Children of ISIS fighter find new life in Minnesota

Summary

Consider This from NPR: Children of ISIS Fighter Find New Life in Minnesota

Release Date: May 28, 2025
Host: NPR
Episode Title: Children of ISIS Fighter Find New Life in Minnesota

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Introduction

In this emotionally charged episode of NPR's Consider This, listeners are introduced to the heart-wrenching and ultimately hopeful story of Ahmed and his wife, Moroccan immigrants residing in Minnesota. Their journey encompasses the disappearance of their son, Abdel Hamid, his involvement with ISIS, and the remarkable efforts to reunite the family, including the rescue of Abdel's children from Syrian detention camps.

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The Disappearance and Radicalization of Abdel Hamid

[00:00 - 02:14]
Ari Shapiro sets the stage by recounting the unimaginable ordeal Ahmed and his wife faced when their 18-year-old son, Abdel Hamid, vanished during a family trip to Morocco in 2015.

• Ahmed: "He just woke up in the morning and then Abdel was not there. So looked for him everywhere in the house. We went from room to room, from floor to floor. We couldn't find him." [00:46]

Despite initial fears of an accident or unintentional disappearance, the Moroccan police disclosed that Abdel had likely joined a radical group. This revelation confirmed their worst fears: their son had become a member of ISIS, relocating from suburban Minneapolis to the heart of one of the world's most notorious terrorist organizations.

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Abdel's Involvement with ISIS and Return to the United States

[03:09 - 07:37]
Sacha Pfeiffer delves into the broader context of American youth being radicalized online, lured by ISIS's enticing promises. Abdel's journey took him from Turkey to Iraq and Syria, where he not only became a soldier but also started a family, unknowingly leaving his parents as grandparents to children they had never met.

• Ahmed: "When we came back to the States, he gave us a call, actually, and then he said, I'm okay. Don't worry about me. Everything is okay." [04:15]

However, Abdel's communications ceased, leading to fears for his safety. It wasn't until a CBS News report in September 2019 that the family learned Abdel was imprisoned in Syria.

• Ahmed: "My son used to be this, this, this, and this is completely different." [06:02]
  (Upon seeing Abdel in the CBS interview)

Abdel was eventually repatriated to the United States in 2020. Faced with prosecution, he admitted to his involvement with ISIS, labeling himself a traitor and expressing deep regret.

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The Struggle to Reunite with the Grandchildren

[07:37 - 22:44]
The revelation that Abdel had children complicated the family's trauma. Determined to find their grandchildren, Ahmed and his wife reached out to former US Ambassador Peter Galbraith, leveraging his connections to Kurdish officials managing Syrian detention camps.

• Peter Galbraith: "I sent them photographs electronically prior to going there, along with the names, the dates of birth, the parents." [09:06]

After extensive efforts and three trips to Syria, Galbraith successfully identified and facilitated the safe return of Abdel's two young sons to the United States in May 2024.

• Ian Moss (State Department Official): "They certainly were scared. I think they were also just confused. They'd been on 20 some hours of flights and are now arriving at 3 o' clock in the morning at JFK to meet with grandparents that they'd only seen via video." [10:58]

The arrival of the grandkids marked a new chapter for Ahmed and his wife, bringing both joy and the challenges of integrating traumatized children into their lives.

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Life After Reunification: Healing and Hope in Minnesota

[11:21 - 18:29]
Sacha Pfeiffer describes the family's adjustment period in Minnesota. The grandchildren, initially speaking mainly Arabic, began embracing their new environment, learning English, and engaging in typical American childhood activities.

• Ahmed's Wife: "English. Spiderman. Tom Jerry, Master Bean." [13:27]

The grandparents were committed to providing a nurturing environment, teaching the boys various skills and ensuring they felt loved and supported.

• Ahmed: "We feel younger." [16:31]
  Ahmed's Wife: "I feel like I'm... rejuvenating." [16:25]

Despite the potential need for future counseling to address their past traumas, the family expressed immense gratitude and happiness over the reunification.

