month, a video thought to be filmed in May made headlines for its chilling content: 25 young teenage soldiers shooting 25 Syrian soldiers in front of a crowd of hundreds of people. At least 52 were killed, including eight who blew themselves up in suicide attacks, the organization said.

“When a child reaches the point of becoming a suicide bomber, this means that he’s been completely brainwashed”, Abdel Rahman told AFP. Bit by bit, the idea of jihad as a duty is drilled into young minds. The children belonging to these groups are sent to mosques, public areas and schools for training.

“America is the head of the infidels, atheism and the central base of corruption and moral decay – it is the land of shame, crime, filth, and evil”, the book says. “This is what they teach” – and he moved his hand sharply across his throat. Yahya told the AP the three of them left for Minbaj and found shelter “with a Russian IS fighter”. A deal struck, they met the uncle in Turkey then went to the Iraqi Kurdish city of Dohuk.

Another young boy who spent time in an IS training camp previous year before eventually being pulled out of the camp by his father told CNN that he and the other boys were forced to watch disturbing acts of violence, including the crucifixion of a young man who did not fast for Ramadan and the stoning of a woman who committed adultery. “I knew I wouldn’t be able to behead someone like that”.

“I was scared when I saw that”.