The Interrogator’s Perspective: An Interview with “Abu Seif Maqus”

No matches

This narrative is based on testimony given by an investigator in the Hisba Diwan during ISIS rule over the city of Raqqa in Syria. His role is confirmed by interrogation reports signed in his name as well as audio recordings of interrogations. These documents were obtained by the ISIS Prisons Museum.

The interrogator’s nom de guerre was “Abu Seif”, or “Abu Seif Maqus”[1]. Some of the former detainees who were interrogated by him and endured his cruelty refer to him simply as “the criminal”. He won these titles by his involvement in torture and punitive violence. This text refrains from mentioning his true name, adhering to ethical standards.

Abu Seif was born in Raqqa in 1990. He pledged allegiance to ISIS and joined the organization’s ranks in 2015 at the age of 25. During his time in the organization he instilled fear in the citizens of his own city. Perhaps the motivations for his behavior lie in hidden aspects of his life, parts of which he reveals to us in this testimony.

When ISIS retreated from Raqqa, Abu Seif was captured and then detained in one of the prisons run by the Autonomous Authority of North East Syria (AANES). This was where the ISIS Prisons Museum (IPM) interviewed him extensively. The interview was recorded on video. The main objective of the interview was to delve deeper into the world of ISIS, to obtain further details about the prisons in which he worked, and to learn more about the activities of the Hisba Diwan and its interventions into the lives of Raqqa’s inhabitants. The interview also explores Abu Seif’s personal life story from childhood on.

This text reflects Abu Seif’s account of events. A degree of skepticism is necessary, however, when considering the stories he tells. This is either because they do not align with the testimonies of numerous former detainees, or because they contradict information he himself provides in other parts of the interview. It has not been possible to verify some of the details mentioned.

The text covers Abu Seif’s biography from his childhood, moving through his mandatory military service under the Assad regime, his recruitment into ISIS, his work with the organization, and finally his arrest by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

“They called me Abu Seif Hisba, Abu Seif Police, Abu Seif Maqus. My son’s name is Seifallah, and thus I became known as Abu Seifallah. In the organization’s records, I was listed as Abu Seif al-Ansari, and Abu Seif al-Raqqawi. They also nicknamed me ‘Anti-Aircraft’ because the Islamic Police Emir once assigned me to stand behind a machine gun.”

Misery and Military Service

Abu Seif recounts that his family settled in a village in the Raqqa countryside after his grandfather had fled his native village due to a tribal vendetta. The family was poor and owned no land. When Abu Seif was about 12 years old, in 2002, he began working alongside his family as a day laborer on a farm. From 2006, he worked as a tiler in construction workshops. In 2009, he was conscripted into the Syrian Army for his mandatory military service.

Transferred to Damascus to perform his service, Abu Seif carried with him a medical report stating that he had undergone five or six operations on his chest three years earlier. He was therefore classified as a person suffering from a chronic medical condition, and was assigned to a military base in a well-known area of the capital. He served there for about two months. During that time, he fell and broke several bones. He was sent to a military hospital where metal plates were inserted into his body. Later, a fight broke out between him and other conscripts. A female officer witnessed the altercation, and screamed at the conscripts. “Perhaps because the order came from a woman, I had a nervous breakdown,” Abu Seif said. “I charged at her, and I was arrested. My illness was the source of my anger, and they diagnosed me with trauma in the psychiatric hospital. So I was jailed for 16 days, and instead of being sent to Tadmur Prison, my military service was extended by four months.”

Abu Seif was still enlisted when the Syrian revolution erupted in March 2011, and he played his part in suppressing protests. He says of that period: “I was pro-regime, and against the protesters, because I was a soldier in its army, and I saw everything. The protesters accused the army of killing and beating, but honestly, the regime never ordered us to shoot civilians or to open fire on them. We didn’t even have ammunition, not a single bullet. The protesters would provoke us, calling us dogs and other insults. Once I told the officer, ‘Give me the order, and give me anything, even a stick, and I’ll jump over the wall and break them.'”

After his discharge from the army, Abu Seif tried to return to his previous work as a tiler and construction worker, but he was unable to due to his obesity. At the time he weighed 130 kilograms. This, added to the effects of his past surgeries and bone fractures, disabled him.

