Caliphate (TV series)

Last updated

Caliphate
Genre Thriller, drama
Created byWilhelm Behrman
Written by
  • Wilhelm Behrman
  • Niklas Rockström
Directed by Goran Kapetanović
Starring
ComposerSophia Ersson
Country of originSweden
Original languageSwedish
No. of seasons1
No. of episodes8
Production
Executive producers
  • Lars Blomgren
  • Anna Croneman
  • Anette Mattsson
  • Lisa Widén
ProducerTomas Michaelsson
Production locations
Running time46–53 minutes
Production companies
  • Filmlance International
  • Imaginarium Films
Original release
Network SVT1
Release12 January (2020-01-12) –
9 February 2020 (2020-02-09)

Caliphate (Swedish : Kalifat) is a Swedish thriller drama television series. It premiered on 12 January 2020 on Sveriges Television. It became the most-viewed series ever on SVT Play. [1]

Contents

The story is based on the real-life case of the Bethnal Green trio, in which three teenage girls from London met jihad recruiters at their school in February 2015. The television adaptation chiefly follows the characters of Fatima, a Swedish Security Service agent; Pervin, a young Swedish woman lured to Syria; and Sulle, an opinionated teenager groomed by the Islamic State. The plot explores and revolves around themes such as Islamic extremism, terrorism, tensions within Islam and among Muslims, women's rights, and human rights.

All eight episodes were directed by Goran Kapetanović. Caliphate was made available globally on Netflix on 18 March 2020.

Plot

The story starts with Pervin, a young Muslim woman from Sweden who lives under ISIS rule in Raqqa, Syria, with her Islamic State member husband Husam and their newborn daughter Latifa. Disillusioned with life in ISIS-controlled Raqqa, Pervin is looking to return to Sweden. After acquiring a cell phone from her neighbor and friend Tine (who is dragged away from Pervin's home, where she was hiding trying to escape being forced to remarry after her husband's death), she contacts Dolores, an anti-radicalization advocate in Sweden. Dolores puts Pervin in touch with Fatima, who is an agent of the Swedish Security Service. Fatima is at odds with the leadership due to some previous incident with "Lorentz". Fatima starts talking with Pervin over the phone, and tries to work her for intelligence related to a terror attack being planned in Sweden, in exchange for a safe return to Sweden for Pervin and her daughter.

Pervin tells Fatima about "Al Musafir" or the Traveler, who is in Sweden and is planning the attack. Al Musafir is Ibrahim "Ibbe" Haddad, who is working as a teacher's assistant in a high school, while recruiting others into the terror attack. He has already successfully recruited two brothers – Jacob, a former prisoner and alcoholic, and Emil, the younger, sensitive, and mentally disabled sibling. The two have a tense relationship with their mother, who clearly favors Emil and looks down on Jacob not only for his past but for his conversion to Islam. Under a different identity, Ibbe also recruits Miryam, who was raised in Baghdad, and promises her marriage in exchange for her work in his plans.

Ibbe simultaneously tries to radicalize young girls at the high school by sharing ISIS recruitment videos and propaganda. He successfully recruits Sulle, a Palestine activist, and her friend Kerima, both 15-year-old girls who start wearing the hijab and taking lessons in following Sharia law. The girls are shown pictures of palaces and told that if they moved to the Islamic Caliphate, they could live in luxury and be part of something special by marrying jihadist fighters. Sulle's parents wise up to their daughter's radicalization, and try to stop her by threatening to marry her off to a relative in Jordan. Sulle inadvertently pulls her 13-year-old sister Lisha into the Islamic extremist ideology, the implications of which are not fully realized until later in the show. At home, Kerima is physically abused by her alcoholic father, who has Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder after having fought in the Second Chechen War; stalking her, Ibbe takes Kerima into his home to indoctrinate her further.

Fatima does not reveal her source (Pervin) to her superiors, but does reveal vague details about a terror plot. Her superiors tell her to drop the investigation, and have her suspended for consuming cannabis. She remains in touch with her boyfriend, Calle, who's also in the Security Service, and continues to share information with him. She continues extracting information from Pervin and tries to piece together details of the plot. She gets on Jacob and Emil's trail when she investigates intel from Pervin about an abandoned shooting range. Jacob gets her license plate, and tracks it down.

