Saturday, April 11, 2015

The caliphate's food queues: Hundreds queue for hours as they wait for food in ISIS capital

The caliphate's food queues: Hundreds queue for hours as they wait for food in ISIS capital 


  • Syrians line up despondently in scenes more familiar inside refugee camps
  • Posted by anti-ISIS activist with message: Hunger, poverty, homelessness
  • Syrians persecuted by terror group's warped interpretation of Islamic law

Famished and queuing despondently as far as the eye can see, these images will have the Islamic State's slick propaganda unit spitting feathers.

In scenes more familiar in the most impoverished refugee camps, scores of downtrodden Syrians wait in line for hours for food in the terror group's self-declared capital Raqqa.

It's a far cry from the all-conquering image of prosperity its jihadi PR machine would like the world to believe.

The pictures were posted on Twitter by a member of the anti-ISIS campaign group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently who risk their lives every day by documenting atrocities from inside the city.

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Impoverished: Dozens of Syrians queue for food in the Islamic State's self-declared capital of Raqqa
Downtrodden: In scenes more familiar in the most impoverished refugee camps, the pictures are a far cry from the all-conquering image of prosperity that terror group's slick PR machine would like the world see
Downtrodden: In scenes more familiar in the most impoverished refugee camps, the pictures are a far cry from the all-conquering image of prosperity that terror group's slick PR machine would like the world see

Abu Ibrahim Raqqawi one of the group's founders, wrote the accompanying message: 'Lines waiting for some food. Yes this is the #ISIS State. Hunger, poverty and homelessness.'

For those lucky enough to have a home, he paints a bleak picture of life spent in the dark and cold for hours on end.

'The city suffers from a shortage of electricity where the power goes off for 21 hours in the day,' he wrote in another tweet.

ISIS prides itself on its well-oiled propaganda offensive, pumping out images, videos and even a weekly English-language magazine designed to recruit and radicalise would-be jihadists.

Co-ordinated by its AlHayat Media Centre, the terror group makes extensive use of social media to keep in near-constant contact with supporters in the West - even selling branded merchandise such as T-shirts, baseball caps and cuddly toys. 

But as seen here, that ease of disseminating information can easily backfire. 
Most of the Syrians in this line appear to be woman and children. The pictures were posted on Twitter by the anti-ISIS group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently who risk their lives leaking information from the city
Most of the Syrians in this line appear to be woman and children. The pictures were posted on Twitter by the anti-ISIS group Raqqa is Being Slaughtered Silently who risk their lives leaking information from the city

The food queue pictures emerged days after ISIS took their draconian rule to bizarre new levels by threatening to jail any man caught wearing skinny jeans in an apparent crackdown on hipsters. 

The terror group said it would also imprison anyone caught with music on their mobiles, smoking or turning up late for prayer in the city.

Violators will be jailed for ten days, during which time they will be made to take an 'Islamic course'.

At the end of their prison term, they will be forced to take a test, with those who pass being released immediately. 

Those who don't will be fined and kept in prison until they do.

Other sickening sentences involve people being stoned to death for alleged adultery and thrown off buildings after being accused of being homosexual. 
Bleak picture: Abu Ibrahim Raqqawi one of the group's founders, wrote the accompanying message: 'Lines waiting for some food. Yes this is the #ISIS State. Hunger, poverty and homelessness'
Bleak picture: Abu Ibrahim Raqqawi one of the group's founders, wrote the accompanying message: 'Lines waiting for some food. Yes this is the #ISIS State. Hunger, poverty and homelessness'

One resident, named only as Jassem, told the group how dozens of people had fled the city in the wake of the jihadi network's brutal enforcement of its twisted form of sharia law. 

He said: 'ISIS tightens penalties and uses the principle of intimidation in dealing with public, which led to the migration and escape of many people.  Freedom of expression has become a crime.'

In a separate development, ISIS has announced that all nurses working in areas under their control must speak English - something the NHS still hasn't introduced.
Revealing plans to open a school of nursing in Raqqa, the extremists also disclosed the tough entry requirements for prospective medical workers.

Among them are rules that applicants are no more than 25 years of age, must be willing to work anywhere inside the territory controlled by the extremists, and must speak fluent English.


The latter rule is something that even the NHS has yet fully put in place, with nurses who trained in European countries still able to treat patients without any formal language checks thanks to bureaucratic rules barring the Nursing and Midwifery Council testing EU candidates.







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