The Daily - Trapped in Syria, Part 2: A Plea to Parliament

Episode Date: October 22, 2019

Yesterday on “The Daily,” we met Kamalle Dabboussy, who said his daughter had been tricked by her husband into joining the Islamic State. His daughter and three grandchildren are being held in a Syrian detention camp for the relatives of ISIS fighters.When we left off, Mr. Dabboussy had just received a call from a journalist that suggested his family’s situation was about to become far more precarious. President Trump had announced that he would withdraw U.S. troops from the Syrian border, and Kurdish forces who had been guarding the prisons were expected to abandon their posts, leaving the detainees’ lives in imminent danger.Today, we follow Mr. Dabboussy’s struggle to convince the Australian government that his daughter and her children are worth saving — despite their ties to the Islamic State.Guest: Livia Albeck-Ripka, a reporter for The Times in Melbourne, Australia, spoke with Kamalle Dabboussy, whose daughter Mariam is trapped in Syria with her children. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Background coverage: Here’s the first episode in this two-part series, in which we introduced Kamalle Dabboussy and his fight to bring his family home from a war zone.Mr. Dabboussy is one of a cohort of parents in Australia lobbying the government to help release their loved ones from detention camps in northern Syria.

All of a sudden US troops left their observation posts along the Syrian border after the White House said it wouldn't stand in the way of a Turkish invasion. Turkey has confirmed that its ground forces are on the move after launching an aerial attack overnight. It comes after the abrupt US pull out from the area. Turkey has released a video of its fighter jets bombing Kurdish positions as the nation presses ahead with its invasion. The best time to get these 66 women and children out

of the Al-Hulkamp was before the Turkish invasion. The government had little appetite, I must say, to get these people out of Syria before the invasion. I don't detect a great appetite now. And it's certainly now a lot more complicated. Now, their future looks really, really uncertain. And if they do get out, perhaps to Kurdish...

Yesterday on The Daily, we met Kamal Dabusi, who for months has been lobbying the Australian government to bring back his daughter and grandchildren who were being held at a detention center in Syria for the relatives of ISIS fighters. When we left off, Kamal had just received a call from a journalist that President Trump had just announced he would withdraw U.S. troops from the Syrian border, and it was expected that the Kurdish forces who had been guarding the prisons as allies of the US would abandon their posts, leaving the prisoners' lives in imminent danger. Today, my colleague Livia Albek-Ribka follows

Kamal's journey to convince the Australian government that that danger is greater than the one posed by bringing his daughter home. It's Tuesday, October 22nd. So Kamal has a little cry in the car. He gathers his thoughts and then he pretty much immediately springs into action. About 25 minutes later, he calls his journalist back. He gives them a quote. Another 20 minutes pass. Another calls his journalist back. He gives them a quote. Another 20 minutes pass.

Another call from the media. Then other people start doing interviews. We don't want people coming back having the skills in bomb making and terrorist activity to commit an atrocity in our country. Conservatives in the country start talking, saying... Australians don't want them back in the country. They don't trust them, they don't believe them. No way we cannot bring these women and children back. It is too dangerous for us to send people in there to get them out.

That option went. As soon as the US President said we're removing the troops, that option was off the table. If you want to go out there and have this hatred towards Western society and this ideology, we're not going to just turn around and say, oh, come on back down to Australia, we're going to look after you. Sorry, no, I won't. So Kamal does another interview in response to that.

Please save our children. That's the plea from a spokesman for the 65 Australians detained in the Al-Hol camp in north-eastern Syria. Then he does a presser. These are Australian lives. We're talking about 44 children. We're talking about 46 children by some accounts. It's just one interview after

the other. Please make them safe. After the other. Make them safe. If you have to assess them anywhere, assess them anywhere around the globe that you need to, but make them safe. Kamal Dabusi, thank you very much for talking to A.M. this morning. Thank you. And it's from here that he makes a plan to drive to Canberra. At this point, the government still hasn't really acknowledged him or the other families. And so he decides he's going to physically take himself there and meet with as many politicians as he can to lobby, to make a final push in what he believes is this closing window to get his daughter home.

Hello. Hi, Kamal. How are you? Sorry I'm a little late. That's OK, you made it. How are you doing? I did make it. I think there was a marathon on in my ear. So I meet Kamal at his cousin's house in Melbourne.

