It's emerged that around 60 UK women have fled to Syria on jihad, and are running a state militia intent on punishing women for what they perceive as 'un-islamic' behaviour. Among the key figures of this state-run police force is 20 year-old Aqsa Mahmood, who left Glasgow for Syria last year.
The force, known as Al-Khanssaa, are said to be operating in the Syrian capital of Raqqa, and sees the recruits walking the streets to pick out those engaging in western behaviour – experts have speculated that, since there are only 500 or so British jihadis over there, the women will be moving in the same circles as those responsible for the beheading of James Foley and Steven Sotloff. The average age of recruits is 18–24 years old.
British women, such as Mahmood, are being given authoratitive roles within Al-Khanssaa because they appear to be the most committed of the jihadists; academics at the International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation at King's College London have said they've seen 'a big uptake' in the number of UK women going abroad to fight.
A video, showing female IS fighters being trained, was recently released and one of the British women who has fled to Syria – Muslim convert Sally Jones, aged 45 and originally from Kent – has ranted online about wanting to behead Christians with a 'blunt knife.'
'We think it’s a mixture of British and French women, but its social media accounts are run by the British and they're written in English,' says Melanie Smith, a research associate at King's. The women are using social media to boast about their Al Khanssaa activities, or express their interest in joining the police force (as well as posting cute pictures of cats, which is just as eerily disturbing); The Mirror recently reported on Khadijah Dare, a 22 year-old woman from Lewisham in London, who regularly posts photos of beheaded men on railings to Twitter. Also, a member known as Umm Farriss posted a photo of herself wearing a suicide bomb, and others have been known to use Askfm to contact their friends back home and discuss what life is really like in Syria.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.