The bodies of two Egyptian girls were discovered at the al-Hol detention camp that houses people linked to the Islamic State (ISIL) in northeastern Syria, according to local Kurdish security forces that run the facility. “The bodies of two Egyptian girls were found in the sewage” in the camp, a Kurdish security source told AFP news agency on Tuesday, November 15, requesting anonymity. Another camp official, who also asked to remain anonymous because of retaliation, said the decapitated girls were ages 11 and 13, the Associated Press news agency reported. Syamad Ali, an official with the Kurdish-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, confirmed the killings. The overcrowded camp in northeastern Syria is home to more than 50,000 people, including relatives of suspected Islamic State fighters, as well as displaced Syrian and Iraqi refugees. The killings are the first since US-backed Syrian fighters completed a 24-day sweep of al-Hol in mid-September in which dozens of people were arrested and weapons seized in the operation. The operation took place after crimes inside the camp. After the rise of ISIL in 2014 and the declaration of a so-called Islamic caliphate in parts of Syria and Iraq, thousands of men and women came from all over the world to join the extremist group. Islamic State lost the last piece of land it once controlled in eastern Syria in March 2019, but its cells have since been blamed for deadly attacks in Syria and Iraq.
“Terrified”
The International Rescue Committee (IRC) said it was “appalled” by the killing of the girls. “This latest incident of child deaths in the camp highlights the urgent need for longer-term solutions for children in al-Hol,” said Tanya Evans, IRC country director for Syria. Earlier this month, Doctors Without Borders (Doctors Without Borders) compared the fate of the thousands of children living in al-Hol to being in “a giant open-air prison”. Children make up 64 percent of the camp’s residents, and half are under the age of 12, according to MSF. Kurdish authorities have repeatedly called on foreign countries to repatriate their citizens from Syria’s overcrowded camps. However, most have done so only sporadically, fearing security threats and a domestic political backlash.
