0:01

This is a CBC Podcast. I

0:08

dare not even say this out loud at this

0:10

point. It feels too

0:13

incredible. She is who right now we

0:15

suspect she is. And this is hard

0:17

to describe. It's

0:20

early morning. Joanna and I

0:22

are at breakfast, but we're not eating.

0:26

We've barely touched the bread and honey on our table. We're

0:29

too distracted, trying to

0:31

make sense of a rumour we heard last night.

0:36

We did not see this coming. We were not looking

0:38

for this person. And yet she

0:40

has landed right in front of us. She

0:43

is DA. DA,

0:48

the Canadian woman who we

0:50

had met in Al Raj,

0:53

we knew ahead of time that she

0:55

knew baby Salman's Canadian mother. And

0:58

she was willing to give us

1:00

information about it. When

1:04

you come to a place like Syria, you have

1:06

no idea who will speak with you until

1:09

you get here. And

1:11

in our hunt for Salman, we basically had

1:13

no one. And then we

1:15

had DA. A

1:17

woman we'd never heard of who knew Aisha

1:20

was friends with her and was keen

1:22

to talk. She's,

1:25

in terms of a character, she's this

1:27

petite young woman, very

1:29

energetic, this sort of pixie-esque energy. She's

1:31

flitting from one place to the other.

1:34

Her words just

1:36

rush out. She was incredibly,

1:38

incredibly helpful. She

1:41

talked about Aisha baby Salman's mum,

1:45

in terms of characterisation, lovely person, the

1:48

sort of things that you would say about a friend who had

1:50

passed away. DA

1:52

seemed popular with the other women. Well-connected,

1:55

confident, and she

1:57

seemed to care about Aisha and his family. What

24:01

do you think about the fact that

24:03

Yazidi women were taken and they were

24:05

raped and they were used as slaves?

24:09

That's really... that's

24:12

horrible. Yeah. Did

24:15

you have slaves living with you? No. Slaves living

24:17

with them, no. I knew this

24:20

was happening. It's like talk. Talk,

24:23

you know, that people

24:25

had slaves and, you

24:27

know, I didn't necessarily know it was Yazidi. I didn't know

24:29

what Yazidi meant. I feel like,

24:31

you know, you're living in a bubble. You know,

24:34

I didn't understand even how big it

24:36

was because I was in Canada and no one talked

24:38

about IS at that time. You know what I mean?

24:40

It wasn't something that you see. I used to watch

24:42

the news. It wasn't what I seen. So

24:44

I didn't know after how many years

24:47

later how... how

24:49

expanded, how the influence became and how...

24:54

D.A. left Canada for Syria in late

24:56

2014 when IS was at the height

24:58

of its notoriety. This

25:01

was after the killings of American

25:03

journalists James Foley and Stephen Sockloff

25:05

and British aid workers David Haynes and

25:08

Alan Henning. Where

25:10

news of their deaths was everywhere. D.A.,

25:14

I'm just going to stop for one second. You

25:16

didn't see the beheading videos? I did, but I didn't. You didn't

25:18

see the... No, no, I

25:20

know, I know, but I didn't... I wasn't on

25:22

the internet. I didn't know how many people were

25:26

watching. It wasn't something when I was in Canada,

25:28

something that was in my eyes. You

25:30

know what I mean? It wasn't in my face. And

25:33

maybe I was just really naive about it, or,

25:35

you know... I've

25:37

spoken to a lot of women like D.A., women

25:40

who marry diasphytus. There's

25:42

often a collective amnesia, a

25:45

lot of denial. Some

25:47

actually were victims or tragically

25:49

naive. A lot of them

25:51

blame their partners. Some

25:53

are utterly unrepentant, and

25:55

others, they'll say anything to

25:58

get home. In

26:00

the end, it comes down to three things.

26:03

The lies they were told, the lies

26:05

they're telling me, and the lies

26:07

they're telling themselves. And

26:15

so we're going to... Wait, do you mind if,

26:17

when you ask me about the ISIS, because I

26:19

won't sit well in the camp. OK, no, no.

