Motherhood in the Islamic State

Photo: Getty Image

The atrocities perpetrated by ISIS are so vile and disgusting that bloggers are being told they cannot show them. For example, I posted a photo of the Jordanian pilot who was captured by them and was burned alive in a metal cage as he prayed in his last moments.

Hiding the atrocities does no justice to the problems the Islamic State have wreaked in the world. I believe the world needs to be shocked into action, but I also understand how blog providers like Google would have a problem with showing the barbarism.

We know that Hamas uses human shields and fire rockets on Israel from mosques because they know the Western mind has a different sense of morality than they have. They use our humanity to their advantage in war and ISIS has learned from them.

The Islamic State in Mosul, which they labeled their caliphate, is about to be retaken by U.S.-led forces. Some of the enemy fighting to hold the territory are the wives of the jihadis and they apparently are willing to die like their husbands.

Some of these women are mothers.

In a last ditch effort to stop the advance into Mosul by our U.S.-led troops, these mothers are using their own children as human shields. ISIS has sent them out, trapped within the few remaining streets held by the terror group, with their children by their sides in an effort to stop the air strikes and slow the Iraqi troop advance the AP reported.

"The women are fighting with their children right beside them," Lt. Gen. Sami al-Aridi said. "It's making us hesitant to use air strikes to advance--if it weren't for this, we could be finished in just a few hours."

So what do you do if you're a sniper and you spy a woman in a suicide vest as she is holding her child and approaching your men?

The answer is obvious and yes, quite troubling, but you have to pull the trigger.

If we could understand that ISIS and everyone associated with it are the enemy and will do all they can to kill us, we therefore need to understand that even this child will one day grow up with Allah's duty to kill us.

The truth is horrible, but it's the truth.

If there was some way to save the child without putting our allies and ourselves in immediate danger, then it should be done. But saving the child also entails debunking him/her of radical Islam. That must be the long-term goal of all ISIS children who survive.

What kind of mother allows her child to die?

The kind that religiously believes that it's the right thing to do.

And therein lies the problem.

Delays to end the battle in Mosul over the last nine months is very frustrating for Iraqi command. One anonymous commander said that civilian deaths should be acceptable and Iraqi artillery, which doesn't need U.S. approval, should be used to clear the last areas under ISIS control.

"They're all [ISIS], just kill them all," the commander said. "There are civilians there, but they are [ISIS] families."

It's hard to disagree with him when you realize that by not using the firepower you have you put your own troops at much higher risk.

But Aridi said that in spite of the fact that his forces were taking casualties--14 were wounded Thursday--he could not punish a child even if his father was a criminal.

Sounds very nice . . . until the kid's mother kills you and he grows up to kill your kids. Some of the kids are already being taught to behead captors or shoot them in the head in front of a propaganda video camera.

In the last gasp for ISIS, they sent a wave of suicide bombers and female fighters out into the city and elsewhere in Iraq.

Thirty-eight women have already blown themselves up to target civilians and enemy forces in the past month in Mosul. About 20 have done so since Sunday, showing the desperation they have to hold this "religious" caliphate.

War sucks. War is hell. There will be people killed who didn't deserve to die, but neither does U.S.-led forces if it can be avoided.

On July 2nd, at a displacement camp west of Baghdad, a suicide bomber dressed in a hijab mingled with crowds of refugees and then blew him- or herself up, killing 14 and injuring 13 others. 

The bomber's gender couldn't be identified among the dead.

Less than two hours later, a pair of female suicide bombers in Mosul's Old City, got to go to Paradise and watch their husbands take on their 72 virgins each while they served the dead jihadis grapes and naan.

ISIS motherhood therefore is helping your child achieve their place in Paradise. The question remains: do the boys get 72 virgins too?

Yes, the ISIS form of Islam is more like a cartoon . . . but insult it at your own risk. 

By the way, you cannot insult a religion because it has no feelings.

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