Isis brides How women in Syrian camps are marrying for freedom
Hundreds of foreign women with links to Islamic State in Syria’s sprawling al-Hawl detention camp have “married” men they met online, and several hundred have been smuggled out of the facility using cash bribes gifted by their new husbands.
The camp’s inhabitants have been sent payments totalling upwards of $485,000 according to testimony from 50 women inside and outside al-Hawl, local Kurdish officials, a former Isis member in eastern Europe with knowledge of the money transfer network and a foreign fighter in Idlib province involved in smuggling.
The practice is a significant security risk inside Syria and for foreign governments who refuse to take their nationals home – but according to many of those interviewed, getting married is both easy and an increasingly popular escape method.
“Every day
