Thousands of terrorists around the globe have a new reason to worry that their governments now know who they are, thanks to an Islamic State defector who handed the information over to Sky News.
The information was provided to Sky News by a former Free Syrian Army convert to the Islamic State. Disaffected with what he said was the organization’s failure to abide by Islamic rules, he quit, and provided the news agency with a memory stick stolen from the head of the Islamic State’s internal security police.
The documents appear to be just a portion of an overall treasure trove that has been received by German authorities. According to the New York Times, the Interior Ministry on Thursday confirmed it had the information and that they believe it is authentic. Three German news organizations first reported news of the list on Monday, but the matter received more attention when Sky News announced that it, too, had information.
The memory stick, Sky News writes, holds “tens of thousands of documents, containing names, addresses, telephone numbers and family contacts of Islamic State jihadis” from at least 51 countries. The information reveals that those jihadis were required to fill out a 23-question form as part of their application to join the international terrorist group.
The report does not include the nature of those questions, but does include details on some of those who have joined the Islamic State. They include, for instance, 26-year-old Abdel Bary, a London rapper whose whereabouts are unknown, but who the United Kingdom has designated as a foreign fighter.
“But the key breakthrough from the documents is the revealing of the identities of a number of previously unknown jihadis in the UK, across northern Europe, much of the Middle East and North Africa, as well as in the United States and Canada,” Sky News reports. One such file, called “Martyrs,” includes information entirely on fighters who have volunteered to carry out suicide attacks around the world.
That information could serve as a major breakthrough for authorities around the world, who have faced increasing difficulty trying to contain the Islamic State’s propaganda efforts and stop Westerners from attempting to join the group.
The man who provided the information, who went by the name Abu Hamed, additionally complained that the Islamic State has been co-opted by former soldiers from former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party.
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Asked if the file could help to finally destroy the group, Hamed reportedly replied, “God willing.”
