Chess, smokes, therapy for ex-jihadists at Syria rehab centre

MAREA, Syria: In a rehabilitation centre in northern Syria, young men huddle over an innocuous game of chess and some cigarettes — activities they once brutally suppressed as Islamic State group jihadists.

Based in the rebel-held town of Marea, the Syrian Centre for Countering Extremist Ideology is home to around 100 one-time IS fighters from Syria, the Middle East and even Europe.“I used to dream of establishing an Islamic state... but now, we take courses that clear up what’s wrong with what we once believed,” 23-year-old Mohammad Haj Ahmad says.

Ahmad hails from Raqa, the northern city that served as the de facto capital of a now-collapsed jihadist “caliphate” sprawling across Syria and Iraq.He joined IS in 2014 and took part in one of its most gruesome battles at Tabqa airport near Raqa, where jihadists executed more than 200 army troops.

“I was completely convinced by their slogans about jihad, that they were the only ones implementing religion correctly, and that everyone else was an infidel and an apostate,” he tells AFP.“My father was scared I’d be convinced to blow myself up.” Now, Ahmad and fellow ex-jihadists are undergoing intensive rehabilitation courses in Marea aiming to wash away extremist habits so they can ultimately reintegrate into society. Ahmad doesn’t know what he will do once he is cleared by rebel authorities to leave the centre. “Maybe I’ll start a business, continue my studies, or go to Europe,” he shrugs.