ISIS Facing Defection of Foreign Fighters as Caliphate Crumbles
As the Islamic State (ISIS) loses ground, foreign fighters are leaving in droves with many surrendering to or being caught by Turkish border police. Last week, a group of ISIS sympathizers consisting of two Britons, two Egyptians and an American yielded themselves.
One of them is Stefan Aristidou from Enfield, north London, believed to be in his mid-20s, who went missing in April 2015 but had actually gone to Syria. He surrendered at the Kilis crossing in southern Turkey along with his wife — said to be a British woman of Bangladeshi heritage.
Another is 46-year-old Kary Paul Kleman from Florida who converted to Islam and moved to the Middle East after divorcing his first wife in 2011. He left Syria last April 20 with his Syrian wife and two children in tow. They were also joined by two Egyptian women, whose spouses had been killed in Syria or Iraq.
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Tens of thousands of foreigners joined ISIS after it declared a caliphate across Syria and Iraq in 2014. They were lured by the jihadists' promises of a prosperous existence in a community where the literal interpretation of the Islamic law would be implemented.
After more than two years of living in war-torn ISIS-controlled areas, many disillusioned foreigners have fled. Kleman, for one, had told his family in the United States that the promises that led him to Syria "was all a scam." Others were compelled to escape the conflict zone following airstrikes and military operations against ISIS.
Officials in Turkey and Europe say an increasing number of ISIS operatives from Britain, France, Belgium and Australia who have been with the group since 2013 have contacted their embassies looking to return. Britain alone estimated that 850 of its citizens have traveled to Syria or Iraq. Half of that number have returned home while around 200 were killed in the fighting.
