Schoolgirl who ran away to ISIL is feared dead

London "jihadi bride" killed in Raqqa.

Schoolgirl Kadiza Sultana, one of three east London schoolgirls who ran away to join ISIL in Syria, pictured in February 2015. She was fared killed in an air strike in Raqqa, Syria. Photo from MetropoShow more

LONDON // One of three schoolgirls who travelled to an area controlled by ISIL in Syria to become “jihadi brides” is believed to have been killed in an air raid. a lawyer for her family says.

Lawyer Tasnime Akunjee, representing the family of Kadiza Sultana said they had learnt that she died in Raqqa when a bomb dropped by after Russian aircraft hit her home in ISIL stronghold. Her family were informed by other residents in Raqqa and although her death has not been confirmed, they are “devastated,” said Mr Akunjee.

Sultana was 16 when she ran away from her home and family in Bethnal Green, an area of East London with a sizeable Mulim population in February 2015. She was with two friends, Amira Base and Shamima Begum, who were both 15 at the time and who had fallen prey to what has been dubbed “bedroom jihad” whereby young and often educated but impressionable girls are lured to ISIL.

The British trio were captured on CCTV as they went though security at London’s Gatwick airport and became some of the most infamous ISIL recruits. They travelled through Turkey into Syria and Sultana ended up in Raqqa. She married an American national of Somali origin, who was killed last year.

Sultana had abandoned her A level studies after becoming radicalised online but her family in Britain, who made public appeals for her to return, claimed she had soon become disillusioned with life in Syria. Earlier this year, her sister Halima Khanom said, “Things have changed. The way she used to talk about things has totally changed.”

According to her family, Sultana was hoping to leave Syria only a few days before she was killed, but in a telephone call to her sister, which was broadcast by the Uk channel ITV news, she expressed doubts that she would make it.

“I don’t have a good feeling. I feel scared,” she said. “You know the borders are closed right now, so how am I going to get out?”

Straight after the phone call, Ms Khanom said, “She sounds very terrified. She did get very emotional. I don’t think she’s ever made a choice by herself.”

Sultana and the other two teenage girls who ran away with her were schoolmates at Bethnal Green Academy. They are among 800 British people who are thought to have fled the Uk to join ISIL in Syria and Iraq. Mr Akunjee said the only good that could come of Sultana’s death would be as “a testimony for others of the risks of actually going to a war zone, to dissuade people from ever making that choice.”

Sultana’s sister said, “We were expecting this in a way but at least we know she is in a better place.”.

* Associated Press