ISIS Releases Guide For Female Jihadists, Extols Virtues of 'Sedentary Existence' For Women

The “divine duty of motherhood” is the purpose of a woman’s existence and she has no greater responsibility than that of “being a wife to her husband,” according to a manifesto published last week by the Islamic State group’s female-only al-Khanssaa Brigade.

An English translation of the document, originally published last week in Arabic and titled “Women in the Islamic State: Manifesto and Case Study,” was released on Thursday by the Quilliam Foundation -- a London-based counterterrorism think tank.

“The era of Western dominance and its influence on our lifestyle and way of living has passed,” the document, which seems to be aimed at recruiting women from Middle Eastern nations, asserts. “The model preferred by infidels in the West failed the minute women were ‘liberated’ from their cell in the house. Problems emerged one after another after they took on corrupted ideas and shoddy-minded beliefs instead of religion.”

The authors of the document, who offer a detailed guide of the role of female jihadists in ISIS, state that it is the “divinely ordained duty” of women to lead a “sedentary existence.”

“The problem today is that women are not fulfilling their fundamental roles, the role that is consistent with their deepest nature, for an important reason, that women are not presented with a true picture of man, and because of the rise in the number of emasculated men who do not shoulder the responsibility allocated to them,” the document says, adding that “pure women” should be married off by the age of 16 or 17.

Shattering the myth of female jihadists fighting alongside men in the ranks of ISIS, the document states that women are only allowed to pick up arms if “men are not enough to protect her country,” adding: “It is always preferable for a woman to remain hidden and veiled, to maintain society from behind this veil.”

Haras Rafiq, Quilliam's managing director, said, in a statement, that the document sheds light on the mindset of women who willingly join ISIS, adding that it made clear that the ideas of “adventure and excitement,” which are often used by female Western recruiters trying to recruit young girls to ISIS, “are the realm of men.”

“There has been a huge amount of speculation about what the role of the women who join Islamic State -- often dubbed jihadist brides -- is,” he said, in the statement. “This translation … clarifies a number of issues that have been obscured by the language barrier until now. It allows us to look past the propaganda banded about on social media by Western supporters of IS.”