Sisters convicted of preparing terrorist crimes and IS membership

NOS News•today, 4:57 PM

The sisters Amina and Amal E. were convicted by the court in Rotterdam for, among other things, preparing terrorist crimes and membership of the IS terrorist movement.

25-year-old Amina E. was sentenced to 3.5 years in prison, of which 10 months were conditional. A factor in this is that she has been in Syria for a long time, has made propaganda for IS and has carried firearms. She was “more than just the wife of a warrior”, the court found.

Her sister Amal (38) has to spend 2.5 years in prison. After her prison sentence, she must undergo therapy and be supervised. Like her sister, she was married to a fighter and she gave Koran lessons, which, according to the court, indicates that she adopted the ideas of IS and was a supporter of it.

The sisters are part of a group of twelve women who were brought back from the Al Hol prison camp in Syria in 2022. Because, according to the judge, they were held there under difficult conditions, the verdict was lower than the demand.

The Public Prosecution Service had asked for a prison sentence of six years and four months for Amina. The sentence against Amal was five years and four months. Both women suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder as a result of their stay in Al Hol.

The women traveled to Syria in 2014, when Amina E. was still a minor. She married an IS fighter there, according to her, against her will. But the judge sees it differently, because chats and photos show that she supported the ideology of IS and glorified life in IS territory.

According to the judge, her young age does not detract from the criminality of what she did, although the sentence did take into account the fact that she was still so young when she traveled to IS territory.