Daesh ‘beheading, raping’ Palestinians in Yarmouk camp

Palestinian residents of Syria’s Yarmouk refugee camp have undergone executions, beheadings, and rape by the Takfiri Daesh terrorists, says the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO).

The head of the PLO in Syria, Anwar Abdel-Hadi, said Wednesday that clashes between Daesh and al-Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front militants were ongoing and that Daesh had taken control of 70 percent of the camp.

Abdel-Hadi said that the Palestinians in the camp were trapped and could not leave their homes due to the fierce gun battles.

The PLO chief added that the Nusra Front allowed Daesh to enter the Yarmouk refugee camp last year but the two terrorist groups had since turned against one another.

He said at least 20 people in the camp had been beheaded and buried with their identities still unknown.

Some 3,000 Daesh militants have been deployed in Yarmouk and the neighboring Hajar al-Aswad area, the PLO head said.

According to Abdel-Hadi, Daesh terrorists have used their tactics of rape, beheading and torture to force residents of the camp to adhere to their ideology.

“We have asked for a truce to be called in order for the sick and injured to be allowed safe exit from the camp but IS refused,” he said, in reference to Daesh.

The camp was once home to 160,000 Syrians and Palestinians. However, it has turned into a ghost town as a result of the violent attacks by anti-government militants over the past five years of tumult in Syria.

The majority of Yarmouk’s population has fled to other Syrian towns and cities, with some making their way to Arab and European countries.

Over the past few months, the Syrian army, backed by the Russian air power, has been making major gains against terrorist groups, recapturing several strategic areas from the Takfiris.

Daesh militants come from 70 countries

Meanwhile, leaked documents from Daesh show nationals from more than 70 countries have joined the terrorist group.

The information came from a Daesh defector who handed over some 11,000 personnel files to US television network NBC, although more than half were found to be duplicates. They include recruits from France, Germany, Lebanon, Britain, Australia and Canada.

NBC then passed 4,600 of the files, which are one of several large-scale leaks from within Daesh this year, to the national Combating Terrorism Center (CTC).

Earlier in January, German newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung and broadcasters WDR and NDR independently reported that they had obtained “many dozens” of pages of documents detailing names, countries of origin, telephone numbers, and even sponsors and recruiters of terrorists with the Takfiri group.

The CTC, which is independent from the US military academy, said it has been able to confirm “approximately 98 percent” of the documents it received from NBC by cross referencing them with similar Daesh personnel records maintained by the US Department of Defense.

Application forms, completed by recruits in Arabic and often including notes from the assessors, refer to around 30 percent of the estimated 15,000 new recruits who entered Syria during 2013 and 2014.

The analysis provided not only a composite picture of the militants but also an insight into how Daesh is “attempting to vet new members, manage talent effectively … and deal with a diverse pool of recruits,” said the report, which is available on the CTC website.