-By Warner Todd Huston
Officials in Austria have gone public with fears that the terror group ISIS may be finding a new wave of recruits among its teenaged girls after a number of girls have run away from home intending to join ISIS forces in Iraq or Syria. Unfortunately, Austria isn’t alone teens are fleeing countries all across the west to join jihadis.
Earlier this year, two teenaged Austrian girls ran off to Syria and soon began posting photos of themselves on their social media accounts toting AK47s, wearing burkas and sporting ISIS regalia. Others have since attempted to run away and join these girls sparking fears among officials that the girls are fostering a sickening trend of wannabe terrorist runaways.
Thanks to their social media updates, Samra Kesinovic, 16 and her friend Sabina Selimovic, 15, have become minor celebrities among many teens in Austria’s Muslim minority community after the two ran away from their homes in Austria and ended up hanging around ISIS in Syria.
This month authorities announced that they apprehended two more teen girls who were trying to find passage through Turkey and into Syria to join the ISIS jihad movement.
Austrian officials also reported that they stopped a German citizen who was traveling through Austria in an attempt to join up with ISiS in Syria.
Austrian Interior Ministry spokesman Alexander Marakovits lamented the fact that a growing number of Muslim teens in Austria are making plans to join ISIS forces.
“If we can catch them before they leave we have the chance to work with their parents and other institutions to bring the youngsters out of the sphere of influence that prompted them to act in this way the first place,” Marakovits said.
The problem in Austria isn’t an isolated one. An American teen was recently arrested on charges of conspiracy to provide material support to a terrorist group when she tried to leave the country for Syria.
19-year-old Shannon Conley from suburban Denver appeared in court on September 10 where she faces up to five years in federal prison and a possible $250,000 fine for trying to leave the US to join ISIS.
Conley converted to Islam and was convinced by a Tunisian member of ISIS whom she met online to try and board a flight to Syria.
The young woman told authorities she intended to help ISIS with her skills as a nurse’s aide.
In another case of a western woman going jihad, just this month a 20-year-old Scottish student named Aqsa Mahmood fled Britain and joined ISIS forces in Syria.
Melanie Smith from King’s College International Centre for the Study of Radicalization reported that up to 21 British girls have run off to join ISIS forces.
Stories like this are occurring all over the world as the terror group grows in power and stature among Muslims.
**GOOD NEWS**
Just an update to note that one of these Austrian teens has already been killed while fighting for ISIS. As of press time, authorities aren’t sure which one is dead but either Samra or Sabina has been killed.
Here’s hoping they get the other one in short order.
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Warner Todd Huston is a Chicago based freelance writer. He has been writing opinion editorials and social criticism since early 2001 and before that he wrote articles on U.S. history for several small American magazines. His political columns are featured on many websites such as Andrew Breitbart’s BigGovernment.com, BigHollywood.com, and BigJournalism.com, as well as RightWingNews.com, CanadaFreePress.com, Wizbang.com, among many, many others. Huston has also appeared on Fox News, Fox Business Network, CNN, and many local TV shows as well as numerous talk radio shows throughout the country.
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