And we get on the road and we've got this six and a half, seven hour drive ahead of us. You're so comfortable. I should have warned you one thing about traveling with me. You have to put up with my music, whatever it is. Oh, what's your musical taste? It's very sort of late 70s, 80s. Not much of the 90s. Actually, where?

Oh, here we go. So the 70s are your era? More 80s. Not 80s. Do you like Bowie? So in a lot of ways it feels like a normal road trip. Hello. Hello. How are you, father? Well. How are you, brother? I'm good, thank God.

Sorry, I didn't have time. But a lot of the time, he's fielding calls. From the other families who are worried about the women and children. Did it? I've tried to speak to confirm. I've not been able to get through at all. Did you get a message? Yeah, I got a message. From the attorney for the families who wants to discuss their strategy. Are you ready to go over to the partner? Yes, sure, just give me a second.

And more calls from the media. He's also hearing from the young women themselves. How are you? I'm so scared. Oh my God, I don't know how much longer I can do this for. They're messaging him, frantic, for information. The news is developing fast and there are all kinds of reports flying around. Most of it sounds very bad. There are rumours that food and water will be cut off from the camps,

that ISIS fighters could escape and attack the women. We're just laying in our tents. I'm going to send you a photo. All the kids are laying down, made them lay down so the bullets don't reach them. So the women are naturally terrified. Kamal is receiving these texts. They killed a few women and they also injured a few women today. We're going to die. We don't deserve this. We need a second chance.

Please let somebody know. And the women in the camps are also texting and trying to get through to their families. We then call Kamal for clarification. Did it? I've tried to speak to confirm. I've not been able to get through at all. Did you get a message?

Did you? Yeah, I got a message. I love it. So the whole thing is kind of like this game of broken telephone and Kamal is like the operator. This is an issue more for the Melbourne families than the Sydney families. So not to worry too much for the Sydney families. But I will let you know...

Assuaging people. Also, have you heard anything from the government in this regard, or are we going to wait for the meeting to occur? We have to wait and see. But we are in there and we are fighting. We've got national coverage now on this. I don't think in the short term there's anything more that we can do. I think it's just holding our breath, really, for this week.

Yeah, yeah, fair call. OK, then. But the one person who he wants to reach most, his own daughter, Mariam... ..isn't answering. OK. I'll try again, and now it's time with Mariam. Finally... ..it's been visible its whole process. Are you calling Mariam? OK, I'll try again and now it's time with Marion. Finally.....somebody picks up the phone.

Get out of here! Get out of here! Get out, get out! Yell out! Hello? You can hear a woman's voice kind of yelling and then the call cuts out. and then the call cuts out. Kamal maintains his calm. The thing about Victorian roads, they're relatively straight. I know that some... We have normal conversations, he's singing along to the music.

My name's Johnny and we might be a sin We have normal conversations, he's singing along to the music. And as we get closer to Canberra, he says... Does it feel like a pivotal moment? I don't want to let myself feel that. I don't want to build expectations. Yeah. He's trying to manage his expectations about what he'll be able to achieve with these lawmakers. But he's also allowing himself to imagine this future

in which Mariam is home. I'm immensely looking forward to having her back. I think that I need to check myself because the girl that I married and the girl that left is different to the girl that's coming back. And I need to remind myself of that. And I don't know what to expect when she gets back, really, as far as the details go.

to expect when she gets back really as far as the details go. And I think I've seen it too many times that people expect that old relationship to return or that old person to return. That may be an expectation I don't want to place on the relationship. It's going to be a remapping and it's going to be a new relationship and it's just going to be a new woman and it has to you know there's going to be a lot of healing that has to happen and um that has to happen without the expectation of what i think the relationship needs to look like i don't know if that makes sense yes she she just needs to heal yeah and then i need to map the relationship with her and it's got to be one that's two adults back in their relationship

it's just terribly complex as to what's going to happen next So after seven hours on the road, we make it. We get to Canberra. OK, let's get ourselves fixed up. We check into our hotel. We say our goodnights and get to bed. But at some point in the night after we go to sleep, there's this news. The Kurds have struck a deal with Syria,

with the Assad regime, and the women fear the worst, The Kurds have struck a deal with Syria, with the Assad regime, and the women fear the worst, that its troops could take over the camp, raping them, turning them into slaves, or worse. Hi, this is an Australian in the camps. We just got news that the Kurds have allied with the regime. The women are sending Kamal frantic voice memos from the camp. One of their deals is to give us women, ISIS prisoners and women and children from the

