Were here to discuss the book guesthouse for young widow. This is not her first book. Shes a fantastic writer and journalist have been written for Time Magazine for engagements across before publishing first book, she also is coauthor of an awakening, and conversation with her tonight is senior fellow and director mr. Robert. Policy analyst, commentator and has written for or recited by this year. The baltimore sun. Bloomberg, cnn. And a handful more. These individuals are outstanding in their fields and i look forward to hearing what they have to say. [applause] im delighted to be here. Let me start by saying i was told by the bookstore before leaving you have to buy this fantastic book. That is the one requirement. I am delighted to be sitting next to my brilliant and very brave friend who i have now known since 1998 when we both were in kairos studying arabic. I mention this because there are very few people that know the region as well as does. She knows the language skills, shes worked on the region over 20 years. So, could you tell us what brought you to this book . You have written to other books on the region but this is different. This is something quite different and maybe tell us what brought you to writing this book. Sure. Thank you for coming and thank you to bobby im so happy to be here with you. So, this book i suppose the genesis of it came or emergents and. As you said, as is safe now . Ive covered the region for a long time. Ive come covered the war and a lot of different conflicts in moments of instability across the middle east. Over various years. I always reported on how conflict impacted women, girls in particular ways. It was always something from the early days in iraq when girls stop going to school after the war. But the conflicts in the middle east in the course of my career always stayed in the middle east. There is a great deal of instabilities, a pupil, but it stayed within the confines of the region and this was the first time i was living in the u. K. In 2014 when suddenly all of these young people and i was teaching at the time so i surround a lot of young people. People from the u. K. , london in the areas i taught were getting up to go join isis and i was bewildered by that. How suddenly the middle east conflict was drawing people in from regions far beyond that seem to have no impact. Very dismayed and upset by the Media Coverage of those young people because many were young girls because isis targeted what is so particularly specifically girls. And the press coverage was very, is exclusionary. Suddenly these were not european girls anymore they were inhouse for isis, they were packing lubricant to the caliphate. Sixteen yearolds who had been groomed to. I thought how ephemeral is your european citizenship if you are not even british anymore. I wanted to tell the story in an intelligible way from both the side of the middle east and from the side of europe. You cover i believe 13 young women and girls in the book, could you start from the three from Bethnal Green and show tell us about those. Those girls became a global sensation because something about their youth, the images of them walking through the metal detectors at the airport when so global. There are 15 yearolds living in east london in a community that is largely populated by immigrants from south asia. Their families were i believe youth you paean. They were lured into isis online. Through social media. Their parents had no idea what was happening and the things they were hearing were not come join a death cult that enslaved these women. Certainly thats not what they were hearing, they were popular girls they got straight as they were bright, they were the girls the teachers admired and they started being exposed to on instagram, twitter and platforms a lot of messaging from isis propaganda about stuff that was real. About Guantanamo Bay and meuse lemon civilians being killed from burma to palestine. Theyre hearing about his llama phobic eight crimes. They were a lot of them were visibly muslim girls who would wear headscarves. They were hearing and lots of they were being persuaded. That there was a no place for them in europe. They cannot be european citizens, british young girls and at the same time so they were lured by this idea that they could go join this utopian society where they would have a role, they could be empowered and respected. You talk about being persuaded by isis using social media, how about facing anti muslim. It is probably fair to say for a lot of young people in europe are the ones i ended up interviewing and speaking to that perhaps they had not experienced it directly themselves but i think it is also important to say for americans i think it is hard to describe the intense climate of anti muslim racism. Its what i think would be like to be a person of color in this country in the 60s. Daily slurs, pretty intense degree of racism. Hard to get, the statistics on getting jobs if you have a muslim name are Something Like. It is a really intense environment in europe for young people. I think feeling included as a muslim is part of a National Identity has been challenging. You did indepth resources are and we talk about how you were talking to families and communities and what were they telling you . The families often in the u. K. Were bewildered. They had no idea that there girls were being lured into this. A lot of the families were, the parents were firstgeneration immigrants. And this was a scary thing reporting this i thought that could have happened to me or to girls