In the midst of worldwide heated debate raging across about the fate of returning women and children, the families of individuals who fought among the ranks of ISIS and other terrorist groups in Syria, the International Observatory of Human Rights introduces the story of a London family trying to find their 3-year-old grandson amongst the chaos of the last ISIS stronghold.
Ashfaq (Ash) and Mahfooz Khurshid are a typical British family from the East End of London. Ash works as an acupuncturist and a bus driver, while his wife Mahfooz is a teaching assistant. They were both born in the UK to British-born parents of Pakistani origin. In 2013 their young 18-year-old son, Haroon was studying at Queen Mary University of London, when he abandoned his studies and left for Syria without his parents’ knowledge.
Haroon’s cousin Bilal followed him to Syria a few months later in 2013 but was killed by a barrel bomb in November 2015, leaving a wife and two daughters behind in Syria. In March 2016, after three years fighting in Syria, Haroon became a father with Aisha Razzaq, his Canadian bride, who had also travelled to join a militant group. Baby Salmaan was born in a terrorist cell. A few months later Haroon was shot in the head by a sniper. He was just 21 years old.
Aisha contacted the Khurshid family over social media app Telegram to tell them of Haroon’s death. She remained committed to the cause and wanted to stay in Syria despite the imminent threat to her life, and more worryingly to the life of her child. Aisha remarried another foreign fighter but became a widow for the second time shortly afterwards when her second husband was also killed.
In London, Ash and Mahfooz were suffering with the loss of their son and the knowledge that their grandson was in peril, lost in Syria with a radicalised mother, who would potentially bring him up to be a fighter.
Haroon’s radicalisation in the UK and ACF’s attempts to save him
A local youth centre – the Active Change Foundation (ACF) based in East London, is an organisation that works with young people at risk of being radicalised or engaged in gang activities. The centre, once funded by the UK government, was founded by Hanif Qadir, a former extremist who has conducted cutting edge work and interventions to help young people & families facing difficulties such as the Khurshids. Qadir, and his colleague Mike Jervis, were both working to engage and mentor radicalised boys and young men that were passing through its doors on a daily basis. They met Haroon and had noticed that the company he was keeping was leading him down a dangerous path, yet they continued engaging and mentoring Haroon in the hope he would resist the temptations of his peer group.
Haroon had started visiting the centre, where ACF attempted to engage him in their programmes, but he was constantly pulled back into the extremist crowd – a group of disruptive young men who were known extremists, two of whom were later convicted of terrorism offences.
Mike Jervis revealed to IOHR the details of his attempt to help Haroon:
“We were speaking to Haroon to say, “Look you don’t have to follow these people, they have a very different agenda”. But then it was a short window…and we lost him.”
ACF tried desperately to intervene, aiming to offer Haroon a solid programme of support and rehabilitation, but the strong pull of his peer group was too hard for Haroon to resist and he was never to be seen again at the centre and ended up leaving the UK to go to Syria.
Unfortunately, despite these efforts, Haroon became involved in the hate campaign spewed out onto the streets by Anjem Choudary, a radical preacher from east London, who was sentenced in 2016 to five and a half years in prison for inviting support to the Islamic State. He was released in 2019 after serving less than half of his sentence and will complete the rest under strict supervision. Up to 25 measures to control him have been prepared.
Ash told the IOHR team that he would punch Choudary in the face if he saw him and blames him for his son’s radicalisation. While Haroon’s father is furious at Choudary and his network, his mother Mahfooz seems to have come to peace with her son’s fate.
“My faith is that my son, Haroon, was born and before he was born our God decreed that he would live a certain number of years on this earth. And I can’t blame any human being in this world, for my son leaving this world and passing away.”
Mahfooz Khurshid, Haroon’s mother
According to a Daily Mail report from August 2016, Haroon had allegedly been attending talks by Choudary in London and Luton. Haroon’s father Ash maintains that he feels his son was totally brainwashed by the rhetoric of Choudary and his associates.
In an exclusive IOHR interview, Ash sifted through photos of his son growing up as a playful boy and expressed his regrets for not being there for his son at that time.
“I got disconnected from the family, so the radicalisation phase of life I was not ever aware of…I got to find out from my wife and daughter that he was in Syria.”
Ash Khurshid, Haroon’s father
As Ash was separated from Haroon’s mother at the time, he was then heartbroken to find out from his daughter, that Haroon had travelled to Syria. He was naturally deeply shocked and upset. He could not understand why his son would do something like that, as it is not something that he would have ever agreed with, no matter what.
Haroon’s time in Syria and his death
Haroon left the UK for Syria in 2013 and spent the last 3 years of his life fighting among the ranks of a militant group. Whilst out in Syria, Haroon met and married a Canadian woman named Aisha, who had left Canada for Syria. In March 2016, towards what was to be the end of Haroon’s life, Aisha and Haroon had a child together, a boy, that they named Salmaan. A few months later Haroon was shot dead. While in Syria, Haroon did not make regular contact with his parents and kept a distant relationship. They communicated occasionally through phone calls where he expressed his allegiance to what he viewed as a good cause.
Then one day came the phone call they had dreaded for a long time. Aisha was the first to inform Mahfooz about the death of her son. She began speaking to Mahfooz about how blessed it is to die as a martyr and the heavenly rewards from such a death. Without any warning, Aisha then gave Mahfooz the devastating news that her son had been shot in the head by a sniper while trying to “free a village” and told her that they should be proud of him and the lives he had saved. Inevitably, Mahfooz was heartbroken. She then relayed the news about their son to her husband Ash.
