Swedish IS Woman Enslaved Children in Her Home - Here's the Punishment

Iraqi Lina Ishaq, referred to in Swedish media as the ”Swedish IS woman”, is sentenced for holding women and children as slaves during the rule of the Islamic State in Syria. Ishaq, who is now a Swedish citizen, is sentenced to twelve years in prison for genocide, crimes against humanity, and serious war crimes. The verdict is historic as it is the first time a Swedish citizen has been convicted of the crime.

Lina Ishaq was sentenced to six years in prison for gross violations of international law and serious war crimes two years ago. Now she has been convicted again for other crimes she committed during her time in the Islamic State caliphate.

This time it was because Ishaq had allowed her son to participate as a child soldier – or rather as a terrorist – in the fight for the Islamic State. The IS woman is now serving her sentence at the Hinseberg prison outside Örebro.

The main part of the new legal case concerns that Lina Ishaq had slaves in her home in Raqqa, the self-proclaimed capital of the Islamic State, where she moved after leaving Halmstad. According to the legal documents, Ishaq kept three women and six children locked up in her home between 2014 and 2016.

They were Yazidis, mainly women and girls, kidnapped by the terrorist sect from their families. During their time with Ishaq in Raqqa, they were threatened and abused, and they were humiliated by being forced to wear Muslim clothes.

Lina Ishaq enslaved women and children. Photo: Police

Convicted in the district court and court of appeal

On February 11, Stockholm District Court announced that the IS woman is convicted of crimes against humanity, genocide, and serious war crimes. The court considered a twelve-year prison sentence to be an appropriate penalty. At the same time, it was the first time a ”Swedish” person was convicted of crimes against humanity.

The prosecutor appealed the verdict to the Svea Court of Appeal and requested a life sentence. On Tuesday, the Court of Appeal upheld Stockholm District Court’s twelve-year prison sentence. Thus, the verdict became historic – it is the first time a Swedish citizen has been convicted of crimes against humanity.

– The Court of Appeal, just like the District Court, considers that the prosecutor has shown that the defendant held several Yazidi women and children deprived of their liberty and forced several of them to perform household chores, participate in religious education, and pray – all within the framework of the slavery system introduced by IS, says the court assessor Robert Green.

”Swedish IS woman” is Iraqi

Lina Ishaq originally comes from Iraq. Her family is, or was, a Christian refugee family that came to Sweden in the early 1980s. She was granted Swedish citizenship in 1984.

However, Ishaq converted to the Muslim faith after meeting a Muslim man in her twenties. The couple left Sweden in 2004 and then moved around between different countries. The United Kingdom, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and Egypt. The goal was to live segregated with other Muslims.

When the Islamic State declared its caliphate, the family moved to Syria to join the Islamist struggle. However, her husband was killed fairly quickly in Syria. At the same time, Lina Ishaq’s teenage boys were recruited as child soldiers for Allah.