Dolores and Ibbe are at an anti-radicalization meeting when Ibbe steps out to talk with Jacob. The host shows an ISIS video and points to a tattoo on the forearm of one of the terrorists. Later while at a cafe, Dolores sees the tattoo on Ibbe's arm. After Ibbe drops her off, she calls Fatima to tell her she has important information, who asks her to meet her at Fatima's apartment. When Dolores goes there, she is stabbed by an assailant and dies. When Fatima arrives, an alert has been issued to bring her in, and she plans to escape. She goes to Dolores's house to get some cash and supplies, but two cops also enter. She locks them in a bedroom at gun point, before escaping, and becomes the subject of a manhunt. She finds shelter at the home of her father's colleague.

Pervin becomes the focus of attention of Ahmed, one of Husam's colleagues. He arrives one night at her house and catches her talking to Fatima. He rapes her, and is about to kill her when she stabs him to death. She dumps his body in her neighbors' well. Husam is under the influence of sleeping medicines and happens to walk into the kitchen and see the blood on the floor, but Pervin convinces him that he is dreaming. He never quite forgets this and becomes convinced that he killed Ahmed, until Pervin finally tells him the truth.

Fatima seeks helps to extricate Pervin, and a plan is set to remove her from Raqqa. Meanwhile, Sulle and Kerima have plane tickets to travel to Turkey, and are picked up by Ibbe and the woman who has been teaching them about Islam. At the last minute, Sulle's younger sister Lisha joins them in the car and they set off for the airport. Sulle lied to her parents about going to a basketball game. Her father Suleiman, who voices his disdain of religion, finishes work early and decides to go and watch her game, but sees that the stadium is empty. He calls Calle, who sets off an alert with authorities in Germany and Turkey. They believe they have tracked the girls on their way to Istanbul, only to realize that their passports were switched, and that the girls were in fact in Ankara. They decide to intercept the transport vehicle at the border between Turkey and Syria. They manage to rescue everyone except for Lisha, who is en route to Syria.

Calle convinces Fatima to seek help from Pervin to save Lisha. Pervin and her daughter have reached their transport vehicle when Fatima convinces her to return home and save Lisha. In return, Fatima would personally come to Syria to rescue them all. Pervin convinces Husam to take Lisha on as his second wife.

Before leaving to carry out the attack, Jacob stabs his mother to death in their kitchen. Fatima is trailing Jacob and Emil, but loses their trail after they switch cars at their mother's house. Fatima learns of the three terror targets minutes before the police close in on her location, and she is taken into custody before she can share any information. In return for the information, she promises to extricate Husam along with Pervin and Lisha. All three terror attacks are stopped anyway by the Security Service, who, it turns out, knew about them all along. They kept Fatima in the dark because they did not trust her. In exchange for her silence, she is released from jail. Ibbe sets a bomb off within a garage, and escapes narrowly by disguising himself as a woman.

Fatima travels to Syria to rescue Pervin, Lisha, and Husam. Minutes before she arrives, Husam's colleague Omar arrives to take Husam to perform a suicide bombing. Husam tries to buy time, but Lisha who is completely radicalized (even moreso than her sister was) and unwilling to return to Sweden, reveals their escape plan to Omar. Omar shoots Pervin in the back and is about to shoot Husam, when Fatima arrives and shoots him dead. They quickly move to the car, while an insane Lisha refuses to join them so they leave her behind. They make it outside Raqqa, but Pervin dies just after the border post. A devastated Fatima helps the equally distraught Husam carries his daughter, and they make it back to Sweden.

Sulle and Kerima are interrogated by the Security Service. A regretful Sulle gives up Ibbe's identity in an effort to save her sister Lisha. Kerima tries to commit suicide, and is taken to a mental health facility where she gets her hands on a cell phone and warns Ibbe that his cover may be blown. Calle goes to the school to bring Ibbe into custody, but Ibbe escapes. Kerima meets up with Ibbe and decides to participate in a new attack on a girls' concert. Kerima is to wear a suicide vest that is locked so that she cannot remove it once she puts it on. Ibbe convinces Kerima that he and Sulle are also part of the attack, and will be wearing similar suicide vests. Once at the concert, after putting on the suicide vest, Kerima texts Sulle; only to learn that Ibbe had lied, and Sulle is not involved at all in the plan. In the concert facility toilets, Kerima briefly attempts to remove the vest, but fails; so instead warns some of the attendees in there, who flee, and waits for the bomb to explode while having a final exchange with a tearful Sulle over the phone. Ibbe triggers the bomb.

