Malnourished children who fled IS in Syria are 'close to death'
Most youngsters have had nothing to eat for days, and the extremist group's deathly dystopia has all but crumbled to nothing.
Wednesday 6 March 2019 12:42, UK
On a scratch of land four miles from Baghouz, the families of IS fighters who've fled the conflict lie and rest.
They've been camped at this spot for the last two days, running away during a pause in the violence.
More than 3,000 people, mainly women and children, have emerged.
It is a United Nations of extremist families. Uzbek children sit next to those from France.
Around them, Kurdish fighters and American special forces stand guard.
Little children clutch dirty bags of bread.
Most have had nothing to eat for days.
Many of them are malnourished and some are close to death.
The smell of faeces and urine is overpowering.
This dismal sight is what remains of the Islamic State.
The extremist group's deathly dystopia has all but crumbled to nothing.
A French woman called Dorothy, who lived in Toulouse before converting to Islam and joining IS, tells me her husband, a well-known French IS terrorist called Jean Michel Clain - whose brother was among those behind the Paris attacks in which more than 100 were killed - died two days ago in an airstrike.
Nearby there's another western family.
This time from Finland - unlike most of the IS families they are full of regret and want to go home.
Thirteen-year-old Sumaya was brought to live in IS territory by her mother five years ago. They managed to leave Baghoz and want to go back to Helsinki.
"So many families were burned because of the bombing. It's terrible...I just want to go to Finland".
The men who've surrendered are taken away for questioning.
Some limp on crutches, injured in the deadly fighting for the town.
But despite the atrocities committed by IS, everyone is given charity by aid workers who've come to the front.
David Eubank, a humanitarian worker with the Free Burma Rangers who provide urgent medical assistance, told me he'd treated more than 20,000 people in the past month.
He said: "There's a kid last night shot in the head and her brain was exposed. We can't do brain surgery here. So we just bandage it, try and keep it clean, put an IV [drip] in her, stabilise her and get her out.
"So, the kids come out hungry, wounded, terrified, absolutely confused. They've grown up thinking IS is the centre of the universe."
The Islamic State is all but finished.
In the next few days, the last fighters will make their final stand.
But their families remain stateless and unwanted, and what to do with them in the long-term nobody knows.