camps to Bashar and to transfer us women, ISIS prisoners, and women and children from the camps to Bashar and to transfer us to Damascus. This is not what we deserve. We're scared, we need help, we really need urgent help. The majority of these kids are little babies. We don't want them to be raised in regime prisons. At least our kids, at least our children, they don't deserve to see this. They don't deserve to see this. Please, please, please, before it's too late, within the next few

days this is going to happen, please, please help us. I know nobody can really come here and help us, but somebody needs to say something. Somebody needs to do something. I don't want to be forgotten. I don't want to be ignored from the world. I don't want my kids to be ignored from the world. Please, please, please. Please just save us from here. The Kurds did a deal with the Syrian government

to fend off a Turkish offensive. They say they had to choose between compromise and genocide. The next day, we wake up to the news that the Kurds have formed a deal with Syria, which, for Kamal, is a horrendous thought. He thinks that if the Syrians take over the camps, the women are as good as dead. In fact, he says, death would be the more merciful option. he says death would be the more merciful option.

So when Kamal shows up in Parliament that day, he is on a mission. We're just walking through the press gallery in Canberra in Parliament. You can see all the different national media outlets, Channel 10, ABC, SBS. We're heading into an interview where Kamal's going to be interviewed by Channel 7. There you go, guys. You should be able to hear each other.

Hello there. Is it Kamal? Is that how I say it? Yes, that's right, yes. Hi, Kamal, it's Ray from Channel 7. How are you going? I'm good, thank you, Ray. That's good. I just, obviously, this story is huge. Media are asking him the same questions over and over again.

And what's her name? Mariam? Mariam Dabusi. Obviously, now it's getting very violent. What's your message to our government about your Australian daughter who's stuck in a detention camp at the moment? As Kamal gives these interviews over and over and over and over... He is actually wearing down. He's getting sick. But he can't let himself stop.

He'll talk to anybody. We've had sporadic contact. but he can't let himself stop. He'll talk to anybody. We've had sporadic contact. Phones are a difficult issue but there are some central places where you can buy time. But of course, the real reason that Kamal came here is to talk to the politicians, the lawmakers who will ultimately decide the fate of these women and children. And so he has meetings lined up with any of them who will listen.

Heading on in to speak with Christina Keneally, who's the Shadow Minister of Home Affairs. Just knocking on the door now. Hello. Here we are. Thanks so much. Hello, I might be, maybe I was. Okay, thanks for waiting. Here we are. Thanks so much. Maybe ours. OK. OK.

Do you think it's Mr Chancellor? No, not this one. OK. No, not this one. Sorry. All right. OK. I know that.

OK. All right. Catch you after the call. Nice to meet you. I'm following him as best I can, but a lot of it is behind closed doors. And from what you can tell, what's the reception that Kamal is getting? It's not a very favourable one. Australia has a conservative government

and a lot of the comments that these lawmakers are making indicate that they are really opposed to bringing these women home. There's one man in particular, the Home Affairs Minister, Peter Dutton, who is especially outspoken. He's saying things like, based on the evidence that he has received, some of these women could be capable of making bombs or even unleashing what he describes as a mass casualty. Kamal says that, based on what he knows of these women, they weren't fighters.

He describes them as baby-making machines. He talks about this one girl in particular who went into Syria at 15, and by 19, she has three children. So this leads him to believe that, you know, it's very possible a lot of these women were coerced, they were forced, including his own daughter. In all the years that Mariam was with ISIS, Kamal didn't quite know what to think about what had happened, about how much had been her own choice. But that day in the camp, when he sees her after all that time,

he finally gets to ask her. And she told him a story. That when she and her husband Khaled had gone to Turkey to stay with his family back in 2015, that after a few months he told her and the rest of the family that they needed to go to the Syrian border to rescue a relative who had joined ISIS but now wanted out. And Mariam says when they get there, all of a sudden gunshots are ringing into the air. Everybody's running. There's mayhem. And then she's forced at gunpoint with her child into a car, which takes them across the border into Syria. And it's not until Mariam sees this ISIS flag