• Ahmed: "We feel relieved now. We got our kids back and we got our grandkids back. I mean, life is beautiful now, to be honest." [22:33]

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Broader Implications: US Efforts to Retrieve Children from ISIS Camps

[18:29 - 21:46]
The episode broadens its scope to discuss the ongoing international efforts to evacuate children from ISIS detention camps. With approximately 35,000 individuals held in these camps, many of whom are children born or brought by their parents to Syria and Iraq, the humanitarian and security implications are profound.

• Ian Moss: "As long as these children remain in the camps, the international community faces a serious humanitarian and a potential future security problem." [19:01]

Peter Galbraith emphasizes the urgency of rescuing these children to prevent further radicalization.

• Peter Galbraith: "The older the children get, the more likely that they're going to buy into the ideology there. And that's why it is so urgent to get the children out, get them out at a young age." [19:50]

The United States continues to prioritize the retrieval of these children, advocating against punishing them for their parents' actions and highlighting the necessity of dismantling the camps to prevent future threats.

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Conclusion: A Family Reunited and Looking Forward

[21:52 - 22:44]
Returning to Ahmed and his family's personal triumph, the episode highlights their aspirations for the future. They eagerly anticipate Abdel's release from federal prison, envisioning a fully reunited family under one roof.

• Ahmed's Wife: "I know America work hard to bring my grandkids. It's working hard for this. Thank you so much." [22:20]

Ahmed encapsulates the family's journey with heartfelt emotion:

• Ahmed: "We feel relieved now. We got our kids back and we got our grandkids back. I mean, life is beautiful now, to be honest." [22:33]

This story not only underscores the resilience and unwavering hope of a family torn apart by conflict and radicalization but also shines a light on the broader humanitarian efforts to protect innocent children from the ravages of extremist ideologies.

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Production Credits:
Produced by Monika Evstatieva and Katherine Fink. Edited by Barry Hardiman and Robert Little with audio engineering support from Robert River Rodriguez. Executive Producer: Sami Yenigun.

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This detailed summary captures the essential narratives, emotional beats, and key discussions from the episode, providing a comprehensive understanding for those who haven't listened to the podcast.

Transcript

[Ari Shapiro]

Here's a story about children who were lost and children who were found. It involves a family that went through an almost unimaginable shock. It's not a story this family likes to revisit.

[Ahmed]

It's hard for me to talk about, you know, the past. It hurts, to be honest with you. It hurts a lot.

[Ari Shapiro]

That is Ahmed, who asked that we not use his last name because due to what you're about to hear, he's concerned about the security of his family. Ahmed and his wife were born in Morocco. They moved to the United States in the late 1990s. They became US citizens, had kids, and a decade ago, in 2015, they traveled with their family to Morocco to visit relatives. During that trip, their 18 year old son, Abdel Hamid, disappeared.

[Ahmed]

He just woke up in the morning and then Abdel was not there. So looked for him everywhere in the house. We went from room to room, from floor to floor. We couldn't find him.

[Ari Shapiro]

They searched hospitals and police precincts.

[Ahmed]

I was thinking that he left the house, you know, going for a walk or something and attacked or something like that. So auto accident.

[Ari Shapiro]

Eventually, the police told them there was a way to check if their son was still in Morocco.

[Ahmed]

Moroccan police told us that when a kid or young man leaving without telling their parents their destination, I guarantee he went there to join some radical groups or something like that.

[Ari Shapiro]

The police were correct. Their teenage son had joined a terrorist organization. Their oldest boy, an American citizen who'd grown up in the suburbs of Minneapolis and gone to a US High school and community college, was now a member of isis. His parents would later learn that he had also gotten married and had children. Consider what happened to the families of the Americans who joined isis. Coming up, you'll hear about the families they left behind and the ones they formed overseas. From npr, I'm Ari Shapiro.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

I'm Tonya Moseley, co host of FRESH air. At a time of sound bites and short attention spans, our show is all about the deep dive. We do long form interviews with people behind the best in film, books, tv, music and journalism. Here our guests open up about their process and their lives in ways you've never heard before. Listen to the FRESH AIR podcast from NPR and why, why? When Malcolm Gladwell presented NPR's Throughline podcast with a Peabody Award, he praised it for its historical and moral clarity. On Throughline, we take you back in time to the origins of what's in the news, like presidential power, aging and evangelicalism. Time travel with us every week on the Throughline podcast from npr.