Production

The series was produced by Filmlance ( The Bridge ) for Swedish broadcaster SVT, and sold by Endemol Shine International. [2] It is based on an idea by Wilhelm Behrman, who created the series together with Nikolas Rockström. [2] It was directed by the Guldbagge-awarded director Goran Kapetanovic. [2] It was shot in Stockholm and Jordan. [2]

Cast

Related Research Articles

Mohammed Haydar Zammar is a Syrian-German militant who served as an important al-Qaida recruiter, and is currently a member of the Islamic State. He claims to have recruited many of the organizers of the September 11, 2001, attacks. He was detained in Far'Falastin. A video believed to be taken in early 2014 places him listening to a speech by Abu Ali al-Anbari, the number two in the Islamic State, in Aleppo, Syria.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Islamic State</span> Salafi jihadist militant Islamist group

The Islamic State (IS), also known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) and by its Arabic acronym Daesh, is a transnational Salafi jihadist group and an unrecognised quasi-state.

Colleen Renée LaRose, also known as Jihad Jane and Fatima LaRose, is an American citizen who was convicted and sentenced to 10 years for terrorism-related crimes, including conspiracy to commit murder and providing material support to terrorists.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi</span> Leader of the Islamic State from 2013 to 2019

Ibrahim Awad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri, commonly known by his nom de guerreAbu Bakr al-Baghdadi, was an Iraqi militant who was the first caliph of the Islamic State (IS) from 2014 until his death in 2019.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Asayish (North and East Syria)</span> Police force in North-East Syria

The Internal Security Forces, also known as the Asayish in the Jazira, Euphrates, and Afrin Regions, is the internal security and police force in the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria. Formed in the early stages of the Syrian Civil War, it had initially been established to police areas controlled by the Kurdish Supreme Committee. In October 2013, the Asayish claimed to have 4,000 members; by 2017, the number had reportedly risen to over 15,000.

The condition of human rights in the territory controlled by the Islamic State (IS) is considered to be among the worst in the world. The Islamic State's policies included acts of genocide, torture and slavery. The United Nations Commission on Human Rights (UNCHR) stated in November 2014 that the Islamic State "seeks to subjugate civilians under its control and dominate every aspect of their lives through terror, indoctrination, and the provision of services to those who obey". Many Islamic State actions of extreme criminality, terror, recruitment and other activities have been documented in the Middle East.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Al-Khansaa Brigade</span> All-female police unit in Islamic State (2014-2017)

The Al-Khansaa Brigade was an all-women police or religious enforcement unit of the jihadist group Islamic State (IS), operating in its de facto capital of Raqqa and Mosul.

The Bethnal Green trio are Amira Abase, Shamima Begum, and Kadiza Sultana, three British girls who attended the Bethnal Green Academy in London before leaving home in February 2015 to join the Islamic State. According to the Institute for Strategic Dialogue, they were among an estimated 550 women and girls from Western countries who had travelled to join IS—part of what some have called "a jihadi, girl-power subculture", the so-called Brides of ISIL. As of 2024, one girl has been reported killed (Sultana), one girl has been stripped of her British citizenship and denied re-entry into the country (Begum) while the third's fate is unknown (Abase).

Ahlam al-Nasr is a Syrian Arabic poet, and is known as "the Poetess of the Islamic State". Her first book of poetry, The Blaze of Truth, was published in 2014 and consists of 107 poems written in monorhyme. She is considered one of the Islamic State's most famous propagandists and gives detailed defenses of terrorist acts.

Tareq Kamleh is an Australian citizen who fled to Syria as a medical doctor to join the Islamic terrorist organisation ISIS, where he performed pediatric work in Raqqa, Syria, in the Islamic State Health Service. On 29 April 2015 Kamleh was brought to Australian Government and media attention for a propaganda video he posted from Raqqa. The recruitment video was titled “health services in the Islamic state”, and includes Kamleh, among other medical professionals, urging fellow Muslim ‘brothers and sisters’ to join the Islamic State. Kamleh is currently wanted by the Australian Federal Police in connection to crimes carried out in Raqqa. Tareq Kamleh's whereabouts are currently unknown, although it is presumed he is dead.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ruqia Hassan</span> Syrian journalist

Ruqia Hassan Mohammed, also known by her pen name Nissan Ibrahim, was a Syrian independent journalist and blogger based in Raqqa, Syria. She was a member of the activist group known as Raqqa Is Being Slaughtered Silently, and wrote frequently under the pen name Nissan Ibrahim. She is thought to be the first identified female citizen journalist executed by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Raqqa campaign (2016–2017) order of battle</span>

In course of the Raqqa campaign (2016–2017), an international coalition, primarily composed of the Syrian Democratic Forces and CJTF–OIR, captured the Raqqa Governorate from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, which had declared Raqqa city the capital of its self-proclaimed caliphate.