flying from this halfway house that she understands what has happened to her. And Kamal believes his daughter. Do you think that... Do you see Mariam in this purely as a victim or do you think she may have made some choices herself mariam's choices have been to survive i see her purely as a victim and everything that comes from nina has been just to survive i don't see her as as a perpetrator at all she is a victim

and any decision she's made has been solely to survive and for the best interests of her kids um and and and and And I firmly believe that. I'm sorry to belabor this point, but I have to ask. You know, these women are Australian women. They grew up in a Western country with Western values. And the idea that they were forced, tricked, duped, that they had no agency whatsoever, I can see why that might be a hard pill for

for some people in the australian public to swallow because what does that say about women from the australian context i think if you are raised as an anglo in anglo communities for most of your life one might say I find this hard to believe, but then I've also had people come and tell me, you know, if my husband said, let's go for a holiday, or my husband told me, we're going to go and do this great humanitarian act of trying to save a family member from a terrible regime, I would be there backing him up a hundred percent and I would be supporting him all the way. So I do get a mixture of views from the public to say that putting myself in those shoes,

in Mariam's shoes, they actually would have supported their husband. And most of the women that made those choices to go went because they were trying to protect their family unit. And culturally, this is raised as the most important thing in your life. Your family, your family, your family. You do whatever you can to save your family unit. And that is sort of the number one cultural value that persists within the Muslim community is that family unit is so important.

So even if your husband's made a mistake, you still support your husband, even if he's made a mistake. And that's a culture that women are raised in predominantly. But you didn't raise Mariam like that. No, that's why he had to trick her to go across the border. Mariam would never have agreed to that but she wanted family so she probably you know would have uh you know

even if she'd had a warning sign she probably would have dismissed it in her brain because she actually wanted family so much as well so yes she was independent and yes she was stubborn and she was fiery and she was feisty but uh or let's say lively is lively um but but i you know i think if she had any doubts until it was something concrete she would have just been dismissive because she wanted family so you think maybe that there were red flags for her and she pushed them away because i think but i potentially i mean i think to myself even if there were some smaller red You know, I think that despite Kamal's unwavering belief in his own daughter's story, he does understand. He understands why people might be afraid for these women to come home.

But he also kind of says that's not the point. The bigger point here is we don't know these women's culpability. So he says let's bring them back and let's have due process applied before we turn our backs on these women, assuming that they're guilty. He says this is what a country like Australia actually owes its citizens, whether they're guilty or not guilty. And right now we just don't know. Basically, what he's saying is there are dangers, yes,

with repatriating people, but there are also dangers with not. And that's why he's in Canberra, fighting for their right to come home. Hi, everyone. How are you? I'm Olivia. I'm a reporter with the New York Times. Nice to meet you, Olivia. Nice to meet you. Good come home. Hi everyone. How are you? I'm Olivia, I'm a reporter with the New York Times. Nice to meet you Olivia. Nice to meet you. Good to know you, Matt.

How are you? Good. Kamal. Kamal. Keep going. Come in. So I'm following Kamal around, office to office. It seems like at least some of these lawmakers are empathetic to his plight, but it's not

clear whether they have any power to actually change the situation. There were definitely no promises made. But there's this moment. He bumps into an MP in the hall, an old acquaintance, and this guy says, we've been discussing your issue at length this morning. This seems to energise Kamal. He gets excited.

He thinks things might be about to change. Maybe government was in the process of reaching a decision. But then some time passes and there's no news. And there's really nothing left to do there but wait. So after the last meeting of the day, we leave. We don't drive back to Melbourne, where Kamal had been meeting with families. We drive to Sydney, where he lives, and where a whole other group of families are awaiting his news. OK, we are just driving away from Parliament, back towards Sydney. It's about a three-hour trip.

It looks like at this point there's no news. On the drive, Kamal seems a little deflated, but he's still hopeful. OK, we're at Trapper's. Oh, wow, there's the giant sheep. I sent it to the big marina. And then Kamal says, we have to pull over to this place called Trapper's.

This was a big stop back in the day. They make the best vanilla slice, which is kind of like this puff pastry with custard inside. And he says, this is the best vanilla slice in Australia. So we pull in, we walk inside. Kamal gets two vanilla slices, one for each of us. And we're eating, having a coffee. Each of us are just taking a moment, checking the news on our phone, and suddenly Kamal is tapping the table, trying to get my attention.