26:22

You know what I mean? DA

26:24

lowers her voice a bit, so it might be hard

26:26

to catch what she's saying. She's

26:29

asking me to not air her condemnation

26:31

of IS, as she fears

26:33

how other women in the camp will respond. Are

26:36

there still women that will give you a hard time for saying that? Yeah,

26:41

not like... They

26:43

will... Yeah, kind of. This

26:47

is part of the danger of these camps. Women

26:50

still police themselves, and others, by

26:52

the rules of IS. Some

26:54

with an iron fist, sometimes

26:56

lethally. I

26:59

know I won't sit well. We're going

27:01

to be very mindful of what we put out while

27:04

you're here. We're

27:16

almost out of time in DA's tent. Any

27:19

minute, the guard will walk in and

27:21

end our conversation. I

27:23

ask if she'll sit down with us again in a few

27:25

days. DA agrees,

27:28

and I make the decision to not

27:30

ask about El Shafiel's shake today. So,

27:33

I mean, we'll see you on Saturday anyway,

27:36

but if we just get you, like, with

27:38

your kids or just get some sounds... But

27:40

with DA watching, I can't

27:42

find a way to tell Juwan I've changed

27:44

our plan. Can

27:47

we ask a couple of questions? I've

27:49

been thinking, oh... You say your children

27:51

always ask about your grandmother and the

27:53

staff back home. Has it ever asked

27:55

you about their father? No.

27:58

No. No, no,

28:00

they don't. Generally, the kids here,

28:02

they don't understand that concept of a father.

28:05

Any man is their father. They don't

28:07

understand what a dad is. They

28:10

don't remember him. They don't know his face. I don't show

28:12

him. I don't have a

28:14

picture, you know what I mean? So they know you have

28:16

a dad and we have the same dad. Maybe

28:18

they think sometimes my dad is their dad. You

28:21

know what I mean? So they don't

28:24

know. They don't ask about him, like, where

28:26

is daddy or anything? Or

28:28

how is daddy? Or what? Tell...

28:31

They know their dad is in prison. Right, OK.

28:33

That's all. That's as much as they know. He's in

28:35

prison. Yeah, as much as they know. OK. And

28:37

nearby? Nearby?

28:42

Yay. Then nearby. Or somewhere.

28:45

OK. Do you tell them

28:47

anything about the father? There was a time

28:49

where I just... Little stories,

28:51

not so much. Do

28:54

you miss him? Huh. The

28:56

dad. Yeah,

28:59

I missed him. Hmm,

29:03

hmm, hmm. Let's

29:05

cut that question out. And

29:12

that's it. Our time in the camp

29:14

is up. I worry she's on

29:16

to us now, that she might

29:18

pull back or even cancel our next interview.

29:21

But by evening, she confirms. I'll

29:25

have to wait. But I

29:27

will get to ask her the question I need

29:29

to. Two

29:39

days later, I'm back at Raj camp. Today,

29:42

I'm in the tent alone with D.A. and

29:44

a friend of hers. You'll hear

29:46

her laughing in the background from time to time. OK.

29:52

Right, I'm just going to check that we are

29:54

recording, which we are. D.A.,

29:58

I'm going to ask you something. I

40:00

just feel so simple. Just

40:02

carry on with me three pairs of pants

40:05

and two t-shirts and I was like, okay,

40:07

I'm on winter break when I

40:09

have exams coming up next week. I

40:11

think I even packed my textbooks to study, you know, back

40:13

from my exam. I didn't think it was somewhere I was

40:15

going to say, yeah, yeah, just come and you

40:18

check it out and you'll see. You

40:20

know, I'm like, I can go back. I can come back. Yeah,

40:22

yeah, yeah. Just a reminder,

40:25

D.A. left Canada in the weeks

40:27

after I.S. released videos of the

40:30

executions of Western hostages. I'm

40:36

actually grateful to him for

40:38

not telling me anything, showing me anything

40:40

or not, because I feel like maybe

40:43

it protected me, you

40:47

know, of any type of

40:49

accountability. I

40:51

know it's dangerous when you know when you have the

40:53

intent of coming, when you know what

40:56

you're coming to, you know, going

40:58

back to Canada, you know, having a possibility

41:00

of facing persecution. I know not knowing what

41:02

was happening when I can't even know what

41:04

I.S. I.S. even stood for. So

41:06

I can say I didn't even have the

41:08

intent of joining

41:11

a terrorist organization. How

41:14

did he treat you at this point? Yeah,

41:16

he wasn't around so much. He

41:19

was around, but it's like he

41:21

wasn't around. And it really,

41:23

it went downhill very fast. That's

41:27

not the person I met, you know what I mean?

