By Samah Abdul Fattah | 2025-10-09

The women and children of al-Hol camp in eastern Syria continue to live in dire conditions after being abandoned by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS).

Years after the group’s territorial defeat, its remnants still wield power inside the camp through fear, coercion, and indoctrination.

According to women’s rights activists in al-Hol, a militant faction known as the "Hesba apparatus" -- known as ISIS’s all-female police force -- enforces extremist rules and spreads the group’s ideology among residents.

These Hesba members are accused of tormenting women and preventing children from attending school, ensuring that ISIS’s influence endures even in confinement.

"Despite all attempts by the camp administration and international humanitarian organizations to improve conditions, al-Hol camp has remained a dark nightmare for many residents due to ongoing criminal practices," said Roshan Kobani, a member of the Women’s Protection Units (YPJ) stationed at the camp.

"The camp's extremist women are striving to maintain their control and disseminate their group's ideology," she said.

"They organize their ranks through the women’s Hesbah apparatus, whose mission is to subjugate residents, recruit women, and ensure children remain under the group's influence," she told Al-Fassel.

"Those who resist the group's ideology, defy its commands, or oppose the forced recruitment of children are subjected to torture and execution," she said.

Indoctrination and exploitation

The manipulation of women and children has long been central to ISIS’s survival strategy.

"The historical record of ISIS toward women and children is atrocious, in fact completely dark," said Nermin Othman, a relief worker with the Kurdish Red Crescent.

During its rise, ISIS exploited women as tools of recruitment and reproduction, while systematically grooming their children to become the so-called "cubs of the caliphate," she said.

"The group compels women to spread its extremist ideas by any means, while systematically brainwashing children to create its next generation of fighters," Othman said.

Even now, ISIS women in al-Hol prevent their children from receiving an education, seeing schooling as a threat to their control.

"ISIS views these children as future assets for reorganizing its fighting ranks, denying them the opportunity to go to the camp's schools and gain the education they need," Othman said.

The group’s leaders, she added, never offered financial or practical help to the camp’s residents.

"With their survival dependent entirely on aid from humanitarian organizations, the camp's residents continue to endure severely difficult living conditions," she added.