Emilie König is a citizen of France, who converted to Islam, and who is alleged to have served as a recruiter, once she went to live in the Islamic State. According to the New York Times, she is one of just two women whose financial assets the United Nations has asked member nations to freeze due to suspected ties to terrorism.

Opposition–ISIL conflict during the Syrian Civil War started after fighting erupted between Syrian opposition groups and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). In early January 2014, serious clashes between the groups erupted in the north of the country. Opposition groups near Aleppo attacked ISIL in two areas, Atarib and Anadan, which were both strongholds of the fundamentalist Sunni organization. Despite the conflict between ISIL and other rebels, one faction of ISIL has cooperated with the al-Nusra Front and the Green Battalion to combat Hezbollah in the Battle of Qalamoun. By 2018.

Hoda Muthana is a U.S.-born Yemeni woman who emigrated from the United States to Syria to join ISIS in November 2014. She surrendered in January 2019 to coalition forces fighting ISIS in Syria and has been denied access back to the United States after a U.S. court ruling rejected her claim to American citizenship. When she was born, her father was a Yemeni diplomat, making her ineligible for American citizenship by birth.

Lisa Smith is a former Irish soldier who converted to Islam and later travelled to Syria during the Syrian Civil War to join the militant group the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) during the Syrian Civil War. Born in Dundalk, she was a member of the Irish Army before transferring to the Irish Air Corps in 2011, but quit following her conversion to Islam. In 2015, following the breakdown of her marriage, she travelled to Syria to join ISIS. In 2019, she was captured and detained by the US forces in northern Syria. She was sentenced at the Irish Special Criminal Court on 22 July 2022 to 15 months in prison following her conviction on 30 May of membership of Daesh.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Al-Hawl refugee camp</span> Refugee camp in Syria

The al-Hawl refugee camp is a refugee camp on the southern outskirts of the town of al-Hawl in northern Syria, close to the Syria-Iraq border, which holds individuals displaced from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. The camp is nominally controlled by the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) but according to the U.S. Government, much of the camp is run by Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant who use the camp for indoctrination and recruitment purposes.

Michael Nikolai Skråmo, was a Swedish-Norwegian terrorist and member of the Islamic State (ISIS). He was a recruiter of IS-terrorists from the Nordic region. His mother revealed to SVT that she had received information that her son had died in early March 2019, during the final battles in the Syrian city of Al-Baghuz Fawqani.

Souad Nawfal is a Syrian Muslim schoolteacher and activist who became known for her protests against Bashar al-Assad and the Islamic State (ISIS) in Syria. She received the Homo Homini Award, a human rights award, in 2014.

Tareena Shakil is a British former terrorist who is notable for being the first, and only, British woman convicted of having travelled to Syria to join the Islamic State. She was sentenced to six years' imprisonment in 2016 for willingly joining the terrorist group and for encouraging terrorist acts online. She had chosen to take her toddler son to Syria with her, and was later discovered to have made the one-year-old child pose with an AK-47 and wear Islamic State balaclavas for photographs. Both during and in the months before she travelled to join ISIS she posted content on social media supporting the Islamic State and justifying their actions, telling people to "take to arms". She messaged friends on the day she arrived in Syria saying that it was her 'responsibility' as a Muslim to kill 'murtadeen' apostates and that she wanted to die a martyr and carry out Jihad, yet would later claim that she had never agreed with killing anyone. Amongst other lies her trial judge concluded she made were her claims that she had not known that ISIS had committed atrocities before she went, her stories that she had been "kidnapped" to Syria, and what The Guardian described as her 'odd' claims that she had only put her child in an ISIS balaclava because the toddler "enjoyed wearing hats".

References

  1. ↑ Hopewell, John (8 April 2020). "Endemol Shine's 'Caliphate' Breaks All-Time Records on SVT Play". Variety.
  2. 1 2 3 4 Hopewell, John (27 January 2020). "Wilhelm Behrman on 'Caliphate,' Luring Audiences, Why Scandinavian TV Is Turning to Terrorism".
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.