41:29

I think Syria really changed him. I

41:31

think the two years really changed him, you know, and I seen

41:33

that difference when I came. It

41:37

wasn't, we weren't compatible anymore. Forget

41:39

ISIS. In the home, we just weren't

41:42

compatible anymore, you know what I mean? He

41:45

came to Syria and his, how

41:47

he, he had

41:49

a different standard. I

41:52

was still the same person, same

41:54

city girl, and he wanted a more traditional

41:56

girl, you know what I mean? Because he

41:59

really absorbed. how it's supposed

42:01

to be here, you know, how a woman or a wife

42:03

or somebody, and it just didn't work out, and I just...

42:06

I just didn't want anything to do with it, you know what I mean? I

42:09

wanted a divorce for so long and had nothing to

42:11

do with what he was, you

42:14

know, what he's been convicted of doing. It's

42:16

just a whole big mess. Oh, God, I just

42:18

hope I feel like I can't believe this is me. I

42:21

got it from all people, from all men.

42:23

This has to be him. What

42:26

do you think about the brutality, some

42:30

of which, now that we are all open, some of which

42:32

was committed, the worst of

42:34

which was committed by your ex-husband, the

42:36

father of your children? It's

42:39

horrific. It's horrific. It's

42:43

something I can't even understand.

42:47

Any human can do, just for what? Just for show? You

42:49

know what I mean? I just didn't understand the benefit

42:51

of it, just because it's a little

42:53

bit of a struggle. I didn't understand the benefit of it, just

42:57

because this person is a foreigner and

43:00

let's just put fear in, let's make the

43:02

world seem around the top of the world and

43:04

we control everything. Maybe that kind of stubbornness

43:06

and pridefulness is

43:10

what ended making their face such

43:12

a harsh sentence.

43:16

Do you think that was what happened? The power

43:18

had just gone to his head. Yeah, I

43:20

think for a lot of people, that

43:22

invincible kind of feeling that you're in

43:24

it now, you're just living, they're living

43:26

in that moment that you

43:28

think that nothing can touch me, you know,

43:30

nothing can happen. I think people got caught

43:32

up in the moment without thinking,

43:35

just doing things because you just feel powerful

43:37

in that moment. Because he

43:39

was cruel. He did evil

43:41

stuff to the journalists, aid

43:44

workers. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It

43:48

seemed really cowardly, kind of, you know, in

43:50

a way that people that can't even help

43:52

themselves, that they didn't, you know,

43:54

that can't even, they're not

43:56

here to fight nobody. Do

44:08

you have any contact with him now or is that over? Yeah,

44:13

I just one time, just

44:17

one time his lawyer contacted me way back

44:19

in January and that

44:21

was it, talked to him one time. The

44:24

Red Cross letter used to come, you know, and he says,

44:26

but they haven't been, maybe I got two or three from

44:28

him from before. What was he saying? He asked

44:31

me for forgiveness. From you? Yeah.

44:34

Really, what did he want forgiveness for? How

44:40

the relationship went bad. It went really

44:43

bad and downhill and just, you know, this

44:45

and I think maybe

44:48

all this mess, he wants me to get out, he wants

44:50

me to go back to my country, he wants me to

44:53

go back to

44:55

my parents and like this. I don't know if he's,

44:58

you know, bringing me here, telling

45:01

me to come and like

45:03

this, like this maybe. So

45:06

he's just, he's been asking you for

45:08

forgiveness. Yeah, like this. Maybe getting into

45:11

all this mess, you know, like this.

45:14

He wrote to you, did you write back? Mm-hmm.

45:17

What did you say? I

45:19

talked about the kids. He, you know, talked

45:21

about the kids and stuff. What

45:24

would you say to him now? What

45:27

would I say to him now? I

45:31

would, I just want, I

45:33

just want, I would love to ask him was it worth it?

45:35

Was all this worth it? Was

45:37

it worth it? You know,

45:40

missing out, now you're really going to miss out on all

45:42

your kids' lives, you know, seeing them

45:44

grow up. Was it all worth it? Maybe

45:48

one day, I'll ask you.