Updated ,first published
Nineteen Australian women and children linked to Islamic State flew out of Syria late on Monday night, bound for Australia, leaving behind one woman, Hodan Abby, and her nine-year-old daughter.
Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke has confirmed that seven women and 12 children embarked in Damascus and were on a flight home. The number includes one young woman who just turned 18 and is the daughter of one of the so-called ISIS brides.
Government sources have confirmed the Australian temporary exclusion order imposed by the Albanese government forced one woman and her child to stay in Damascus. This masthead can reveal that woman is Abby.
Four women are expected to land in Sydney on Tuesday, along with their six children. Two more women, accompanied by seven children, are expected in Melbourne.
Burke imposed a temporary exclusion order on Abby in February. Her daughter, who is also now stuck in Syria, has serious medical issues caused by shrapnel wounds she suffered as a baby.
The child has shrapnel in her head, neck and hip, which this masthead reported in 2021 made it difficult for her to walk and caused delayed speech and development.
Sources close to the family group but unwilling to speak publicly say the child needs medical attention after earlier attempts to get her an operation were rebuffed by authorities at the al-Roj camp. The girl is experiencing ongoing physical disabilities.
Abby herself also has a piece of shrapnel in her chest.
Australian government sources have said they will not provide consular assistance to Abby and her child.
Abby escaped from her home in western Sydney with a friend when she was 18 and entered Syria in 2015 with the hope of becoming a jihadist bride. The young women told their parents they were going on holiday. Abby’s friend was killed in Syria in 2015.
Sources close to the repatriation say Abby and her child had a plane ticket and had hoped to return, but were stopped at the airport and prevented from boarding because of the exclusion order. Family members had hoped she might be able to challenge the exclusion order regime.
The order extends for two years unless a court strikes it down or the minister issues a return permit. The government has not confirmed whether Abby has applied for such a permit. Lawyers for the family group declined to comment.
Abby had the option of sending her daughter back to Australia with the other mothers as the child is not subject to the order. However, she elected not to.
The interim Syrian government in Damascus has said it would look after the pair.
The women who are returning to Sydney are: Nesrine Zahab, who was 21 when she claims she was tricked into going into Syria by her cousin and IS recruiter Muhammad Zahab; Aminah Zahab, Muhammad’s wife, and Sumaya Zahab, Muhammad’s sister. Hyam Raad, about whom little is known, is the fourth woman returning to Sydney.
Travelling to Melbourne are Kawsar Kanj, about whom little is known, and Kirsty Rosse-Emile, the daughter of two former Christians who converted to Islam when she was nine. She travelled to Syria at 19 with her much older, radicalised husband.
A group of so-called IS brides arrived in Australia earlier this month. Three out of four of them were arrested, and there were chaotic scenes at Melbourne Airport.
At least some of the women in the latest group are expected to face criminal charges, but neither the government nor the Australian Federal Police has said what those might be, nor whether there would be arrests at the airport. Some women who are under criminal investigation might not face immediate arrest.
In a statement, Burke reiterated that the Australian government “has not and will not provide any assistance to this group”.
“Our world-class law enforcement and intelligence agencies have been preparing for their return since 2014 and have long-standing plans in place to manage and monitor them,” he said.
Sources close to the return operation said two people from Australia, one man and one woman, had travelled to Syria last week to accompany the women and children home.
Senior Coalition figures, who have been demanding the government find a way to block the Australian citizens from returning, said the government had failed to properly manage the group’s return.
“The government’s being very passive here,” Liberal frontbencher Andrew Hastie told Sky News. “Their job is to protect Australians, and these people betrayed their country.”
Nationals leader Matt Canavan questioned why more women weren’t issued with temporary exclusion orders.
“It’s probably too late for anything to change now, of course, but the government has exposed Australians to unnecessary risks.”
An exclusion order is placed on ASIO advice and on narrow grounds. The minister must believe it would help prevent a terrorist act, or training or support for terrorism. It can also be imposed if ASIO assesses the person to be “directly or indirectly a risk to security for reasons related to politically motivated violence”.
The return means that, apart from the excluded woman and her child, all the Australian so-called IS brides are now out of Syria for the first time since the end of the so-called Islamic State caliphate in March 2019.
The women travelled – some willingly and others claiming to have been forced by husbands or family members – to live under the warlike Islamist movement after it gained territory in 2014.
Since IS’s defeat, they have lived in tents in a variety of camps in north-eastern Syria. Coalition and Labor governments have both organised repatriations in small groups, but the Albanese government has refused to bring anybody home since 2022.
It issued the group one-use-only passports, after DNA testing in 2022, to ensure the children are indeed citizens by descent. But the government has withheld other assistance, with Prime Minister Anthony Albanese saying he has “nothing but contempt” for the women.
The government’s refusal has earned the condemnation of child advocates, including Save the Children and Human Rights Watch, and has forced the women and their supporters to make their own arrangements to return.
Save the Children Australia chief executive Mat Tinkler said on Tuesday the safety and wellbeing of the returning children – who make up two-thirds of the group – should be the priority.
“The political debate surrounding their future in Australia has been deeply disappointing,” Tinkler said.
“Their childhood has been badly interrupted, and they deserve to be given the space they need to safely reintegrate into the community and rebuild their lives in Australia.”
An earlier return on May 7 marked the first time globally the Syrian government has allowed IS-linked women and children to travel without the direct involvement of a national government.
The move could set a precedent for family advocate groups from other Western countries to follow.
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Michael Bachelard is a senior writer and former deputy editor and investigations editor of The Age. He has worked in Canberra, Melbourne and Jakarta, has written two books and won multiple awards for journalism, including the Gold Walkley.Connect via X or email.
Brittany Busch is a federal politics reporter for The Age and Sydney Morning Herald.Connect via email.