Mothers Of Muslims Sign On To Fight Against ISIS
Many young Muslims are becoming victim to the lure of violent ideology and vulnerably being led to their deaths by extremist organizations that seem to be above the law and efforts to stop them.
Ibrahim Kamara was fighting for the Islamic extremists in northwest Syria, yet still wanted to desperately reach out to the woman who mattered most to him, his mother. The teenager from Britain recorded a video on his phone, as another jihadi who fought alongside him told the media, yet his mother never saw the video before Ibrahim was killed in an airstrike.
Although lost to and taken by this violent organization, the bond between mother and child continues. This tie is being used as a means to combat radicalization via a course created by Edit Schlaffer, a sociologist from Austria, which is for troubled regions such as Kasmir. It aims to put mothers of extremists and young Muslims at the forefront in the fight against Islamic extremism.
Time shares how the course better enables mothers of young Muslims to curb any draw to extremism.
“On a recent July morning, the first British graduates of the Mothers Schools, which Schlaffer runs through her Vienna-based NGO, Women Without Borders, gathered at the town hall in the city of Luton in England. Over 10 weeks, 45 women had attended sessions on subjects like monitoring internet access, better communicating with teenagers and identifying signs of radicalization in children. ‘We as mothers are so close to our children, we have to bring sense into the world, and we have to start with our children [and] guide them through these troubled times,’ Schlaffer told them. ‘Mothers will make this world safe for us all.'”
Khadijah, the mother of Ibrahim, rode the train from her home in Brighton to attend a session and speak to women about her experience and the anger she felt, along with the denial and hurt produced by her son’s involvement with ISIS and death in Syria. Many mothers in attendance shared that Khadija’s words were a powerful testimony and a stern warning about what may occur if signs of radicalization are ignored in sons and daughters.
Luton Muslim extremists guilty of encouraging young children to support Islamic State, London, England Aug 2016 pic.twitter.com/66auPvBR88
— Cheshire-Life (@UKIPonline) August 17, 2016
Rozina Jarral, 39, attended the course to learn how she could relate better to her 13-year-old son. She commented on how surprising it was to her that ISIS so frequently uses the internet to lure teens and youths.
“It’s been an eye-opener. I didn’t realize about social media and how that could lure children in. What I took away from it was how to create a loving, caring environment at home, to keep the communication going, because when there are arguments at home they will want to go outside, and that is where people could take advantage.”
Schlaffer created the Mothers School course back in 2013 after being involved in a project in Tajikistan, where she was told by many women of their worries over the increasing influence of Wahhabism, which is an extreme branch of Sunni Islam. The course creator then conducted a survey involving 1,000 people to determine how strong an influence a parent can be on youths, and devised the course based on the results of the survey. It was then introduced in Pakistan, India, Indonesia and areas in sub-Saharan Africa. Since its beginnings, 1,500 women have graduated from the course. Schlaffer, however, admits that she never thought there would be a need for such a course in Europe.
Young Muslim calls on police, Nenshi to do more about extremists https://t.co/KTXStFp3Wo
— Sohail Chaudhry (@Sohail_Calgary) August 14, 2016
The publication reminds that Europe is certainly not immune to the effects and forces at work by extremism, sharing that up to “4,294 Europeans have traveled to fight with radical groups in Syria and Iraq, according to the latest figures from the International Centre for Counter-Terrorism in the Hague.” The attacks on Paris, Brussels and in Germany over the past year, have caused a sense of unrest and unease across much of the continent.
Schlaffer comments on the sudden need in Europe for her course.
“We have always worked in countries of crisis and transition, and all of a sudden [we have] this crisis of identity in Europe. [We] are so strategically placed to serve as a buffer between radical influences and those who are targeted.”
Although the course has demonstrated there are very real concerns for mothers of Muslims, it has also become a platform where these women seek to remind that not all Muslims are out to do harm, drawing on the rise of Islamaphobia.
[Featured Image by John Moore/Getty Images]