[Ari Shapiro]

It's Consider this from npr. When ISIS was at its height, its ranks included several hundred Americans. They were often young men radicalized online by savvy marketing that promised free housing and the chance to meet a wife. When the Islamic State collapsed, some of those young men ended up in huge detention camps in Syria, and the US has been trying to bring them home. Today, we're bringing you the story of one American family coping with the aftermath of the child they lost and the children they found. NPR's Sacha Pfeiffer takes it from here.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

It may be hard to understand why a kid from the US Would join isis. It's one of the most violent jihadist groups in the world. But its marketing campaign was savvy. ISIS recruiters on Twitt and YouTube promised a better life, from free housing to the chance to meet a spouse. That message worked on teenagers like Abdel Hamid. After going missing in Morocco, he flew to Turkey, and from there made his way to Iraq and Syria. But he occasionally reached out to his parents with reassuring messages.

[Ahmed]

When we came back to the States, he gave us a call, actually, and then he said, I'm okay. Don't worry about me. Everything is okay.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

What did he say he was doing?

[Ahmed]

Oh, he was telling us that he's gonna go for college. He wants to become a doctor because he left there to help injured people.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

His parents hoped that was true. Eventually, Abdel Hamid gave them more shocking news. He'd started a family, and that meant Ahmed and his wife were grandparents to a pair of little boys they'd never met.

[Ahmed]

When he was in Syria, most of the time, he called us from there, sent us pictures of his kids.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Then they stopped hearing from Abdel Hamid. For nearly a year, they had no idea where he was until a CBS news report in September 2019. We are hopping around now. Want to go to northeastern Syria? That is where prisons are filled to the point of bursting with foreign ISIS fighters. In a CBS News exclusive, Holly Williams was given rare access to one of these prisons and spoke with an ISIS fighter from Minnesota. That ISIS fighter was their son being interviewed behind bars on national television. Did you not know that it was a terrorist organization when you joined it?

[Ahmed]

To be honest, I was kind of a conspiracy theorist a little bit.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

But it's a terrorist organization, Abdel. It's a terrorist organization that's carried out attacks.

[Ahmed]

Here's the thing. People like me that see this, that first of all, don't really believe the news.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Abdel Hamid's parents learned from that news broadcast that he was in a Syrian prison. What did you think when you saw that TV interview?

[Ahmed]

I couldn't recognize him.

[Ahmed's Wife]

He said, that's not my son.

[Ahmed]

I said, this is not my son. My son used to be this, this, this, and this is completely different.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Physically.

[Ahmed]

Physically, yeah.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

How had he changed?

[Ahmed]

I mean, he was too skinny, and malnutrition, you can't tell.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

The CBS footage showed Abdel Hamid limping from two broken legs. He had a stump for one arm. Was there any sense of relief that finally you knew where he was?

[Ahmed]

Yeah, in that sense, yes. It was a relief because we know that he's alive first and we can work with the government to bring him back.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

The US Government eventually did bring him back. Abdel Hamid was returned to Minnesota in 2020 to face prosecution. He admitted to being a soldier for ISIS and pleaded guilty to supporting a foreign terrorist group. He also called himself a traitor and said he was consumed with regret. As for his little boys, they'd vanished. You have 20 minutes available for this call. I got in touch with Abdel Hamid at a noisy county jail in Minnesota. He's now 28 years old. He told me while he was in Syria, he married the widow of another ISIS fighter. She had a son by her previous husband. Then she and Abdul Hamid had another son. They raised the boys together until my wife was killed.