Various opposition militias, known collectively as the Free Syrian Army, emerged during this period when the popular uprising against the Syrian regime was met by violence. Abu Saif was not impressed. “Honestly, I never believed in the Free Syrian Army,” he says. “As for ISIS, I was convinced by it when I saw it, and I swore allegiance. Maybe I won’t be believed when I say I did it for the money. I was a day laborer before, and my daily wage was 200 Syrian pounds [about three US dollars], and our house was 100 square meters. We were five young men and three girls, with no land. What else could I do? Then ISIS came along, and it gave things. It gave you money, it gave you a house, and other things too. So you were encouraged, and swore allegiance.”

Abu Seif reflects on his decision to join the organisation in a monologue, saying: “If you want to work in Lebanon, you can’t. There, they ask you: ‘Where are you from? From Raqqa? Then you’re ISIS.’ Here in Syria, the regime army arrests you and sends you back to compulsory military service to die on one of the front lines against the protesters. We have relatives in Saudi Arabia, but you need money to get a visa and go there.”

From Training Camp to “Islamic Police”

The Syrian Revolution was a response to the Assad regime’s oppression of the Syrian people over four decades. Initially a peaceful movement, the revolution soon militarised. Brigades formed with various names and affiliations, familial, regional, or tribal. Abu Seif made friendships with many of those who joined the opposition brigades that formed in Raqqa province.

Seeking to justify his affiliation to ISIS, Abu Seif in his interview with the IPM nevertheless mocks these brigades. He scorns a neighbor for forming a brigade named after his home neighborhood, and another person who created and led his own private militia. He describes ISIS as a much more organized force.

He says he joined ISIS through the recruitment office set up in Raqqa. Then he spent 45 days in an ISIS camp in the city of Tabqa. The camp schedule consisted of two parts. The first was religious, in which recruits were taught the organization’s interpretation of Islamic law, and lasted 22 days. The second part was military, and again lasted for 22 days. Then Abu Seif was assigned to the “guest houses” in which ISIS gathered its fighters before sending them to the front.

But Abu Seif did not go to the frontlines. Instead he served in the ISIS “Islamic Police” eastern section, Raqqa province, though he downplays the importance of his role there. The police headquarters at the time was an old building that had previously housed a government administrative office. To make his role seem less significant, Abu Seif claims he had merely been a driver for the police patrols that ISIS occasionally sent out to cover personnel shortages at the checkpoints. Among the checkpoints he says he was sent to was the “Raqqa Province checkpoint”, also known as the “Maqas” checkpoint, located in a region of the same name. He mentions another checkpoint in the al-Mushallab area, but adds, “Of course, I didn’t go there.”

He narrows down his work in the Islamic Police to handling quarrels, thefts, and financial disputes. As an example, he says, “Someone is owed a debt by another person, so they come to the Hisba office and file a complaint about the person who owes them but hasn’t paid. The office staff then prepare a report stating that the debtor must come to the police office, and the report is sent to them. If they don’t show up, they are notified again. If they fail to show up once more, a third and final written notice, in red, is sent to warn them: ‘If you don’t show up, we will kill you.’ If the person still doesn’t show, the police office sends a patrol to bring them in.” Abu Seif emphasizes that his role was solely to deliver notices to those against whom complaints were filed.

From Islamic Police to the Hisba Diwan

Abu Seif recounts a specific incident from his time in the Islamic Police. During a patrol through eastern Raqqa, the force encountered a young man sitting on a street corner next to a motorcycle. The officers knew the man was a motorcycle thief, so they asked him, “Is this yours?” The man hesitated before replying, “I don’t know.” The police officers then beat him until he could no longer walk. Afterwards they took him to their base where they detained him. The next day a court representative, a man from the Arabian Peninsula, examined the young man. When he saw the condition he was in, he demanded to know who had beaten him.

Abu Seif mentions that this incident led to the punishment (ta’zir) of all the patrol members. Ta’zir is a term used by ISIS meaning “discretionary punishment”, which can take various forms, including beating or imprisonment. Although Abu Seif claims he did not participate in the beating of the young man, he was still subjected to ta’zir, and as a result he was transferred from the Islamic Police to the Hisba Diwan. This claim appears to contradict his later statement that Hisba officers were superior in status and morality to those in the Islamic Police.

Abu Seif implicitly praises the prisons of the Hisba Diwan. He says that unlike the ISIS “security” prisons, the Hisba prisons did not use such severe torture methods as shabah —the practice of hanging prisoners by their wrists for long periods and beating them – or balingo – suspending them from a mechanical hoist. “Honestly,” he says, “the Hisba prisons are much better than the other prisons I’ve been to.”

