Linda Wenzel

Last updated

Linda Wenzel
Born2000
Saxony, Germany
NationalityGerman
Other namesLinda W.
Criminal charge(s)Membership in Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
Illegal entry into Iraq
Criminal penalty6 years imprisonment
Criminal statusIncarcerated
Spouse
Abu Usama al-Shisani
​
​
(m. 2016;died 2016)​
Military career
Nickname(s)Belle of Mosul
AllegianceFlag of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant2.svg Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
Unit Al-Khansaa Brigade
Battles/warsBattle of Mosul

Linda Wenzel (born 2000), [1] [2] identified in Germany as Linda W., is a German-born Al-Khansaa Brigade member for the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, who was captured by Iraqi troops during the Battle of Mosul, and was convicted of joining ISIL and entering Iraq illegally. [3] She was nicknamed the Belle of Mosul. [4]

Contents

Personal life

Wenzel was born into a Christian family [1] and grew up in the small German town of Pulsnitz, near Dresden and the Czech border, sharing a house with her mother and step-father. Wenzel moved to Pulsnitz following her mother's divorce. She attended the local Ernst-Rietschel comprehensive school and was particularly interested in mathematics, chemistry, and physics. [5]

Radicalization

In the beginning of 2016 classmates of Wenzel noticed a change in her behavior, when Wenzel starting listening to Arabic music and asked the headmaster for permission to wear a headscarf at school. In the spring of 2016 Wenzel told her parents of her growing interest of Islam, but did not reveal that she had converted and had become a Muslim. During Ramadan, she told her family she was on a diet. Her parents accepted her interests, saying "we didn’t think anything of it, and even bought her a copy of the Qur'an". Wenzel had apparently been approached by Islamists online, who convinced her to convert. [5] However, according to the mayor of Pulsnitz, the school was aware of the conversion months before, and the school principal talked to the parents about it. [6] [7]

According to Wenzel, she was groomed online by a Jordanian teenager named Fatema who convinced her to convert to Islam and introduced her future husband, former ISIS fighter Abu Usama al-Shisani, whom she subsequently married via a phone conversation. [8]

On Friday 1 July 2016, she told her mother she would be back on the following Sunday at 4 o'clock, feigning spending the weekend at a friend's house. However, the friend knew nothing of Wenzel's whereabouts. Hidden under the mattress in her room police later found receipts for two tickets from Dresden to Frankfurt and from Frankfurt to Istanbul that were purchased with fake authorization from her mother's account and her mother's passport. [5]

Islamic State

Arriving in Syria, she married a Chechen fighter serving the Islamic State, [9] [10] after which she traveled to Syria and then onward to Mosul to fight for the Islamic State, apparently before the October 2016 start of the Battle of Mosul. [10] Her husband was killed in the beginning of the Battle of Mosul. [3] Some have speculated that she may have served as a sniper, [11] and was alleged to have admitted that she killed Iraqi soldiers. [12] During the siege of Mosul she suffered a gunshot wound to her left thigh, and an additional wound to her right knee from a helicopter attack. [13]

Wenzel was also believed to have been a member of the Al-Khansaa Brigade, which is responsible for enforcing the Islamic State's Islamic morality code, inflicting punishments such as whipping for Sharia violations such as women wearing makeup or failing to cover themselves in accordance to the Islamic State's standards. [14] [15] [1] [6]

On 18 July 2017, she was captured in Mosul by Iraqi troops along with four other German women. She had a malnourished baby boy, who is presumed to be her son, [12] with her at the time. [16] [17] Due to her inability to converse in Arabic, Iraqi troops had at first mistaken her for a Yazidi woman, despite having refused any help offered by the Iraqi army. [16] Footage of her capture, in which she was seen screaming and crying as she was being dragged by Iraqi forces, was disseminated a couple of weeks following her capture. [13]

On 15 December 2017, Wenzel was able to meet with her family in Baghdad while awaiting trial. [2] On 22 May 2018, Wenzel was sentenced to 5 years in prison. [18]

Captivity in Iraq

Wenzel and three other German women were formally charged by Iraqi authorities. Subsequently, German diplomats have attempted to avert death penalty charges and sentencing for Wenzel, and were reportedly confident in their ability to avert such a sentence while saying she would be expected to serve a long jail sentence. [19] However, Iraqi then-Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said on 18 September 2017 that Wenzel may face the death penalty by hanging, as:

You know teenagers under certain laws, they are accountable for their actions especially if the act is a criminal activity when it amounts to killing innocent people. [3]

— Iraqi then-Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi

Wenzel has denied the charges against her saying that she was a housemaid. According to Wenzel, Islamic State authorities refused her requested return to Germany following the death of her husband, and provided her with a month's $200 widow's allowance. [8]