[Ahmed]

She was killed in front of her kids, in front of me. Something the boys remember. And after that, we went and surrendered to the Syrian Democratic Forces. And then they were taken away from me a day or two later when.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Abdel Hamid surrendered and his boys were taken away, his younger son was 2 years old and. And his older one was 4. And when Abdel Hamid's parents learned the kids were missing, they were determined to find them. But they kept their family situation a secret from almost everyone, even most of their relatives.

[Ahmed]

We don't want nobody to know about what's going on. And we just tried to survive day by day, knowing that we had a hope, knowing that one day we'll get together and live as a family.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

They became consumed with tracking down their grandchildren, the ones they'd seen only in photos. But how. They heard about a former US Ambassador, Peter Galbraith, who might be able to help them. So they wrote to him. When I visited Galbraith at his home in Boston, he read from their email.

[Peter Galbraith]

Hello, Mr. Galbraith. I am writing to see if you can help me in finding my two missing grandchildren.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Galbraith has connections to Kurdish officials who oversee Syrian detention and displacement camps holding tens of thousands of ISIS fighters and their families. And Galbraith wondered if that's where the boys may be.

[Peter Galbraith]

There are two main camps now. There's Al Hul, which has endless lines of tents, latrines that are disgusting. Raj camp, the same idea. Tents surrounded by wire so that nobody can leave.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Galbraith has helped get about 30 children of various nationalities out of those camps, including some American children. So using his connections, he reached out to the Kurdish officials who run the camps to try to find Ahmed's grandkids.

[Peter Galbraith]

I sent them photographs electronically prior to going there, along with the names, the dates of birth, the parents.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Then, over the course of a year, Galbraith made three trips to Syria to look for the boys. On his third trip, camp officials brought two young children to meet him in a small office. They seemed to be the kids he was searching for. Galbraith said the older boy in particular seemed wary of him, distrustful.

[Peter Galbraith]

I mean, basically, anytime they encountered somebody, they didn't know something bad had happened. Now this person shows up, a foreigner, an American. You can completely understand why they were fearful, why they thought no good would come from it.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

A DNA test later proved their identities and a network of US government agencies worked together to get the boys out of the camps and to the United States. In May 2024, after a year and a half of complicated negotiations to, the two boys flew to New York on a military cargo plane. It was a long ride arrival pictures from the New York airport show Abdel Hamid's sons looking very serious, probably a little dazed. A former State Department official named Ian Moss was one of the people who welcomed them at JFK airport.

[Ian Moss]

They certainly were scared. I think they were also just confused. They'd been on 20 some hours of flights and are now arriving at 3 o' clock in the morning at JFK to meet with grandparents that they'd only seen via video. It had to be disorienting to say the least.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

But that middle of the night airport arrival marked the beginning of their new lives.

[Ian Moss]

And to be there for that first moment when the boys were walked back to meet their grandparents, who, like you, could just feel that they were greeted with so much love, balloons and everything.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

I met the boys late last summer as they were finishing their first week of school in Minnesota. Every day their grandparents greet them at the bus stop when they come home.

[Ahmed]

Hey. Hey, how you doing?

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

How is school? Their grandfather Ahmed has been showing and teaching them everything he can, from swimming to drawing to growing tomatoes. He says he's trying to make up for what they didn't get in the.

[Ahmed]

Camps, because they've never been in school, just was usually small classroom. They can attend school for one hour back there in Syria. But now they really appreciate it because every day is a new day to them. Going to school and learning things that they never saw actually or touch. So they love it.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

What kind of things would they not have touched?

[Ahmed]

A lot of things. Fruits, toys. The technology around them too.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

So they live near the boys school. We took a one floor elevator ride up to their apartment.

[Ahmed]

This is the apartment. Go ahead. You want to have a seat?

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

I'm confused to find a toddler also in the house. Ahmed, who's 56, tells me he and his wife, who's 48, had a surprise pregnancy a few years ago. So they're now parents to a three year old. And Ahmed tells me that little boy has a cute nickname in the house. That's your baby uncle.

