ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – The father of Haji Ali Eissa - one of five captives executed by the Islamic State (ISIS) in Raqqa in Syria – died four months ago of a stroke following his son’s captivity by the extremist group.
“Haji’s father was always thinking about his youngest son after the boy was taken captive by ISIS for a long time and he ended up dying of a heart attack because of his sorrow,” said one of Haji's relatives at the boy’s funeral.
He added that the death of Haji's father a few months ago was "much better, because he did not see his son killed this way. His death four months ago was better than watching his son’s execution video by ISIS.”
A gruesome video released on Friday by ISIS depicted the killing of five Kurdish captives in Raqqa, including Haji.
They were executed by gunshot by five child soldiers dressed in military fatigues. The child soldiers appeared to be of five different nationalities: British, Kurdish, Tunisian, Egyptian and Uzbek.
In the video, ISIS said that the captives were Kurdish and had been executed in Raqqa, but did not provide further information about which part of Kurdistan they were from, when they were taken captive or when they were killed.
They were reportedly killed in retaliation for recent Kurdish advances in Syria.
Mahmoud Eissa told Rudaw that his brother Haji “was 17 years old when ISIS took him, but three years later at the age of 20 ISIS executed him in this fashion.”
“My brother with his four friends were executed. Three of them were from Kobani. Their names were Mahmud Salih, Mohammed Abdulqadir, Hussein Khalil and the other one was from Afrin.”
He went to explain that Haji “was in grade 12 in school. One day he drove one of his teachers home with his car. On his way back home ISIS in eastern Kobani ambushed him. He could not flee so he was taken by the attackers.”
Rudaw has learned that during his captivity, Haji managed to briefly flee ISIS, but was recaptured.
“Haji was not a Peshmerga or a fighter. He loved peace. He wanted to see Kurdistan is free and fly the Kurdistan flag on our house. Unfortunately, he was martyred,” his brother sighed.
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