“Hell is other people.”
“Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody is going … it's terrible!”
“You can't make a horse from a hundred rabbits, a hundred suspicions are not evidence.”
These powerful, desperate words are nestled on the pages of world -famous books and plays written by some of the most praised writers of history.
But they are also plastered on a wall in one of the most notorious refugee camps in Syria, just outside the tent where the British ISIS -Bride Shamima Begum has been getting away for years.
Mrs Begum left her family in London ten years ago to become a member of the Islamic State in Syria – a journey that made her the most notorious teenager of the UK.
The 25-year-old is now campaigning to be repatriated back to stand in the UK-IMIGHT what the Kurdish-led authorities of the camp say is the responsibility of the British government.
Instead, the government has withdrawn its passport and urged it effectively near the 'Roj' camp of Syria, where thousands of foreigners who register to join the terror group are held.
With her chances of ever seeing the British coasts slim again for no one, it seems that Mrs. Begum has changed the wall outside her tent into a canvas for virulent graffiti.
The words that have been scribbled over the dusty mortar can offer a look at the state of mind of the former ISIS bride while in an outdoor prison that offers neither escape or hope.
I recently traveled to Camp Roj in the hope of meeting Mrs. Begum, and I saw the first hand the wall of graffiti when I tried her out of the tent in Cajole to talk to me.
The wall outside the tent where the British ISIS -Bride Shamima Begum has been in Camp Roj for years
Shamima Begum lives in a Syrian refugee camp with thousands of foreign ISIS hunters waiting to be repatriated
MailOnline's most important foreign reporter David Averre can be seen moments after he has been rejected by Shamima Begum after a short conversation
Shamima Begum is held indefinitely in Camp Roj, in the northeastern province of Hasakeh in Syria
The words are uneven – some vague, some scribbled, others printed deep into the face of the sun.
There is anger in them, exhaustion and even humor, clearly from one note that reads: 'Pies Welcome (LOL)'.
But above all the messages reveal a dark feeling of despair – a result of reflection on the idea that she can never run free again.
Irritated at the top of the wall, sitting above all, the quote 'Hell is other people' -a famous rule of the 'no exit' game by Jean -Paul Sartre in which three people are punished in the hereafter, locked up in one Room together for eternity.
A few centimeters away, another sentence reflects her pinch – “Nothing happens, nobody comes, nobody is going, it's terrible!” – A quote from 'Waiting for Godot' by Samuel Beckett, himself a meditation about the uselessness of hope.
However, other messages are slightly less in -depth and loaded with Expletives.
“F ***!” – One message is, with a second word erased, apparently through a stone that violently scraped back and forth against the wall.
Then there is a paradox.
A 'co-ex-exist' drawing-de 'o' transformed into the universal pigeon-and-hi-and-live branch symbol for peace-in-case, almost outdated inscription of the word 'Daesh', the Arab acronym for ISIS whose members remain in hell Sitting when building an Islamic caliphate without tolerance for another religion.
Is this a rejection of the ideology that she once embraced – or perhaps a reluctant recognition of the inescapable shadow cast by the black flag of the extremist group?
I was desperate to find out, but unfortunately Mrs Begum refused to tell me.
Initially I expected that I would meet her in a small outbuilding at the entrance of the camp, but she knocked the door in my face when she heard that I was a journalist.
After I had given her some time to cool down, I approached her tent in a final attempt to convince her. Her reaction was short, but final.
“No thank you, bye!”
Although I was unable to share a good conversation with MS Begum, the messages in the stone wall next to her living rooms speak, speak volumes about her position.
She is just one of the tens of thousands of people who traveled from Great -Britain, the US and many other Western countries to join ISIS and build their caliphate after being swept into propaganda that promised a utopian Islamic state.
Within a few months it was married to a colleague Buitlands ISIS -member – Dutchman Yago Riedijk – and gave birth to three children, all of whom died in their infancy.
For years her place of residence was unknown, but in 2019 she was discovered by journalists In Camp Al -Hol -Syria's largest refugee camp with displaced ISIS hunters after the group was defeated.