Under Iraqi law, Wenzel could have been sentenced to death; however the execution would not take place until she reached the age of 22. [19] The media reported on 18 February 2018 that she was sentenced to a prison term of 6 years, including five years for being an ISIL member and a year for entering Iraq illegally. [20] [21]

Related Research Articles

<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) and by their Arabic acronym Daesh, are a transnational Salafi jihadist group. Their origins were in the Jaish al-Ta'ifa al-Mansurah organization founded by Abu Omar al-Baghdadi in 2004. The organization affiliated itself with Al-Qaeda, so IS was originally a branch of Al-Qaeda and fought alongside them during the Iraqi insurgency. IS eventually split, and gained global prominence in 2014, when their militants successfully captured large territories in northwestern Iraq and eastern Syria, taking advantage of the ongoing Syrian civil war. Notorious for their perpetration of war crimes and extensive human rights violations, IS have engaged in the persecution of Christians, Mandaeans, Shia Muslims, and Sufi Sunnis, and published videos of beheadings and executions of journalists and aid workers. By the end of 2015, they ruled an area with an estimated population of 12 million people, where they enforced their extremist interpretation of Islamic law, managed an annual budget exceeding US$1 billion, and commanded more than 30,000 fighters.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi</span> Amir al-Muminin 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.

The persecution of Christians by the Islamic State involves the systematic mass murder of Christian minorities, within the regions of Iraq, Syria, Egypt, Libya, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Mozambique and Nigeria controlled by the Islamic extremist group Islamic State. Persecution of Christian minorities climaxed following the Syrian civil war and later by its spillover.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">War in Iraq (2013–2017)</span> War between Iraq and its allies and the Islamic State

The War in Iraq (2013–2017) was an armed conflict between Iraq and its allies and the Islamic State. Following December 2013, the insurgency escalated into full-scale guerrilla warfare following clashes in the cities of Ramadi and Fallujah in parts of western Iraq, and culminated in the Islamic State offensive into Iraq in June 2014, which lead to the capture of the cities of Mosul, Tikrit and other cities in western and northern Iraq by the Islamic State. Between 4–9 June 2014, the city of Mosul was attacked and later fell; following this, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki called for a national state of emergency on 10 June. However, despite the security crisis, Iraq's parliament did not allow Maliki to declare a state of emergency; many legislators boycotted the session because they opposed expanding the prime minister's powers. Ali Ghaidan, a former military commander in Mosul, accused al-Maliki of being the one who issued the order to withdraw from the city of Mosul. At its height, ISIL held 56,000 square kilometers of Iraqi territory, containing 4.5 million citizens.

Between 1 and 15 August 2014, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) expanded territory in northern Iraq under their control. In the region north and west from Mosul, the Islamic State conquered Zumar, Sinjar, Wana, Mosul Dam, Qaraqosh, Tel Keppe, Batnaya and Kocho, and in the region south and east of Mosul the towns Bakhdida, Karamlish, Bartella and Makhmour

<span class="mw-page-title-main">US-led intervention in Iraq (2014–2021)</span> Coalition against the Islamic State

On 15 June 2014 U.S. President Barack Obama ordered United States forces to be dispatched in response to the Northern Iraq offensive of the Islamic State (IS), as part of Operation Inherent Resolve. At the invitation of the Iraqi government, American troops went to assess Iraqi forces and the threat posed by ISIL.

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.

Nasrin As'ad Ibrahim, better known by the nom de guerreUmm Sayyaf, is the widow of Abu Sayyaf. She was captured in May 2015 by US Delta Force soldiers on the mission where they killed her husband, a suspected leader of the Islamic State.

In early 2014, the jihadist group Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant captured extensive territory in Western Iraq in the Anbar campaign, while counter-offensives against it were mounted in Syria. Raqqa in Syria became its headquarters. The Wall Street Journal estimated that eight million people lived under its control in the two countries.

This article contains a timeline of events from January 2015 to December 2015 related to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL/ISIS). This article contains information about events committed by or on behalf of the Islamic State, as well as events performed by groups who oppose them.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Shirqat offensive (2016)</span> 2016 offensive against ISILs positions in Mosul and the surrounding region

The Shirqat offensive, codenamed Operation Conquest or Operation Fatah, was an offensive against the positions of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in and around the district of Al-Shirqat District to reach the city of Mosul.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Mosul (2016–2017)</span> Large-scale military campaign to recapture Mosul from the Islamic State

The Battle of Mosul was a major battle initiated by the Iraqi Government forces with allied militias, the Kurdistan Regional Government, and international forces to retake the city of Mosul from the Islamic State (ISIL), which had seized the city years prior in June 2014. It was the largest conventional land battle since the capture of Baghdad in 2003. It was also the world's single largest military operation overall since the 2003 invasion of Iraq and was considered the toughest urban battle since World War II.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Battle of Kirkuk (2016)</span> Battle between Iraqi Kurdish forces and ISIL in Iraq

The Battle of Kirkuk took place in the city of Kirkuk in northern Iraq between Kurdistan and allies and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. The battle occurred less than a week after the beginning of the Battle of Mosul launched by Iraqi security forces and allies.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Persecution of gay and bisexual men by the Islamic State</span>

Violence against LGBT people is part of the ideology of ISIL, which mandates capital punishment for homosexuality within its territory, in Iraq, Syria and Libya.