[Ahmed's Wife]

Baby uncle, Brother Baba.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

The two older boys think it's funny they have an uncle who wears diapers. The grandkids arrived in the U.S. speaking mainly Arabic, but that's quickly changing. I asked them what classes they like in school.

[Ahmed's Wife]

English.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

And what toys?

[Ahmed's Wife]

Spiderman.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

And what shows they're watching.

[Ahmed's Wife]

Tom Jerry, Master Bean.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

They tell me their favorite English words so far are how are you? So we test that out.

[Ahmed]

How are you?

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Good. So I say, how are you?

[Ahmed's Wife]

You say, good.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

How are you?

[Ahmed's Wife]

How are you?

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Do you want to ask me?

[Ahmed's Wife]

Oh, good. You want to have him ask me? How are you?

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

I'm good, thank you. They like outdoor sports and indoor games. You can touch us.

[Ahmed]

Yeah, he's good at it.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

I ask them where they learn to play. They respond with an Arabic word. It means jail. They use that word a lot. It's what they call the place where they lived in Syria after their dad was taken away. They mention it casually. After all, it was their home for five years, the only home the younger one really remembers. When they describe what it was like, these little boys start matter of factly telling startling stories.

[Ahmed]

He said that he used to grab some erasers for crayons, put him in his pocket and later start chewing them like a chewing gum. Yeah. I said why? He said, because there was not enough food.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Chewing crayons and erasers because there wasn't enough food. They also described playtimes in Syria that were the opposite of American abundance.

[Ahmed]

Because over there we don't have toys, we don't have nothing to play with. Sometimes we just dig on the ground there, mix it with water and try to build something just like a toy or Something like that.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

The phone rings while I'm visiting. It's their father, Abdel Hamid. He was sentenced last year to 10 years in US federal prison. He often calls them from there.

[Ahmed's Wife]

You're dead on the phone.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Yo.

[Ahmed]

Hey.

[Ahmed's Wife]

Hello.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Hello.

[Ahmed's Wife]

Salaam alaikum.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

They say he calls every day, making them laugh with jokes about the baby uncle in diapers. When these two boys arrived in Minnesota last year, it turned their grandparents lives upside down. Both work. Their house is relatively small. They know the kids might need counseling someday to process everything they've gone through. But Ahmed and his wife say bringing these children into their home has brought them tremendous joy.

[Ahmed's Wife]

I feel like I'm. I'm more power. I'm more young, more. I'm not feel like I'm tired. I'm feeling.

[Ahmed]

We feel younger.

[Ahmed's Wife]

Yeah, we feel younger for these kids. I start playing with him. I start. Maybe the start time. I'm not with my kids. I do now with my grandkids.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

I did not expect that answer at all. I thought it was going to be that you were more tired, you were more.

[Ahmed]

No, we. After what happened, we got the good news. I mean, it's like a. What's the term? Rejuvenating. Rejuvenating, yes, that's the word. We feel that more energized than before.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

But kids are tiring, believe me.

[Ahmed's Wife]

Not like if you see kids coming from different country, what happened with him before, and you want to give him everything. You want to see him happy. I never shopping for my kids like I shopping for my grandkids. I'm serious.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Because you want to spoil them more or they.

[Ahmed]

This is how you express your joy. You know what I mean? Oh, finally we got them. It's like compensating ourselves and them. Whatever happened in the past, bad things that happened in the past, we just make them happy. And we are happy. We're really, really happy now to forget everything before.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Are they young enough that you think that's possible?

[Ahmed]

They know. They know now. They know the difference. And they love us more than anybody else because they know that we take care of them and we spoil them. We want to erase anything bad in their memories. May God help us, you know, to achieve that. Might I invite you to take your seats?

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

In Washington, D.C. last fall, officials from across the Middle East, Europe and Asia gathered to talk about the dangers posed by the roughly 35,000 people being held in Syrian camps.

[Ian Moss]

Good morning. Good morning, everybody.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Richard Verma was a deputy secretary at the U.S. state Department until January.

