According to a former ADF special operations intelligence analyst, Islamic State wives and their children who are stuck in Syria would first be transported to a third Middle Eastern nation before being returned to Australia.
A rescue plan to repatriate more than a dozen families who recently underwent “risk assessments” after a covert ASIO mission to the war-torn country will be officially approved at a meeting of the Cabinet’s national security committee on Tuesday.
Following the defeat of the Islamic State in March 2019, 16 Australian women and 42 children have been detained at the al-Roj detention facility in northeastern Syria close to the Iraqi border for three and a half years.
Before their ill-fated “caliphate” fell three and a half years ago, the ladies left Australia to fight with their husbands for the Islamist terrorist outfit.
Australia is already divided over the federal government’s contentious decision to lift the prohibition on foreign combatants and those who went to Syria and Iraq to aid them.
How the families would be securely reintegrated back into Australia was a concern brought up by hosts on The Project on Monday.
When challenged by co-host Carrie Bickmore if Australia is obligated to bring them back “even if there is a tiny danger,” former ADF intelligence analyst Shane Healey responded vehemently.
Absolutely, Mr. Healey answered.
“I don’t understand how we can transport refugees out of Sudan, Afghanistan, and other war-torn nations while leaving Australian residents languishing in such a dreadful position,” the speaker says.
He emphasized that women and children who are saved from the detention facility won’t immediately be flown to Australia; instead, they would need to undergo further evaluation before being allowed to return to their homes, which might take months.
According to Mr. Healey, “They’re going to take them to a host country somewhere in the Middle East and give them a holistic assessment—psychological, educational, and medical, which takes weeks—and then slowly unpack whether it is trauma or any medical issues before starting to build them up to integrate back in Australia.”
One of the processes would be that the majority of young children “probably don’t even speak English or have had formal schooling.”
What he was saying, according to The Project’s Waleed Aly, sounded similar to previous deradicalisation programs with a “sketchy” track record abroad.
Despite considerable public outrage, Mr. Healey was quite convinced that families would smoothly reintegrate back into Australia without any problems.
I detest the phrase “deradicalized,” Mr. Healey added, since I think it refers to an extreme range.
It is their embrace or use of violence, not their radicalism or their faith.
Because they attempted to focus on the religious components, the majority of such courses or programs failed. I used to work with Youth Justice NSW, where we had great success going after those who were willing or accepting of using violence to get where they wanted to go.
So when you do those evaluations, that’s what you’re focusing on, and that’s the key to the entire process. What acts of violence did they see, what acts of violence did they commit, and what do they think about using violence to further any cause?
As the episode came to a close, Mr. Healey launched a scathing attack on the previous Scott Morrison administration’s rigid stance on the repatriation of Australian nationals held in Syrian detention facilities.
He vehemently disputes the previous administration’s justification, which was based on intelligence advice, that removing families from Syrian camps was a poor decision.
The previous administration, in my opinion, wasn’t sharing the entire story, and (former minister) Peter Dutton, I believe, had some other objectives,’ Mr. Healey added.
“Look at Save our Children’s CEO Matt Tinkler. He has frequented the camps both inside and outside.
“NGOs move in and out of the camp with no trouble, ABC and other media have gone inside the camps to film documentaries with no problem, and we have previously dealt with similar difficulties from Sudanese refugees in Australia with no problem.”
“So I simply outright reject it, and I believe they’re incorrect,” you say.
In response, the father and grandpa of an Australian lady and her three children who are being held in a Syrian detention facility expressed his excitement for their potential homecoming.
At the age of 22, Mariam Dabboussy, with her 18-month-old kid, abandoned her middle-class existence to work in childcare for the war-torn hellhole. She later remarried Kaled Zahab.
Ms. Dabboussy is now being kept at the al-Roj refugee camp with her three children and is scheduled to be deported.
Even though he hasn’t received official notice of the mission, her father Kamalle Dabboussy, who still resides in Sydney, says he’d work with all tiers of government to bring his family back.
Every parent wants to make sure that their kids are safe, he said.
Leader of the Muslim community Dr. Jamal Rifi declared that he was “100%” confident the women would return safely and that Australia would be secure.
According to him, if there were any security concerns, the ladies and children could also be properly monitored by the country’s security authorities.
The repatriation “can’t occur fast enough,” according to Mat Tinkler, chief executive of Save the Children Australia.
He continued, “Children have perished in these camps.”
“Australian children are underfed, have untreated shrapnel wounds, and the condition is affecting their mental health,” the statement reads.
But the opposition wants additional information.
Former home affairs minister Karen Andrews claims that she withheld her approval during her time in office because she was worried about the danger to Australian authorities and the possibility of radicalization.
According to Ms. Andrews’s counsel, the women constituted a security concern since they traveled voluntarily and were “usually involved in the role they were expected to play… to help ISIS and foreign fighters.”
Bringing them back, according to Ms. Andrews, “presented an unwarranted danger and significant expense.”
The spokeswoman for the opposition’s home affairs said to the ABC, “I’ve seen nothing to change my perspective.”
Tanya Plibersek, a federal front-runner, refuted the story.
She told the Seven Network that “some of the ladies, the moms, were brought there as little more than little more than children themselves and married off to (Islamic State) warriors.”
Some of them were compelled to go there while others were deceived into going.