that i knew. The parents were often working two jobs, have limited english, did not have a great sense of how to maneuver life in this new society. They were focused on getting by. They were religiously conservative so the girls were spending time at the mosque are covering up a little bit more it was deeply welcome because they thought while we are going to preserve our cultural identity and religious values. They did not have the parenting skills i think to know what was a warning sign for a young teenager in the 21st century in the age of isis. Was her anger from their parents that their children did this or was it totally like my god, how did they wind up getting on a train in on a plane or getting to syria. Thats a huge leap. Some of them were very angry. There was a family of a girl who was scottish and she became a key propaganda. She had of blog about i think was responsible for drawing so many englishspeaking girls and her family was furious because not only had she done this herself but she was drawing other formable girls and with her. They were angry, i think a lot of other families were bewildered. I think they also felt betrayed. Initially there was some part of them that felt some sympathy for the idea or dream to have an islamic homelands, to defend other muslims against injustice and the sense of intense betrayal was all in addition to the loss of a child. Any commonalities that come out through the stories that are worth discussing here or any contrast, any outliers and im not sure what happened with that particular young girl. Some of the outliers i ended up not included their stories because as i was trying to figure out to i could get close enough to whose account i could trust enough to include there were some early on i felt were implausible. There was a girl in tunisia with the graphic arts students and she had a pixie cut and she had a tattoo and the idea that she had ten months prior joins isis and was on her way to syria seems impossible to me. With time i realized that i did not include her. If there is a common theme and its hard. I think the story of isis in the middle east is so much anchored and says an transpacific place. Isis arose out of the syria and iraq in the aftermath of the 2003 invasion and the failed arab spring up rises which opened all this up so, i think specific and very different to the story of isis in europe which was a story of lost secondgeneration youth not fitting. One thing that knits them them together is the feeling of exclusion. I start the book with the story of nora who was a 13yearold tunisian girl growing up in the tunisia before the arab Spring Revolution in 2011. She goes to high School Wearing a headscarf. In tunisia of that era which was very oppressive it was bad. You cannot go to school and a headscarf, he couldnt pull hold Public Office are working at building. If you are a deeply religious then you were excluded. There was no space for you and that tunisia. I think over and over whether in syria it was families who was and could not have access to politics because of their religious background. Again the story of poor governments and exclusion and especially of girls. Growing up under a very authoritarian society that is also very patriarch shook women are stuck in a double bind because you have no access to politics to improve your situation which is also compounded by your structure. Nobody else has done that whether in the jihadist fear or under that repressive regime. Every story you tell youve mentioned the example from tunisia but also europe. Were there differences based on country of origin or where the girls were based . I think in north africa for example a lot of tunisian women, Moroccan Women went imagining this would be a better state. It would be an Islamic State quite literally as it promoted itself and there would be a place where they could go and work and they could be citizens in a very orthodox and it feels perverse to us that it would seem like it would be a society that might empower them but that was the perception. Over time the impulse shifted because isis messaging shifted. After 2014 of 15 and focused heavily on secretary and ideology, its exclusionary violence against other muslims. It became much more of the kind of genocidal project we came to know it as. So, i think differences more across time and what women were responded to then necessarily placed. On the question and the topic of what countries of origin you touched on this earlier and i suspect the viewers dont know this but different European Countries have dealt with foreign fighters differently. So you may be talking about that on evenness what that means if youre british versus some other country. Thats a great question and it is pressing right now because as we sit here there is a camp in the northeast were 14000 foreign women and children are being held. Its a giant isis prison camp for a woman from the west another air countries. What to do with these women and are they members of isis . Are they brides of isis spouses of isis fighters . How do we assess them . I think that is at the crux of challenge of government and figuring out how dangerous they are and what to do with them. The response has been on event. European countries have been quite reluctant to take women and children back, the u. K. In particular, there is the case of the woman who was one of the three girls who became International Story because her citizenship was stripped. Russia has taken some women back in the u. S. I think from an American Perspective taking these women back at monitoring and knowing where they are is safer from simply security perspective than allowing them to potentially go free in the desert. You have been to the camp and talk to the women. Are they remorseful . Are they regretful . Or are they defiant . There is both. Certainly these are the women who came out of the final kind of stronghold devices. A lot were for rent believers. Women who came out and earns the moments when raqqa fell in 2017 i think there those who wanted to get out earlier tried to. There is a higher concentration of hardcore ideologues. But some, many cannot get out. You had to pay smugglers to get out you had to get children out. A lot of women who opposed isis were thrown into prison or had their children taken away. It was hard to get out. Women in those camps are just desperate to come back and be prosecuted, they know, they said we know we have to go to prison and be accountable even if we got there and immediately knew that it was horrible and brutal and we regretted it, within weeks of arrival we know we have to pay the price. So put us on trial. Are we not citizens enough of our home country to be put on trial . Looking back before the rise of isis, i think it wouldve seemed impossible that this small group of folks would build a caliphate. Looking forward, can you imagine another scenario where an isis movement or organization develops and that attracts so many people from europe and beyond . Thats a big question but was this a singular moment because of all that happened with iraq and the arab spring . Could this happen again do you think . I think it was a singular moment because the arab spring uprisings were such a shattering, momentous moment for the region. There was so much hope and women were so involved in those protests and at the forefront of them and at this moment this precipice and the collapse of all that country to country created a unique circumstance where there was a great deal of disorder. A great deal of raised expectations that wereespecially for women coming at the same time as this moment in the syrian and iraqi story. So, i think it was unique and i think isis was the first group that use that language. No one had called for a caliphate before in these terms. I think it awakens and conjures so much longing for being in a different state as muslims from indonesia to europe, at the same time it polluted the idea. I think, i dont see the potential for kind of jihadist kind of read map of this idea. In europe, are you, in terms of communities the impact and blowback on communities has been significant in terms of islamic phobia. Have you been in the communities in aftermath and how are they dealing with this . I think muslim communities in europe are watching closely to see what happens to young muslims from france, belgium and germany. Like what will be their fate . Will they be prosecuted and aided in the same way as a 15yearold white daesh girl . 15yearold white dutch girl who made a horrific mistake . So i think that is one thing. I think the stakes are high for the judgments of european muslims. At the same time, there has been a terrible shadow cast over Civil Society in europe. Because so much of the kind of political activism or preoccupation or concerns, frustrations, grievances of the young people in europe that isis very much preyed upon our kind of seen now in the lens of counterterrorism. If you are a young person in high school in the u. K. And you start going to free palestine matches you will show up on Counterterrorism Police and maybe get a knock on your door. A lot of the state support for Muslim Womens ngos, these other issues are now under the umbrella of counterterrorism. It is as though fate has been securitized in the path of this. I think that is polarizing and one of the terrible legacies of this from muslim communities. Lets open it up to the audience for some questions. If you. Is state your name and your affiliation. Hello. You talk about the women who returned to their countries and the government feels for having them repatriated rather than has there been instances of those governments they you think the girls or are they just punishing them . Thank you. Thats a good question because this question of how to produce counter narratives and how to challenge the next former the next whatever it is next that tries to tap into the same frustrations and desires that young people still have. I think all of those sentiments are still in the grievances and longings are still there country to country. I think by and large it has not been terribly easy to use former radicals or returning women to talk about their experience and to dissuade others. I think it is partly because there is only one small aspect of their message that is largely welcome. They say isis is horrible it was a destructive, it was like islamic cruises upon them. But, all of the other stuff they said about muslims being unwelcome in the west about the american political order, the political economy of the middle east in which all of these oppressive governments have been allies of the United States and are responsible for all of this brutality, torture and oppression. No ones mind has been changed about that stuff. It is kind of the overlay. I think all of that is not very welcome because in the ends if its your Foreign Policy that is a part of this in your cap counterterrorism policy trying to fix at home or the impact at home while you are doing abroad youre working at cross purposes. The woman coming back in the men coming back are often not great at carrying the message that they need to. Just to build on that question, your book at contest a lot of traditional notions about gender and agency and about the role of women in the organization, do you think the areas increasingly scope in europe for a discussion about how to engage youth in specifically young woman from communities who may have been marginalized . I think there is an awakening to the importance of engaging young women, whether muslim women in europe or women in societies like tunisia, morocco, these Different Countries that women in were recruited from in high numbers. Again, i think often that is done through a as securitized lands. You will have what seems like a grassroots women, online digital magazine and then within six months it will emerge that is being funded secretly by the foreign office. So, its the realization or the importance of engaging with those communities and womens in those communities is there but it has become so transactional. Women are great, help us fight terrorism rather than lets make sure you have english classes and shelters against Domestic Violence so you can be more in independent and saved in your community and may be be better parents and better actors within your own right. But to your points if this is all been securitized, he throws a wet blanket on civil participation and all of this seems all that much harder. Absolutely. I think that is why there is real division. I think the atmosphere now certainly in britain, there is tremendous distrust and animosity between communities in the government. Other questions. Youre talking about change over time. Im curious if the message that was being told would change over time and how as things were developing. So, thats a great question because i think the sophistication of isis messaging and is the spoke this context to context was stunning. I dont think anyone was prepared for that. The way that recruiters and women recruiters country to Country Region to region tailored the message of recruitment ideas and narratives to that particular moment in time and space. It certainly changed over time. The early narratives almost everywhere were about aiding elder her muslims in need who are being hurt an award to go help fight the dictatorship in syria, to go live a pious life, to help build the muslim homelands, to join other reforms in fighting against the imperial west. The collective family, that was the narrative initially on that also tailored to pacific societies like in tunisia where the girl thrown out of high school came from was very much tailored to the domestic Political Climate there. The message was, there is no space for moderate political islam in this country anymore. We have to go militants because they closed us down and there was a coup in egypt that effectively achieve that. I think about two years ago a lot of the platforms closed, a lot of the propaganda of the young woman were killed and it very much became the essence of the project was more revealed that the messaging. It was an apocalyptic violence, transnational Jihadist Group with mercenary territorial intention and then it began to sound like it. You talk about social media as an amplifier and excelerator any mention one example of the woman using tumblr. Do you see gender differences in the way theyre trying to reach audiences across europe based on gender or age . Women reach out to women, women invoked themes, graphic means that young woman would appeal to them. So there was certainly for women images of this romantic assessor. There were pink graphics where you could walk off into not a honeymoon but one of the london girls, one of the early tweets and her transformation was zero no, i just realized that honeymoons were around. Im very sad. It was very feminine, new ways providing them with images and ideas that were at the same time romantic, professional, intellectual religious but women are very feminized, aesthetic language. Because you are able to talk to women in these camps after the fact, when they got there on the ground and think my god, this is not what we thought it was via tumbler. What were they telling you . How were their views changing with the situation on the ground or when they got there and thought this is what we thought it would be . There were some girls who were just so clearly traumatize. I think we have to remember that some of them got married two or three times, they had children maybe three children, each child from a different man, men of different nationalities and the title takes its name from these guest houses where women went to after they were widowed and they would wait there to be assigned another fighter has been. Living and moving constantly because they are in the midst of a war, some lost children along the way because of circumstances they were giving birth name. Highly traumatized. Some of them looked glassy eyed. They looked traumatized and were not particularly regretful, they seem to have been coming out of a war and thought the other side would have raped that if they had not been raped and they are just not really there. Some of they them i think were a little bit older, had taken kids there, i think the difference between a 21yearold and a 15yearold can be significant. And they were like women you would meet. Some are educated and had jobs and went back to be teachers and were very regretful. And, just seem to be reading for the time to be able to go back. I miss the beginning of the talk. Im sorry about that. But with women where they all encamps . Are some in europe as well and if so, how were they reluctant to talk to her families reluctant to talk to you . There was a whole array of reluctance to talk to me. I spoke to women who tried to go and were blocked because in the early days it was easier to talk to women who had not gone yet. Once they were there they very often wouldnt talk to a disbeliever. When you say blocked its for folks here. So, there was a. At which it became so clear that there were lots of girls going art young women going that there were passports that the police confiscated three dozen passports so it is clear there was an epidemic. They had their passports taken away or there was a girl who did not have her passport taken away but i think it had been watched in some she went to the airport and was stopped and then went to the airport three days later and stopped again. So, there was a. At which in tunisia as well, i think tunisia ban travel for young woman traveling unaccompanied under 35 to completely i ended up in the search for a young woman black from traveling because they were under 35. Their other categories of women that impacted but it was a blanket travel ban because there is such an exodus but to finish answering that, i spoke to women who had been apprehended for him going. I spoke to families of girls who had gone. I spoke to women who were there and we developed a relationship from afar over the phone. And then once in 2017 the cities of ices started to fall and it was possible to go into that part of syria when i went there and spoke to women in the camp and i also quite early on there is a big piece i wrote for the times in 2015 and that was, i look looking his Southern Turkey and i actually went looking for the london girls. I went to Southern Turkey to see i was kind of on their trail and in Southern Turkey there was women who were defectors. Early ices defectors who had gotten out and grown up in rock. They studied marketing and one studied English Literature and they stay because their families were not able to leave and they joined isis because their families had started to collaborate and it was hard to survive, if you are not going to cooperate with them in some way. So, i spent time with them. I went a few times and spoke to them very closely. So, its all patchwork of Different Levels of access across different places. I want to followup on this topic of ices defected in a conversation about counter narratives. Its really powerful voices but at the same time it was right after the arrival of the caliphate 70 or 80000 twitter accounts that were ices. Im wondering about this idea of counter narrative because those voices would be really powerful if we could get them out there. I think. Is that too simplistic . I dont think its simplistic. I think theres a very ferocious critique of ices within the Muslim Community from political islamists who are basically unpalatable in the public mill you. In europe and certainly parts of the region. I think the blockage of moderate political islam is a big part of the story. If you come from that mill you in that position and political worldview and you say look, they went too far. They are not of us, they are deviant and brutal but we would still really like to have a string of politics from within this perspective, there is no space for that in the region. I think because in europe so much this simple muslim activist and identity are viewed as g hottie theres not a lot of space for it. That is where the critique is powerful other questions. I have two questions. One because this is being recorded by cspan, andy, you have been covering the region over 20 years. Youve done extraordinary work. Any advice for young researchers out there that want to cover the region . For me, making a genuine effort, thats how our paths crossed studying arabic, learning the language of being able to interact and relate in a genuine way with people i think is indispensable. Also most journalists do not and i think that partly reflects the tendency to have terrorism beats rather than regional in the air of ices and really in their eyes 15 years a lot of newspapers will just assign people to for terrorism. So if you are the terrorism reporter you may not know the history of pers 2003 iraq so intimately. We not have been standing there when all of those when the army was and all of the fathers were going there and standing there under the sum and nobody to pay them and cannot go home to take care of their families. If you unravel the story of isis in time it goes back to all of that in part but if you arrive at the thematic when i think so much is a knowledge is hampered by it is that it comes without regional linguistic area expertise which to my mind is how to brand them in just a deviation in just a religious phenomenon. This is the third book and i suspect going to be here three to five years ago again that between now and then i encourage all of you to go out and buy this, to read this really is a brilliant book, im thrilled to be appear with you and it does contest so many simplistic notions about gender and the role of particular young woman. So i encourage you to buy this. It watch book tv and primetime starting at 6 45 p. M. Eastern. You will hear from mary on workforce issues by tech companies. Also this evening, andrew pulock for the student killed him for the student shooting in parkland, florida offering spots on student safety and guns. He reports on the challenges of a college education. Gordon chang weighs in on the dangers they may face. Nfpa Josh Campbell who shared his thoughts under president trump. Check your Program Guide for more information. Recently in washington, d. C. New york times reporters robin and kate discuss the Supreme Court confirmation process of Justice Brett kavanaugh. Heres a portion of the program. Hes a very good lawyer and very good judge. He would probably not get up there and lie in front of the american people, but that he navigated the truth i think is a good way to put it, that there are conceivably different definitions of devils triangle and all of those terms and that he said he had too many beers for example and that understates how excessively he was drinking but he did say he had too many beers. Thats the kind of thing, i mean. It was ultimately not necessarily a technical why, but that is actually, the drinking was a through line that we found in this book which is frankly what help to understand his development personally and what it was like as a young person and how these events may have happened and what might shed light on explaining them. And drinking was a big part of it. And that is what brought so many classmates out of the woodwork during the confirmation hearing who had planned to stay on the sidelines, who wanted to say wait a minute, that is not the brats i remember. It was a very different level of drinking and extreme. And so he kind of parched things perhaps. But i also think there is a question of his temperament towards the end and there is an element to which there are people who have argued, what if cavanagh had gotten up there and said i did some stupid stuff when i was young im sorry and i may have heard some people in the process and i want to feel i feel bad about it. I made a real effort to be a better person. The argument is in this trump moment that would have been inconceivable to think that he could still have made his way onto the court its all about fighting back and all about denying and there is no room for the gray, there is no room for a decent human being who is flawed right now. And so, are our understanding was although he did apologize with how he spoke to amy global chart, and how he wrote an oped in the wall street journal saying i am not i probably went too far. Otherwise there is no room for concessions. I want people to ask, did you find any sense that he expressed remorse anywhere for his behavior when he was younger . If it were to be true . He did apologize to run out of. There is a deeply felt apology. That on september 27 hearing and as i recall he choked up on that. He feels very bad about the way this had come out and so maybe he was referring simply to the Media Coverage but i think the idea that she got hurt was upsetting to him but on terms of saying i dont remember Something Like this but if i heard anybody in the past im sorry that does not happen. Ebm, i think christine has an interesting story of her that maybe she could call Brett Kavanaugh and say lets not do this this was so clearly unrealistic on some level but Deborah Ramirez said if he just apologize and it is so weird to hear about that would be enough but there is no sexual victims of who i talk to that sometimes thats what you need for closure, and acknowledgment and whether or not those were alleged situations but thats lost on how far that can go this is such an interesting topic and should there have been in apology and is that even possible for fuels warranted. Although in this case Justice Kavanaugh said hes innocent of these charges and presumably did not find it warranted but the cultural moment were living in his heart. The cultural moment in which you have the advantage of social media where you can say any hateful thing and get away with it. You can make Death Threats, threaten their family this happen to Christine Bossi ford to Brett Kavanaugh, ashley kavanaugh, Deborah Ramirez that many and people had bodyguards because they were worried about Death Threats and that comes from social media and the feeling that anything goes when it comes to language. I think they mean to movement has been a galvanizing cultural event for the last two years. At the time of the kavanaugh confirmation hearing the me too movement had been underway for a while. There was a backlash brewing that was going too far in the notion or believe all woman was oversimplified and overlooking the investigation part of it that i was talking about earlier. Then you have a president who advocates taking tough stances and has talked about allegations of Sexual Misconduct something were to deny. It becomes very hard to just acknowledge any flaws in that environment. I think one of the things we want to encounter as importers is that we had to fight our own assumptions about us as well as our own preconceptions. We are two women, i think people assumes we would be absolutely on the side of women to begin with in a noncritical way. I think they assume because we are at the New York Times we had him for a liberal agenda. I think it was important for us to put ourselves in kavanaugh shoes and imagine that someone is being falsely accused and go there and explore that and try to understand perhaps we have plenty of people who argue to us yes the temperament was unacceptable but imagine if you are fighting your personal and professional life. I think we try to reflect that in the book. So, it was hard. We wanted to talk to people in kavanaugh scamp. It was hard. They just assumed they had all sorts of ideas in their minds made up about what they are setting up to do. April ryan, on fire,
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