Hisba Factions, Ranks, and Conflicts

Documents obtained by the ISIS Prisons Museum reveal that Abu Seif worked at Raqqa’s Panorama Prison and Muawiyah School Prison. Yet he denies having worked at the Panorama Prison, confirming only that he had visited it once looking for his younger brother, who had been arrested by ISIS before he joined. When the interviewer insists that documents confirm his employment there, Abu Seif reluctantly admits to the fact, then quickly shifts the conversation to the Muawiyah School Prison.

Abu Seif classifies the factions within the Hisba Diwan and its affiliated prisons as follows:

  1. The Mujahideen group, whom he says “left everything behind and came to fight.” He specifically mentions the “Libyans and Tunisians.”
  2. The Iraqi group, whom he categorizes as “people of strength and severity,” adding that they were also “warlike.”
  3. The Jazrawi group – that is, those from the Arabian peninsula – whom he calls the “legislators,” because they were “people of knowledge and learning.”
  4. The Syrian group, whom he considers the “weakest” of these factions.

He explains the relations between these factions as follows: “All orders came from Iraq, which was the real source of power. As for the Syrians, whom we call “Shami” when one of them was appointed as an emir, his seal of office would be placed in the hands of someone of lower rank, and someone else would be tasked with overseeing him.” He gives the example of a man from Aleppo who was appointed as the emir of the Hisba Diwan, though he was elderly. He had only limited religious knowledge, which he had acquired during his residence in one of the Gulf countries. His deputy, however, was a man from the Arabian peninsula, as was his superior.

Abu Seif says the conflicts between the “Jazrawis” and the Iraqis were limited to competition over leadership positions, claiming they often exchanged words like, “I’m more deserving, older, or knowledgeable than you, so I should hold the emir position.” He adds that many people lost faith in the Islamic State due to these conflicts.

He gives an account of what happened during the siege of the last ISIS strongholds in Baghouz, where “a real fight broke out between the Jazrawis and the Iraqis, causing chaos, but the Iraqis soon took control of the matter in the Islamic Police, Security, and Army.”

The External Front

Abu Seif distinguishes between the work, powers, and responsibilities of the muhtasibs (or enforcers) in the Hisba Diwan on the one hand, and the work of the Islamic Police on the other. He also distinguishes between the muhtasib and the police, and between the security and intelligence apparatus, as follows:

  • Muhtasibs (Hisba Diwan): Their main task was to monitor people’s behavior, including their appearance, clothing, speech, and performance of religious duties, and to note any violations of the rules imposed by the Hisba Diwan.
  • Islamic Police: Their role was to deal with disputes, fights, and thefts occurring among the public.
  • Security and Intelligence Apparatus: Their work was purely security-focused, and their agents were scattered among the general public as well as among the organization’s own apparatus. They were able to intervene in the affairs of the Hisbah Diwan, the Islamic Police, the Army, and all other Diwans.

Abu Seif attributes exceptional qualities to the work of the muhtasib, noting that anyone who violated the Hisba Diwan’s orders was dismissed from their position and moved to the Islamic Police or the army, and was strictly prohibited from returning to work as a muhtasib after that. He says that the importance and “elevation” of the muhtasib within the organization was because this position represented the “external front” of ISIS, and was the “guide to the straight path” in people’s daily lives. In other words, the muhtasib was a guardian ensuring that people did not deviate from the path laid out for them by ISIS. He adds that the muhtasib was obliged to speak “with respect and politeness” rather than shouting or cursing at the violators. This was to avoid tarnishing the image of the Hisba Diwan.

Abu Seif also notes that the Hisba Diwan’s management prohibited its enforcers from wearing their official uniforms when not at work. This was to prevent them from using the authority vested in the uniform to dominate or extort from people.

Arrest and Imprisonment Procedures

When asked about the procedures followed for detainees in the Hisba Diwan’s prisons, Abu Seif forgot that he had previously denied working as an investigator. He explained how detainees were first brought to prison and interrogated, giving an example of someone arrested for smoking cigarettes: “The muhtasib hands the offender over to a guard standing at the entrance to the Hisba office. The guard leads the person to a clerk sitting in the office. The clerk asks: ‘What’s your story?’ The detainee answers: ‘Well, Sheikh, they caught me smoking in the street.’ The clerk writes the case report: ‘A smoker detained until the appearance of the sharia judge in the afternoon.’ When the judge arrives, he orders the detainee to be flogged 10 to 20 times. If the prison is overcrowded, the judge shortens the sentence, ordering only five to ten lashes, then releases the detainee after he writes a pledge not to smoke again.”

