In this incredible footage we see how children are groomed for a future with Al Qaeda. Remember Al Qaeda denounced ISIS, and they too are fighting for a future in Syria. Through training at school, field trips to a local zoo with very few animals left we begin to see a picture of what life is like for these children. It is a heartbreaking depiction. It is easy to watch something like this and only fixate on their hate of Americans, but instead do what’s a bit harder, remembered that all these children know is war.
As a parent, your primordial objective is to keep your children safe. That is universally true. If you are sending your adorable five year old to a school to learn how to join Jihad and you are celebrating that that child wants to be a suicide bomber when he grows up, you are at rock bottom. It is counter to ever moral fiber to wish your child to die. This is not a flaw in character, this is a product of an extreme environment where you don’t think there is any other choice.
When the children visit the zoo and see how the regime has turned off the electricity, has not fed the animals it solidifies their hate. When they’re told their generation will be the ones to establish a caliphate, they’re proud. These are the same emotions we all feel when talk about being patriotic or we feel angry at the mistreatment of something we care about.
This is an example of how our foreign policy has failed. If we’d spent a quarter of the money we’ve spent on troupes, bombs, and so forth on educating, influencing and offer better opportunities to those displaced and angry at the United States we would not have such an epidemic today of Jihadists. We can continue to bomb the Middle East, but I’m afraid without other means of influence we will only be creating a more dangerous future.
These are the narratives of childhood in Syria. This is who will be fighting if nothing changes.
