Will avenge Muslims killed in J&K, Gujarat: Kerala youth who joined ISIS

Mumbai: In a message to his family, Mohammad Marwan one of the 15 Kerala youths who allegedly traveled to Syria to join the Islamic State has reportedly confirmed that he is in ISIS territory, and added that he would come back only after he "finishes work with IS to help the persecuted Muslims in Kashmir, Gujarat and Muzaffarnagar".

Asserting that he was not influenced by anyone to take up the journey, he explained that he was fully aware of what he was doing. “No one has brainwashed me and recruited me to IS. I decided to leave for fighting for Islam after reading news about the developments in the Islamic State," he said.

Marwan communicated with his family using the communication app Telegram, towards the last days of June.

"Here, Muslims, including little children, are killed in the bomb attack by the US and Russian forces. How can I sit comfortably at home when the Muslim ummah (community) is attacked," he wrote. “People may call me a terrorist. If fighting in the path of Allah is terrorism, yes I am a terrorist," he added.

Read: Kerala youth joins ISIS, tells parents 'won't return from abode of Allah'

Talking about the scenario in Syria, Marwan details, “things are in bad shape in IS-controlled areas. You have facilities like palatial houses, fridge and car, but see the condition of the Muslims here. Here, they don't have even have electricity as the enemies of Islam have blocked everything. However, the people are contended and happy as they believe that Allah is with them… Right now it is a 24-hour war here."

Claiming that he would be hailed as a martyr in afterlife if he were to die in the battlefield, Marwan wrote, "The martyr who died fighting for Islam has the privilege of recommending 70 persons from family to the other world.”

Earlier, Ijas Muhammad, a physician and native of Kasargode in northern Kerala, another one of the 15 member group believed to have travelled to join the ISIS, sent an audio message to his parents, telling them not to look for him as he had ‘reached his destination’.

At least 8 of the missing 15 have slipped out from Bengaluru and Mengaluru airports in neighbouring Karnataka. Among them were two women in advanced stages of pregnancy.

Police suspect the role of Salafi groups in radicalising these people. “Most of them are inspired by Wahabism. The IS too is driven by the same principles,” said a Muslim reformist in Kozhikode who did not want to be named.