The Aftermath
Aisha kept in touch with Mahfooz saying that if the parents wanted to see their grandson then they must join her in Syria. However, with persistent support from ACF the couple kept their distance, but at the same time they began trying to build a friendship with Aisha for the sake of their grandson, and their desperate desire to keep him safe.
But what is difficult is trying to have dialogue with anyone who is clearly so deeply radicalised and entrenched in her conviction of the beliefs of the Islamic State. The messages that she has sent to Mahfooz are a clear demonstration of her allegiance to the ideology of the Islamic State, one that really has no place in the civility of the UK society. IOHR acquired Aisha’s troubling Whatsapp messages that were sent to Mahfooz calling on the UK-based parents to join her in Syria to meet their grandson:
“Wallahi (I swear to God), if you were here, my heart would become so light, so full of joy…”
“Wallahi, think about how happy your son would be. We are the ones who are gonna get the victory, why wouldn’t you wanna be a part of this? Would you want to be sat back while the gold rush is going? Wouldn’t you wanna come and get it…ask yourself, ask yourself, ask yourself…”
Aisha, Haroon’s Widow
Mahfooz had tried desperately to change Aisha’s views, saying that they could offer their grandchild a better life with security, safety and wellbeing. Her calls fell on deaf ears. She keeps fondly, with the kind of love that only a grandmother can have, a photo of her grandson that she has on her mobile and keeps listening to a Whatsapp message of him laughing innocently over and over. She has had the most contact with Aisha out of the couple, and hopes, mostly, that she prioritises the safety of baby Salmaan over his mother’s own religious conviction. As she looks on forlorn at a photo of her grandson Mahfooz said,
“My grandson is just an innocent child…He deserves a chance to live in a safe place, where he has family. We could offer him so much love and support.”
Ash has only had one Whatsapp telephone video conversation with Aisha where he spoke to his grandson for the first time. He smiles tenderly as he recalls how he saw the smiling face of his grandson telling him that he loves him. To date, the couple have not spoken to Aisha for over a month, leading to urgent concerns over the safety of their grandchild at a time when ISIS has been using women and children as human shields, in what seems to be the final battles in Syria and a possible conclusion among the warring factions.
The Legal Perspective and Salmaan’s fate
Three-year-old Salmaan is the lasting memory of their son and the couple still hope to somehow get him back to the UK. Ash and Mahfooz are both British-born, so was their son, and by default their grandson is entitled to a British passport.
On meeting Nigel Leskin, an immigration lawyer interviewed by IOHR, he specified the need for a DNA test to prove Haroon was the legitimate father. When asked what the main legal difficulties are for the Khurshid family, he said that proving the relation to the grandparents would be the first step.
“It could have DNA test carried out by the authenticated examiners. The Home Office have a list of approved DNA people in different countries…the swab would then probably be sent to the UK.”
What does the Khurshid case mean for the UK and the rest of the world?
In the light of the current news in the UK surrounding the Shamima Begum’s case and the UK’s approach to those returning from Syria, IOHR’s exclusive video series on the Khurshid family will focus on what happens next in the context of the citizenship of the child and bringing him back safely to his grandparents.
The question remains; what rights does Salmaan have as a child born outside the UK to parents aligned to the ideas of a terrorist group? The issue is now being hotly debated in the UK and around the world. Secretary of State for Justice, David Gauke has argued that from a legal perspective Britain cannot make its citizens “stateless”. In a clear contradiction to that statement, the UK’s home secretary Sajid Javid has said that he would not hesitate to block Shamima’s return to the UK.
On 19 February 2019 Shamima Begum faces imminent statelessness as the UK’s Home Secretary revoked her British passport.
As the story about Shamima Begum broke, the UK’s Foreign Secretary Jeremy Hunt said on Twitter:
“The FCO advises against all travel to Syria for a reason…”
As the foreign secretary emphasised, the UK’s Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s officially advise against all travel to Syria and they state that, ‘British nationals in Syria should leave by any political means.’ The US government have also responded to the situation in the wake of the hundreds of captured fighters and the recent exodus of pockets of ISIS fighters and their families. On 16 February 2019 President Trump tweeted that he recommends that the EU take back the 800 ISIS fighters captured and put them on trial.
https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1096980408401625088
France has already agreed and is preparing to take back those that fled to Syria, but the UK has been more hesitant in its response.
Hanif Qadir of the Active Change Foundation spoke to IOHR about his recommendation regarding the future of Aisha and Salmaan:
“As a reformed extremist, I think that the Canadian government and the British government should look at the opportunity to provide her with the support that she may need, incarcerate her if she’s a threat, but at least allow for the child, the grandchild to be nurtured and developed in a humanitarian way…in a decent way. He’s got a right to live and the right to a decent life.”
“With regards to the child, it’s a child, doesn’t that child have the right to a decent life?”
The International Observatory of Human Rights has communicated the details of the Khurshid case to the office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees and The International Committee of the Red Cross in Geneva in an attempt to help the Khurshid family locate and save the life of 3 year old Salmaan.
IOHR has launched a campaign on social media under the hashtag #SaveSalmaan
to help the Khurshid family find their grandchild and bring him to the UK.
This exclusive video is about the plight of the Khurshid family and their efforts to save their grandson is available on IOHRTV: