A report that shivers down your spine. Wednesday March 17, 2021, Daily broadcast the testimony of Pascale Descamps, the mother of a French jihadist converted to Islam and left to join Daesh in 2015. If the latter's companion died in combat, this woman who grew up in Boulogne-sur-Mer (Pas-de-Calais) is detained in a Kurdish-controlled camp in Syria, with her three children. Once a week, she updates her mom, with voice notes sent to WhatsApp. In a message unveiled to journalists from TMC, she tells him that she is seriously ill. "I didn't want to tell you about it because I didn't know what I had", she explains in tears, before continuing: "And, in fact I have a colon tumor. I'm sorry for what I'm announcing, that's how it is. Here, I am offered to do a very, very expensive and very risky operation, in Syrian conditions that I do not want at all. I was told I was risking my life in it. " In this context, the young woman aged 32 "request medical repatriation to be able to be buried and bring back (his) children ". A wish shared by his mother.
Pascale Descamps also hopes that her daughter and grandchildren will be repatriated to France, as is the case with several families of jihadists. "They have the right to a normal life as children. Today they are in detention. They got sick, they experienced hunger, fear. My granddaughter is starting to have tics. Children have nightmares ", she laments before collapsing. However, the idea of repatriation of French jihadists detained in Syria disturbs public opinion. According to an Odoxa-Dentsu Consulting survey carried out in 2019 and relayed by our colleague Paul Gasnier in Daily, "89% of French people fear the repatriation of jihadists and 67% wish to leave the children in Syria ".
Should the government repatriate the French jihadists?
While more than 200 French children are detained in the country, 35 were repatriated since the territorial collapse of the Islamic State (IS) group in Syria two years ago, underlines theAFP. "I understand that it scares", recognizes Pascale Descamps before qualifying: "These are not terrorists that we are going to bring in. They are children, sick women who are already in prison." And to conclude: "Isn't that judging them, already, by letting them waste away, by leaving her sick in a camp? It's not by killing women and children that it will kill ideology." The government enforces the principle of "case by case" to repatriate some children of jihadists. A decision denounced by Pascale Descamps: "What does that mean? In what case are we going to repatriate someone? My daughter is slowly dying in front of my grandchildren. "
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