In Iraq, the defeat of ISIS has generated thousands of orphans

Published on November 11, 2024 at 8:01 p.m. / Modified on November 11, 2024 at 8:02 p.m.

Under the scorching July sun, Anas watches with indifferent eyes as his cousins ​​chase a soccer ball, between the tents bearing the “UNHCR” logo of the United Nations Refugee Agency. Anas is 16 years old and has lived in the Hassan Sham refugee camp, about thirty kilometers from Mosul, Iraq, since 2017. Like his 20 cousins, he is an orphan. Like his 20 cousins, his father was an ISIS fighter. His was killed in 2016 by an international coalition strike during the siege of Mosul. “The houses were collapsing under the bombs, there were dead people everywhere,” says the young boy with an impassive air. Since then, he and his cousins ​​have led a forgotten existence, hidden behind the enclosure of family tents and the camp barriers. “We never go out,” he said simply. “I don’t even go to school. I was told that we had missed too many years,” he adds sadly.

A few steps away, in the shade of a neighboring tent, his grandmother says a rosary while drinking tea. “I had eight sons, all Daesh fighters,” she says in her hoarse voice. Five were killed in Mosul, the other three were arrested too long ago for me to know if they are dead or alive.” Since 2016, and the flight from Mosul, Ghazal Saha has been raising these 20 orphans as best she can. “These children only have God and my poor self to take care of them,” she laments.

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