For Syrians still stuck in the once-thriving city of Raqqa, life
under the thumb of the black-clad Islamic State thugs who patrol the
caliphate’s unofficial capital has become a bleak tableau of misery and
deprivation.
The 2,300-year-old city on the bank of the Euphrates has been ruled by Greeks, Romans, Bedouins and Ottomans, but the Islamist marauders who currently hold power have plunged it into an era of medieval darkness, where children are forced to donate blood and death sentences are meted out in the mosques where the city’s 220,000 residents once worshipped freely, say stranded residents. A daring network of activists still trapped in the city are risking their lives to get their desperate message out to the world in the hope that their city might one day be reclaimed from the grip of merciless jihadists.
“ISIS tries to scare us with constant death threats, but we are no longer afraid, we have become accustomed to death,” Abu Ibrahim RaqqAwi, the pseudonym of a lifelong Raqqa resident who in April, 2014, founded the activist campaign “Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently,” told FoxNews.com by email. “Prices are high, there is little water or electricity. There are no schools or universities. There is nothing important for us to do.”
One Raqqa is being Slaughtered Silently who fled to Greece through Turkey told FoxNews.com he witnessed children being recruited as ISIS soldiers, with the approval of their desperate parents, who were promised money. He said the terror group instead sent the kids on suicide bombing missions, after telling them they would go to paradise.
Drinking and smoking – including the Middle Eastern tradition of hookah – are banned in Raqqa, according to RaqqAwi. Prices for basic goods continue to skyrocket as the local economy teeters on the brink of total collapse. Streets are buried in garbage and sewage, and most public institutions are no longer functioning. Islamic State enforcers patrol the streets hounding citizens and hunting RaqqAwi and his cohorts. Anyone seen with a camera – and the ability to convey life inside Raqqa to the outside world – faces amputation of limbs or even execution on the spot at the hands of ISIS, or Daesh, as it is referred to in Syria and Iraq, he said.
“ISIS has issued death sentences in our names at the mosques, accused us of blasphemy and have said that we are apostates from our religion and that we must therefore be killed,” he said. “They’re calling for our blood to be spilled in the streets just because we highlight their injustice and criminality. Anyone who fights the Daesh or is heard talking bad about them will immediately be killed.”
Always predominantly Muslim, Raqqa is now being forced to live under the terrorist organization’s twisted and unforgiving interpretation of Shariah law. The only non-religious education permitted is in the form of Islamic State’s desperate appeal for doctors to tend to its wounded fighters, RaqqAwi told FoxNews.com. Men and women between 18 and 30 are forced to study medicine, and must draw blood from residents -- including children. The medical students must also treat Islamic State fighters wounded in battles with soldiers from the regime of President Bashar Assad, the Free Syrian Army rebels they once fought alongside, or by U.S.-led airstrikes, which continue to pound the region, but have not stemmed the deterioration of conditions in Raqqa.
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The 2,300-year-old city on the bank of the Euphrates has been ruled by Greeks, Romans, Bedouins and Ottomans, but the Islamist marauders who currently hold power have plunged it into an era of medieval darkness, where children are forced to donate blood and death sentences are meted out in the mosques where the city’s 220,000 residents once worshipped freely, say stranded residents. A daring network of activists still trapped in the city are risking their lives to get their desperate message out to the world in the hope that their city might one day be reclaimed from the grip of merciless jihadists.
“ISIS tries to scare us with constant death threats, but we are no longer afraid, we have become accustomed to death,” Abu Ibrahim RaqqAwi, the pseudonym of a lifelong Raqqa resident who in April, 2014, founded the activist campaign “Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently,” told FoxNews.com by email. “Prices are high, there is little water or electricity. There are no schools or universities. There is nothing important for us to do.”
"They’re calling for our blood to be spilled in the streets just because we highlight their injustice and criminality."- Abu Ibrahim RaqqAwi, Raqqa is being Slaughtered SilentlyWith international journalists unable to cover events in Raqqa, RaqqAwi's group has sought to expose the horrors imposed by ISIS and counter claims that citizens welcome their new de facto government. The group has published first hand accounts, videos and photos from inside Raqqa through its and social media, at great peril to members. The campaign has also included tagging city walls with anti-ISIS graffiti and distributing leaflets, but much of the effort has been stamped out by the terrorist army and several members of the group have fled the city, he said.
One Raqqa is being Slaughtered Silently who fled to Greece through Turkey told FoxNews.com he witnessed children being recruited as ISIS soldiers, with the approval of their desperate parents, who were promised money. He said the terror group instead sent the kids on suicide bombing missions, after telling them they would go to paradise.
Drinking and smoking – including the Middle Eastern tradition of hookah – are banned in Raqqa, according to RaqqAwi. Prices for basic goods continue to skyrocket as the local economy teeters on the brink of total collapse. Streets are buried in garbage and sewage, and most public institutions are no longer functioning. Islamic State enforcers patrol the streets hounding citizens and hunting RaqqAwi and his cohorts. Anyone seen with a camera – and the ability to convey life inside Raqqa to the outside world – faces amputation of limbs or even execution on the spot at the hands of ISIS, or Daesh, as it is referred to in Syria and Iraq, he said.
“ISIS has issued death sentences in our names at the mosques, accused us of blasphemy and have said that we are apostates from our religion and that we must therefore be killed,” he said. “They’re calling for our blood to be spilled in the streets just because we highlight their injustice and criminality. Anyone who fights the Daesh or is heard talking bad about them will immediately be killed.”
Always predominantly Muslim, Raqqa is now being forced to live under the terrorist organization’s twisted and unforgiving interpretation of Shariah law. The only non-religious education permitted is in the form of Islamic State’s desperate appeal for doctors to tend to its wounded fighters, RaqqAwi told FoxNews.com. Men and women between 18 and 30 are forced to study medicine, and must draw blood from residents -- including children. The medical students must also treat Islamic State fighters wounded in battles with soldiers from the regime of President Bashar Assad, the Free Syrian Army rebels they once fought alongside, or by U.S.-led airstrikes, which continue to pound the region, but have not stemmed the deterioration of conditions in Raqqa.
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