Hate and fear as people emerge from Islamic State's weakening grip
As thousands of people, including children, flee the last remaining IS territory in Baghouz, they tell stories of pain and loss.
Wednesday 6 March 2019 20:17, UK
Looking dazed and traumatised, they are brought to safety in the back of a pick up truck.
They blink gently in the winter sun, their eyes and faces masked by the grime of the desert.
It is the first taste they have of freedom in years - 11 Yazidi boys who have escaped from Islamic State after being rescued by Kurdish forces.
The terrorist group enslaved and murdered countless numbers of their people as they overran the community's heartland of Sinjar in 2014.
One of them, Dildar, tells me he thinks he is between 12 and 13 years of age.
He was kidnapped and held by IS for more than five years.
He has no idea what happened to his parents.
Another of the boys, Waheeb, is still terrified and can barely utter the name of his captors.
The word "state" is only just audible when I ask who took him.
But the terror state responsible is now unravelling rapidly - the last IS families - bedraggled and covered in dust - are fleeing the fighting in Baghouz.
Many of them have suffered appalling injuries.
There are no ambulances on hand so they are transported aboard lorries normally used for livestock and will be taken to refugee camps in North East Syria.
But even in this chaos Islamic State members still praise the terror network and regret its passing.
Most of the people coming out don't want to speak, they are hateful after spending years in the dark sect of the so-called caliphate.
But a few do want to tell their story about what life has become inside the fragmenting cult of the Islamic State.
A woman, originally from Algeria, says the situation is catastrophic - there are constant air strikes and buildings are on fire, she tells me.
The last sliver of IS territory is encircled but it is still not clear how many people remain under the group's weakening control. Or how long it will take before it falls