MailOnline's most important foreign reporter David Averre speaks with Shamima Begum outside her tent
Shamima Begum will be seen in 2019 shortly after her British citizenship has been withdrawn
Shamima Begum can be seen in Camp Roj
People stand in a row in Camp Roj, where family members of people who are suspected belong to the Islamic State group (IS) are held in the northeastern province of Hasakah in Syria on October 8, 2023
At that time she expressed little or no regrets for her decision to become a member of the terror group, which notorious described the bomb attack in Manchester Arena as 'justified' – a remark that public indignation stuck at home.
She was controversial stripped of her British citizenship by the then Foreign Minister Sajid Javid and left eagerly in Camp al-Holol.
Now 25 years old, Begum lives in the ROJ camp -a facility reserved for foreign ISIS members who are supposed to have been declared that is separated from the gigantic Al -hol.
She closed her hijab, adopted Western clothing and now claims to give up her extremist ideals, longing for a return to the UK.
She acknowledged that she would be confronted with terror costs and probably a long prison sentence.
But her calls fell on deaf ears.
The British government has refused to take it back, with reference to security risks and in August 2024 the Supreme Court made its final decision after an appeal by its lawyers – Begum is not allowed to return.
Since then she has refused to talk to Western media, almost without exception.
In the meantime, her lawyers have said that they will approach the European Court of Human Rights in a final attempt to reclaim its British citizenship.
If that fails, there is no prospect of being repatriated.
Mrs Begum's frustration with her legal misery is encapsulated on her wall of graffiti by a quote from the crime and punishment of Fyodor Dostoyevski: “You can't make a horse from a hundred rabbits, make a hundred suspicions no evidence.”
This was a clear remark for me about her many years of struggle to regain her citizenship and the unanimous judgments that had been thrown against her, thereby sealing her fate in Camp Roj's dust.
Now she is neither free or trapped. She is not tried, nor is she confronted with charges.
Instead, she is simply trapped in a purgatory where time no longer seems linear and unfolds in the same way day after day.
Shamima Begum refuses to talk to MailOnline Reporter from Achter 'Wall of Despair'
People walk around in Camp Roj, where family members of people who are suspected of it are (IS) are held, in the countryside near Al-Malikiyah (Derik) in the northeastern province of Hasakah on October 8, 2023
Both al-HOL and ROJ-Kampen are located in the province of Hasakeh of Northeast Syria in a democratic, autonomous region called Rojava, founded by the Kurds of Syria, whose Syrian Democratic troops were the most important ally of the international coalition that ISIS defeated .
Shamima Begum is just one of the tens of thousands of people from the UK, Europe and beyond who are held in Al-Hol and Roj, as well as other improvised prisons dedicated to adult male ISIS hunters.
For the authorities in Rojava, officially known as the autonomous administration of North and East Syria (ATES), this is an untenable situation.
They claim that their region cannot bear the burden of monitoring thousands of foreign prisoners for an indefinite period of time, many of whom still adhere to the ideology of ISIS.
They warn that these camps are incubators for radicalization where extremist networks continue to work, indoctrinate children and reinforce loyalty to the caliphate.
“We want our partners in the international community, who fought with us against ISIS, did not forget the sacrifices that our people have made,” said Jihan Hanan, co-chairman and main manager of Al-Hol Camp.
“The case of Al-Hol (and Roj Camp) is directly connected to the case of ISIS.”
The authorities of Rojava say they have limited means to guarantee the safety of these camps, while ISIS slap cells remain active in Syria and Iraq, waiting for a chance of freeing prisoners and restoring their uprising.
Now, with the region that is confronted with external threats from Turkey, Turkish-steering militant groups and perhaps even the new rulers of Syria, the Kurds warn that they cannot hold the line forever.
Their message to the West is clear – these prisoners are not only their problem and must be the responsibility of the nations where they came from.
If repatriation does not happen, the camps will continue to feed extremism and one day they will explode in an ISIS rehearsal that could not only threaten the middle, but also the rest of the world.
