Washington: Daesh, the extremist group that has wreaked havoc in Syria and Iraq, is perhaps best known in the West for its violent behaviour toward journalists. The executions of American journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff are widely regarded as the catalyst that spurred US and allied strikes against the group, for example.
However, the group does offer a more complicated vision of international media. Vice News was able to film its remarkable view of life under the Daesh in Raqqah, Syria, with apparent cooperation from the extremists. “These are managed trips, so you are there with their permission,” Kevin Sutcliffe, Vice’s head of news programming in Europe, explained to the Huffington Post. “While they are, to some extent, keeping you safe ... you are also an interloper.”
Now, Syria Deeply, an independent news site that focuses on the Syrian conflict, has published a list of rules that it says have been given to journalists in the Daesh-controlled region of Deir Al Zour, Syria. The list was sent to Syria Deeply by “Amer,” a local journalist who stayed in the city after the Daesh took over. Amer told Syria Deeply that the rules were sent to him by the Daesh’s media office.
Among the rules are orders that journalists must pledge allegiance to Daesh and its leader.
Given the Daesh’s modus operandi, these rules, while obviously extremely restrictive, are not necessarily surprising. Perhaps most surprising to Western viewers would be that the major international news agencies are tolerated but that satellite news is a no-go. Al Arabiya, Al Jazeera and Orient are described as “channels that fight against Islamic countries,” and journalists are forbidden from working with them, probably because of their respective owners (Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Syria, all of which are fighting Daesh).
The rules appear to be addressing local journalists, and for most Western reporters it remains untenable to visit Daesh-controlled territory.
“Reuters journalists are unable to visit the area for security reasons,” one Reuters report on Raqqah noted in September. When the New York Times reported from Raqqah, it declined to name the writer, instead referring to the reporter as “an employee of the New York Times.”
The rules offer a rare glimpse of how Daesh, the extremist group, would like to become the “Islamic State”, a functioning state with its own rules and laws. Earlier this summer, militants from Daesh released a list of rules for life in Nineveh, Iraq: Citizens were warned that thieves would face amputations, and that graves and shrines were now banned. Daesh later issued strict rules for education in Raqqah, which the Wall Street Journal noted included the banning of all mention of the word “Syria.”