Abu Seif continues, “After the clerk, the investigator interrogates the detainee and sends the case to the judge. The judge, in turn, has investigators, a prosecutor, a court official, a prison, and jailers.” He adds, “The detainees of the Hisba Diwan are placed in the prison on a provisional basis. The investigators’ reports go to the sharia judge.”

Abu Seif then goes on to recall the work of an investigator into hashish-related offenses, saying, “When someone is arrested for smoking hashish, we ask them in the investigation where they got it from, so we can pursue those trafficking it. In court, a hashish smoker is usually sentenced to 80 lashes and 10 days in prison, in addition to a sharia course in prison, after which they receive their personal identification card again.”

He concluded this part of his testimony by mentioning two Hisba commanders he knew. One was “Yusuf bin Saleh al-Arabi” and the other, who was “large and dark-faced, was “Abu Ali al-Sudani”. Abu Ali was transferred from the Hisba Diwan to become the head of the Dawa (preaching) Diwan in late 2016. Abu Seif believes that problems arose between him and higher-ranking commanders, which led to his removal from the Hisba Diwan and his eventual transfer to Tadmur, where he was killed.

Recruitment of Detainees

Abu Seif speaks about what he calls, in the language of ISIS, “al-Rasad”. The term refers to informants. “They would come to us at the Hisba office, voluntarily and freely, wanting to join. And when someone moved from another government apparatus to the Hisba, they would boast and show off.”

The informants were often “poor, destitute, and would report cigarette smugglers in exchange for 1,000 Syrian pounds (less than two dollars during Abu Seif’s time with the organization).” “The people from the Jazira (the Arabian peninsula) and Libya in the Hisba were the most skillful in recruiting informants, persuading them, and receiving reports from them.”

Abu Seif also describes how ISIS agents and fighters were recruited from among the Hisba Diwan’s detainees, explaining that “they were encouraged to join by the good treatment of their jailers, or by witnessing public executions displayed on screens in the prisons, or by a religious call from an ISIS member urging them to jihad. A detainee would say, ‘Okay, I will wage jihad,’ and their sentence would be reduced to three days, after which they would join us.”

Food in Hisba Prisons

Regarding the feeding of Hisba prisoners, Abu Seif recalled that “the task of bringing food from restaurants was assigned to one of the administrators before a kitchen was established in the Diwan. It was managed by someone named Abu Ibrahim, who would ask the jailer every day about the number of prisoners who would prepare food. The jailer would often give him a number higher than the actual count in case new prisoners arrived.”

Abu Seif says that the detainees initially received three meals a day. Lunch usually consisted of a dish of kabsa (rice with meat). “The prisoners would even wish to return to prison after being released, saying: ‘We can’t eat kabsa at home like the one we get in prison.'”

As for the food eaten by the Hisba members, “The locals from Raqqa received a dollar and a half to buy a simple lunch. Meanwhile, people thought we ate kabsa with meat and rice, which was reserved for the men from the Arabian peninsula, whom we often referred to as ‘Abu Kabsa.’ Each of them also received a remittance of 10 to 20 Saudi riyals.”

Public Executions and Executioners

Abu Seif repeatedly denies that there was harsh torture in Hisba prisons. When it is put to him that people who had been in these prisons had named prisoners who had been killed inside, as well as others who had been executed in the streets of Raqqa, he responds, “This happened openly, right before your eyes, in front of the people, and no one could deny the scenes of beheadings in the streets. The goal was to scare and terrorize the people.”

He justifies public executions by claiming they prevented corruption among the people, and offers an example: “When a thief’s hand is cut off in the market, spectators say, ‘We won’t steal, so that we avoid this fate.’ As for the prisoners, most of them would request to have screens set up in the prisons to display public executions because they enjoyed watching them. It showed another face of the state.” In this way, he says, “We tell the people that we don’t compromise, and we’re not that easy, but we also have other things, like religious lessons, for example.”

He adds that “scenes of beheadings made a state like Raqqa stand on one leg.” This refers to the terror that public executions caused among the people. He quickly interjects his favorite word, “honestly,” and then says, “In the prisons, it was different; we used to serve the best food to the prisoners, like kabsa with rice and meat.”