During the Battle of Mosul (2016–2017), numerous reports of human rights abuses surfaced against the various parties involved in the conflict. Up to 1.5 million civilians lived in the city, sparking concerns among various organizations of a large humanitarian crisis. Lise Grande, the United Nations' humanitarian coordinator in Iraq, stated, "In a worst-case scenario, we're literally looking at the single largest humanitarian operation in the world in 2016." Save the Children warned that massive civilian bloodshed was likely, unless safe routes were authorized to let civilians flee. The U.S. government has accused ISIL of using civilians as human shields.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Islamic State occupation of Mosul</span>

The occupation of Mosul by the Islamic State began after the fall of Mosul when Islamic State fighters took control of the city on 10 June 2014. Mosul was a strategically important city for the Islamic State and was a target by anti-Islamic State forces. Over the course of battles in 2015 and 2016–2017, the Iraqi Armed Forces, aided by Peshmerga and CJTF–OIR forces, fully liberated Mosul by 21 July 2017.

References

  1. 1 2 3 Bojan Pancevsk (30 July 2017). "Linda Werzel: German girl, 16, 'was moral enforcer for Isis fighters in Mosul'". The Times.
  2. 1 2 Connolly, Kate (15 December 2017). "German girl imprisoned for Isis role has fleeting family reunion". The Guardian. Retrieved 12 June 2018.
  3. 1 2 3 Rachel Roberts (19 September 2017). "German teenage 'Isis bride' could face death penalty in Iraq" . The Independent. Archived from the original on 14 June 2022.
  4. ↑ "German woman to become first European female executed in Iraq for belonging to Isil". The Telegraph. 21 January 2018.
  5. 1 2 3 "Suspected Isis fighter seized in Mosul may be missing German girl, 16". The Guardian. 19 July 2017.
  6. 1 2 Melissa Eddy (22 July 2017). "German Teenager Suspected of Trying to Join ISIS Is Found in Iraq". New York Times.
  7. ↑ Rick Noack (24 July 2017). "At 15, she joined ISIS after converting to Islam. Now this German teen wants to go home". Washington Post.
  8. 1 2 Rachel Roberts (5 October 2017). "German teenage 'Isis bride' who faces death penalty in Iraq 'was groomed'" . The Independent. Archived from the original on 14 June 2022.
  9. ↑ Priya Joshi (18 July 2016). "German teenager feared to be recruited by Isis after fleeing to Turkey to be with boyfriend". International Business Times.
  10. 1 2 "Teenage Isil bride from Germany captured in Mosul". The Telegraph. 18 July 2017. Retrieved 18 August 2017.
  11. ↑ Josie Ensor (4 September 2017). "Isil for first time urging women to join battle to combat dwindling manpower". The Telegraph.
  12. 1 2 Ludovica Iaccino (11 August 2017). "16 and brainwashed: Linda Wenzel fled Germany to fight for Isis - should she face execution?". International Business Times.
  13. 1 2 Samuel Osborne (7 August 2017). "German Isis bride's capture footage emerges as she now faces death penalty in Iraq" . The Independent. Archived from the original on 14 June 2022.
  14. ↑ Karzan Sulaivany (1 August 2017). "Syrian Kurdish forces catch Swedish IS fighters in Raqqa". Kurdistan24.
  15. ↑ Maria Schaller (8 August 2017). "German schoolgirl who faces execution for joining IS shown screaming in footage". SBS.com.au.
  16. 1 2 "German girl found in ISIS hideout wants "to go home"". CBS News. 24 July 2017. Retrieved 18 August 2017.
  17. ↑ Slawson, Nicola (22 July 2017). "German girl arrested in Mosul is missing Linda Wenzel, say authorities". The Guardian. Retrieved 24 September 2017.
  18. ↑ "40 ISIS Brides To Be Executed In Iraq". International Business Times. 22 May 2018. Retrieved 12 June 2018.
  19. 1 2 "German authorities fight to stop teenage Isis bride being executed by Iraqi authorities" . The Independent. 6 September 2017. Archived from the original on 14 June 2022.
  20. ↑ "Iraq: German 'Islamic State' bride sentenced to 6 years in prison". Deutsche Welle. 18 February 2018.
  21. ↑ "Runaway German schoolgirl Linda Wenzel jailed in Iraq". The Week. 19 February 2018.
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.