He points to his phone. It's Mariam. I know, I know, I know, and... Yeah? About the what? Why? No, that's not true. That's not the information that we're getting.

That's not the information that we're getting. So Kamal has the phone up to his ear. We're in a loud cafe. I can't hear Mariam on the other side. Okay. But he's comforting her and he's calling her an affectionate name. Okay, listen, listen to me, listen to me. I have had it confirmed to me from several different sources that the border crossing between Syria and Iraq is open and it's working.

So the women are just terrified that the Assad regime is going to take over the camp and that they'll be raped, tortured, killed and he's comforting her and comforting her and he's telling her I was just in parliament, somebody told me they had a meeting this morning there could still be a decision today, I'm doing my best, I'm doing my best I can tell you that there was a cabinet meeting this morning I think there is some movement, but we've not yet been informed. I am trying to get information as we

speak and trying to get contacts and networks to give me some indication. The call goes on for some time and it's clear, even just from hearing the one side, that Mariam is becoming increasingly frantic. Okay, believe me, we have said all come home. We are all very worried about that. We have been making the statements about that. She's heard that one of the Australian women in the camp is having her citizenship revoked and she's panicking. The government have told us and the information that we have

is that three people have lost their citizenship and only three people have lost. Kamal does his best to calm her down. There's no confirmation the second one is a woman. No confirmation. But at a certain point... I know that, Baba. But, Baba, I don't think that's what you're facing.

I don't think that's what you're facing, OK? Baba, I know... Habibti, don't... Habibti, don't... They both start crying. And he puts her on speakerphone. What's going to happen to them if they have this idea? It's clear that nothing he's saying is really consoling her. She's spinning through all of these different scenarios. And can I tell you, I was walking through the corridors of Parliament today and people stopping me, shaking my hand, telling me,

wish you all the best, we hope you get your children back. Like strangers stopping me in the corridors of Canberra doing this. So finally he says to her, let me talk to my grandson. So she pulls him in and he's talking to his grandson and Kamal's face just lights up. He's having this back and forth with his grandson. And after that, he talks to Mariam for a few more minutes, and the conversation ends. And we get back in the car, and Kamal puts on this 45-minute song in Arabic. She walked between us.

That he says is one of his favourites. And we're listening to it as we drive back to Sydney. In the days since Livia travelled to Canberra with Kamal, Turkey and the Syrian Kurdish forces declared a temporary ceasefire. But even if the ceasefire holds, the Australian government has said they would still consider it too risky to extract the families of ISIS fighters. Officials have said they would not be willing to put other lives in danger

to save the women and children. On Friday in Canberra, Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton spoke to reporters. They've been fighting in the name of an evil organization, he said. And there are consequences. Livia, I'm thinking back to where Miriam's story started. And to Kamal saying that from a young age, she wanted to be part of a big family. And when she got a baby sister, they were very close. I'm just curious whether they have a relationship now. They do as much as they can, given the circumstances. You know, when I was in

parliament with Kamal, we had this quiet moment and he showed me some pictures of Mariam in the camp and he told me about how like many of the women there she wanted to send something home for her family for her sister and so she collected these little bits of scrap metal things she could find and she made a ring for her sister and gave it to Kamal to take home with him. And she also makes her this video and she says to her sister, Thank you so much for watching this, my dear. I actually look like I'm dying and I don't usually look inside a mirror, so this is actually horrible.

I'm so sorry I look horrible. I haven't looked in a mirror, so this is actually horrible. I'm so sorry I look horrible. I haven't looked in a mirror in ages. And she's like, but I miss you so much, and I'm so excited to see you. Do what you need to do, OK? I love you, and please, can you look after Dan? He's acting strong. I don't know how strong he really is. I love you. I love you and please can you look after dad? He's acting strong. I don't know how strong he really is.

I love you. I love you. And no matter what, you're always my sister. I have a lot of things to talk to you about when I see you, inshallah. And I have so, so much to tell you. I wish we could have talked more often. I don't know why we never was able to speak properly. But inshallah, inshallah, I'll be able to talk to you soon.

I love you. Thank you. Thank you for everything, everything. You're just a mizraha. Love you, habibi. And she's still there. And she's still there. She'd also left me a video message. Which was absolutely heartbreaking for me to hear.

And I haven't played it again. I only played it once. But they're still there, and we are here. And they just need you're not safe. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Bavaro. See you tomorrow.