After rapidly shifting from talking about public execution and its benefits to praising the cooking in the prisons, Abu Seif speaks about the executions conducted in the organization’s prisons, away from the public gaze. He claims that only members of the organization were executed in prison, saying, “If it was reported that a muhtasib had taken a single lira as a bribe, an order would come from the judge to execute him, because he had taken that lira with the state’s sword, which is used for execution. And a state soldier who takes a bribe to allow cigarette smuggling is considered a traitor to the trust and is arrested by the military police and sentenced to death.”

According to his testimony, public execution orders were issued by the judge of the Supreme Sharia Court of the province, along with a judicial committee consisting of several judges who reviewed whether the investigation was valid and whether the verdict aligned with the teachings of the Qur’an and Sunnah. This committee would then send a report for review to the Sharia Judge of the Levant, who was unknown to most. He would then send the case to the Research and Fatwa Commission, which would forward it to the Caliphate Diwan in Iraq for final approval.

Abu Seif denies popular rumors about the immediate execution of beheadings and hand-cuttings, saying: “Honestly (these verdicts) were not executed without the knowledge of those in charge in the state, and not outside their precise hierarchy. People think these processes take a long time, but these bodies and their leaders are in Raqqa, and the papers move quickly between them, without anyone knowing about it.”

Of the judges who issued death sentences, Abu Seif mentioned one, saying he was “from the Arabian peninsula and was named Abu Ma’an.” He continues, “These judges are untouchable. They move from place to place and change their names. One of them could be in Deir ez-Zor, for example, and months later he might move to Raqqa using a new name.”

As for the executor of public beheadings and hand-cuttings in Raqqa, Abu Seif says, “People thought he was Tunisian, but he was actually from Aleppo. He was endorsed by the emir al-Adnani. The person who performs these acts must be specialized and experienced. The execution is filmed and shared with the media. The state and the caliphate cannot have someone whose hands or legs shake when delivering the final blow to someone’s neck.”

When asked if he was ever asked to execute a detainee, he quickly responded, “Even if I was asked to do so, honestly, I couldn’t. It’s true that I was a soldier of the state, but honestly, no one dares to carry out an execution. When you’re told to execute with a single shot, the man’s family might come to you after his death and accuse you. I said that the one who carries out these operations is an expert, and he was endorsed by Emir al-Adnani.”

A Dialogue on Whipping and Execution

The interviewer confronts Abu Seif with many incidents of killing, whipping, and other harsh punishments that were attributed to him, but he denies them entirely, saying these accusations are motivated by people’s hatred toward him. Here the dialogue regarding these allegations is presented. Adhering to professional standards, the full names of the victims are redacted in order to respect their privacy and that of their families.

Interviewer: How did Sheikh (M.), known among the people of Raqqa, die?
Abu Seif: I don’t know.
Interviewer: His family and neighbors say he was killed under your watch in the Hisba Diwan.
Abu Seif: If he was killed under my watch, let a bullet be put in my head. When the man died, I had not yet joined ISIS.
Interviewer: Documents suggest that he suffered a heart attack during torture at your Hisba base.
Abu Seif: This is absolutely untrue. A closer look at the documents confirms they executed him. The court sentenced him to death. I am from Raqqa. When someone was whipped in al-Naim Square, I knew, and everyone else knew. And anyone who doesn’t know that cannot have been in Raqqa. They will say I was the masked person who executed him. Yes, I was in the Hisba and in the police force, but I didn’t change my title like others who changed their titles many times.
Interviewer: What about your neighbor (C.)? What happened to him?
Abu Seif: They say I arrested people, went on patrols, had a white car, that I was the emir of intelligence in the province, and an investigator too! Has Abu Seif become an octopus? As for this neighbor of mine, did I kill him? Did they say Abu Seif killed him? Yes, his wife died from a heart attack after the organization executed her children and the children of her brothers. A report came to the Hisba about people playing cards in her house with her husband, so we raided the house, and she fainted and died. The neighbors started saying Abu Seif… Abu Seif. I have absolutely no relation to it.
Interviewer: Did you participate in the stoning of people accused of adultery?
Abu Seif: No.
Interviewer: Didn’t you cut off the hand of someone from the Hazima area?
Abu Seif: That was the work of the judicial police. The screams recorded in my voice, yes, they are in my voice, but they were acting. During interrogations, one of us would be harsh and shout to scare those we were questioning, while the other investigator would act calmly and speak with them quietly. When I would shout and interrogate, the other investigator, Abu Hudhayfah, was the one writing. In investigations, there should always be at least two investigators, and sometimes three.
Interviewer: What about Dr. (K.)? Do you know him?
Abu Seif: They say we beat him and stoned him, but I have never heard his name before.
Interviewer: And Dr. (N.)?
Abu Seif: I don’t know her.
Interviewer: You whipped Dr. (H.) 400 lashes, and there are hundreds of names of people who suffered the same fate.
Abu Seif: There is a Hisba department called the medical Hisba. A person like me, ignorant of these matters, is forbidden from speaking to a doctor in it. No patrol is allowed to do so either. Only the medical Hisba handles violations by doctors, and it was headed by Talha al-Jazrawi. In the organization, we always searched for doctors. I’m the one who saw the wounded in battles and couldn’t find a doctor to help them, so how could Abu Seif interrogate or beat a doctor?
Interviewer: You supervised the flogging of Dr. (K.) with 400 lashes.
Abu Seif: Me… Abu Seif?!
Interviewer: And Dr. (N.) and her husband, did you participate in stoning them?
Abu Seif: How did you find out about that? If I had participated, I would have said so. I once stood by as a spectator during the flogging or execution of someone in al-Naim Square. Does this mean that Abu Seif was the one who stoned and executed, and who ruled for stoning and execution? Yes, I did carry out flogging once or twice, but that was it.