[Ian Moss]

More than 25,000 of the displaced persons are children growing up in dire conditions without access to education, opportunity or social support.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Some of those children are American. Some were born there. Others were brought to Syria and Iraq by their parents. So far, the United States has brought about 30American kids home from the camps, usually to live with family members. More than a dozen are still there. The US has also brought back American adults, some now in prison. But Verma says getting kids out is even more critical.

[Ian Moss]

As long as these children remain in the camps, the international community faces a serious humanitarian and a potential future security problem.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

The camps are heavily populated by the wives and widows of ISIS fighters, and many of those women remain loyal to isis. And because of that, there's concern they'll radicalize the children around them. Here's Peter Galbraith again.

[Peter Galbraith]

And the older the children get, the more likely that they're going to buy into the ideology there. And that's why it is so urgent to get the children out, get them out at a young age.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Some countries have resisted bringing home the children of ISIS fighters out of fear they could be a security threat. But Moss views those kids as innocent victims of poor decisions made by their parents. He says don't punish the children for the sins of their fathers. And he says if the camps aren't dismantled, they could produce future terrorists.

[Ian Moss]

People will continue to exist. You can pretend as if this is a problem somewhere else, but you don't know what the future holds. Like, that problem could be on your doorstep if you don't do anything about it.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

The US Is pushing other nations to reduce the number of people in the camps by taking back their citizens. The Trump administration's State Department calls that a high priority. And it says that's especially important due to the fall of the Assad regime in Syria, which has raised fears of a possible ISIS comeback. Ian Moss says the Minnesota family, Ahmed, his wife, and their grandchildren are a model success story so far.

[Ian Moss]

These two boys are now living with their grandparents and building lives and doing well. That we were able to keep a family together meant the United States was able to lead by example.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Galbraith, who helped get those boys home, agrees. He said this about the contrast between the two frightened children he met in Syria in 2022 and the ones he next saw again when he visited them in Minnesota last fall.

[Peter Galbraith]

Worlds apart. I mean, they were happy, they were well adjusted. You know, they were relaxed. I mean, you know, they were just healthy, normal boys. And it was wonderful, just completely wonderful.

[Ahmed's Wife]

2. Go ahead. Good numbers. 1. Uh huh. 2. 3.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Back on the outskirts of Minneapolis. The two grandkids are now 8 and 10 and are speaking more English. Every day. They proudly count the number of times they can kick a soccer ball to their grandparents.

[Ahmed's Wife]

Seven. Seven.

[Ahmed]

Oh, good.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

The grandparents told me that once their son Abdel Hamid is released from federal prison, they want him and their grandchildren to live with them under the same roof. And they say they are grateful for the United States government's efforts to reunite their family.

[Ahmed's Wife]

I know America work hard to bring my grandkids. It's working hard for this. Thank you so much.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

That reunification means their years of worry about their missing son and missing grandchildren are finally over.

[Ahmed]

We feel relieved now. We got our kids back and we got our grandkids back. I mean, life is beautiful now, to be honest.

[Ari Shapiro]

This episode was produced by Monika Evstatieva and Katherine Fink. It was edited by Barry Hardiman and Robert Little with audio engineering support from Robert River Rodriguez. Our executive producer is Sami Yenigun. It's Consider this from npr. I'm Ari Shapiro.

[Sacha Pfeiffer]

Shortwave thinks of science as an invisible force showing up in your everyday life, powering the food you eat, the medicine you use, the tech in your pocket. Science is approachable because it's already part of your life. Come explore these connections on the shortwave podcast from NPR. Politics is a lot these days. I'm Sarah McCammon, a co host of the NPR Politics Podcast, and I'll be the first to tell you, what happens in Washington definitely demands some decoding. That's why our show makes politics as easy as possible to wrap your head around. Join us as we make politics make sense on the NPR Politics Podcast, available wherever you get your podcasts. Want to hear this podcast without sponsor breaks? Amazon prime members can listen to Consider this sponsor free through Amazon Music.