Interviewer: Why do people accuse you of all these things?
Abu Seif: Yes, I did arrest people, and I participated in patrols. I’m human, and I liked that. I liked acting as if I were a leader. Yes, I could scream for hours, but I don’t know how to write. I can still remember the place where I worked frying falafel when I was nine years old, without finishing sixth grade in school. If I were good at writing and was asked to interrogate, I would have done it. I like to interrogate, but they wouldn’t accept me as an interrogator. That’s because I had been a drunkard in the past and smoked hashish… So how could I become an emir in the state?

The Security Apparatus and Mass Graves

In his testimony about the burial of those executed or beheaded by ISIS, Abu Seif recounts, “I, like others in the Hisba, would hear that masked men had placed the bodies in a vehicle belonging to the Sharia Court or the security apparatus, without us being allowed to inquire about their destination. I don’t know if they were buried in mass graves.” He suggests that ISIS, “wasn’t capable of hiding these bodies and graves, because the families and tribes from which these individuals came wouldn’t remain silent about their loved ones’ fate. Raqqa’s tribes are powerful and influential both within and outside the organization. How could any group, no matter how many masked men or weapons they have, deter the major tribes of Raqqa province?”

Regarding the mass graves dug by the organization near the Sharia Court, in Panorama Square, and in the al-Fakhikha area in Raqqa, where bodies were layered, Abu Seif explains,
“These graves were dug and filled during the siege imposed by the Global Coalition on Raqqa. At that time, we would dig trenches in front of houses, and sometimes we’d tear up the tiles in the rooms to bury the bodies of those killed. We would then cover them up, to prevent the smell of decomposing bodies from spreading.” He continues, “When we were in the al-Hajin area (Deir ez-Zor province), a young man told me that about 4,500 people had been killed in massacres committed by the Global Coalition’s heavy bombing. But there were no prisoners among the dead, because we had released them from the prisons before the Coalition’s siege on Raqqa.”

However, in another part of the conversation, Abu Seif mentions the killings carried out by the ISIS security apparatus, saying, “We don’t know who, how, why, or when the security personnel arrested and killed. We know they arrested people from our area and neighborhood, and those arrested never returned to their homes. They were definitely killed and buried in mass graves, just like those killed by the Global Coalition’s bombing.”

Anu Seif absolves the Hisbah Diwan and the Islamic Police of responsibility for the beheadings of those bodies discovered in mass graves, as well as the thousands detained in ISIS prisons whose fate remained unknown. However, he says, “The organization’s security apparatus and those responsible for its hidden prisons may have been the ones who carried this out. Whoever is arrested by the security apparatus is not the one who interrogates. Those who interrogate are not the ones who judge. Those who judge are not the ones who execute the sentence and kill. Those who execute are not the ones who bury. The task of the security patrols is to arrest, but their members are prohibited from asking the detainees any questions.”

As for the “Hotta pit” near Tal Abyad, Abu Seif claims that both the Free Syrian Army and ISIS threw bodies into it. “This is public knowledge that everyone knows. For instance, Abu Isa, a leader of one of the organization’s brigades, threw bodies into it. Everyone competed in doing that.”

The Massacre of Rebellious Judges

Abu Seif lists several prisons where, according to him, Global Coalition airstrikes killed prisoners, including a prison in the Mayadeen area and another in the al-Shafa area, both in Deir ez-Zor province.

He also names members of the organization who were killed by Coalition airstrikes: “Among them was Abu Islam al-Omri, whom I knew, and was with us in the Hisba previously. He was killed when the Coalition bombed the Mayadeen Prison. Another was Abu Ali, whom I also knew. He was from Raqqa and was a member of the organization; he was killed by a strike in the al-Shafa area. There was also Abu Hamza al-Sahrawi, a Tunisian, and a senior cleric in the organization, well-known by everyone in Raqqa, who was also killed by the Coalition’s bombing, along with 10 to 15 judges known for their authority and influence.”

Abu Seif confirms that what he calls a “security breach” led to the killing of all these men in one location. He attributes the breach to the organization’s security apparatus desiring to eliminate them after a dispute, “because the information they possessed formed the organization’s archive on the state’s affairs and activities.” He explains, “The judges who were killed in the Coalition airstrike had abandoned their work and positions, saying: ‘Either our rulings and orders are obeyed, or there is no judiciary in the state, nor a security apparatus, as long as this apparatus works alone, independently from the judiciary.'”

The Final Struggle

In the final part of his testimony, Abu Seif describes ISIS as it entered its final phase: “Those of us in the Hisba and other Diwans moved into military work. Administrative tasks ceased during the Coalition bombing and war against us. The state was militarized, and everyone was under the command of the military and security forces. The application of judicial rulings stopped, including punishments like flogging and execution. As for the prisoners, they were transferred from the prisons under tight security measures a month before the Coalition’s siege.”

Abu Seif recounts his departure from Raqqa four months before the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) took control of the city in 2017. He emphasizes that he “didn’t flee,” saying, “I left on a mission assigned to me by the organization in al-Midan (in the Raqqa countryside). I intended to return and fight for the city, to defend it. But the roads leading to it were blocked.”

According to this narrative, Abu Seif joined a military rehabilitation camp in Hama, justifying it by his previous injuries. He then joined the “mukhabbat” and later the Omar al-Shishani Brigade, which he says was prepared for infiltration operations after leaving Raqqa. He adds, “The Omar al-Shishani Brigade had anti-aircraft weapons. They later merged with a brigade called the Support Brigade. When they attached me to the mortar section, I refused because our mortar shells were homemade and might explode before they were launched. As for the task of bomb-making, I was afraid of it. So, I told them to send me to any section, and they chose me for infiltration operations that everyone else avoided. I knew the person in charge of these operations preferred agile individuals, and that didn’t apply to me because of my previous injuries.”

Abu Seif spent three months in al-Midan, where the organization had brigades named al-Muthanna and Ribat Khalid. According to him, after six days of fighting between the two brigades and the Syrian army and the SDF, they were besieged. “Artillery bombarded us heavily from the ground, and planes targeted us from the air. We fled in boats until we reached Mayadeen, which fell nine days later, and then we finally withdrew to Baghouz.”

Abu Seif’s Language and Abu Satif’s Dream

Abu Seif was later arrested by the SDF, and he is currently held in one of their prisons. Describing his current situation, he employs a monologue, shifting between speaking to himself and addressing an absent interlocutor. He wonders, “What does a prisoner feel and experience? Of course, they want to leave prison. One of us would ask the other: When was the last time you saw your wife in a dream? Your wife or your mother. Imagine not knowing the date or the days. You can’t speak with your friend beside you.”

This former investigator in ISIS prisons believes that the prison in which he is now detained is harsher and more cruel than any prison he has seen before. He says he loses morale every day and suffers psychologically from the conditions.

Regarding his family, he says, “I don’t know anything about them now. I married a woman with six children, whom I took in because they were orphans. We had two more children together. When the coalition bombed Baghouz, the children were killed, except for one boy and one girl.”

Throughout the conversation, it was clear that the language used by ISIS—their terminology, rulings, imagination, and worldview—still fills the mind of the former investigator and interrogator. It lingers in his words and phrases, even though he spent less than two years (2015–2017) in the organization.

  1. Maqus is the name of an area at the entrance to Raqqa city.