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ISIS Women in Syria’s Al-Hol, Roj Camps: Uncertain Fates Ahead

One of the main streets in Al-Hol camp (Asharq Al-Awsat)
One of the main streets in Al-Hol camp (Asharq Al-Awsat)
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ISIS Women in Syria’s Al-Hol, Roj Camps: Uncertain Fates Ahead

One of the main streets in Al-Hol camp (Asharq Al-Awsat)
One of the main streets in Al-Hol camp (Asharq Al-Awsat)

Over the years, Al-Hol camp has grown into a bustling city of tents, home to nearly 43,000 people, mostly women and children from Iraq and Syria. Another section hosts families from 54 different Western and Arab countries.
Situated around 45 kilometers east of Al-Hasakah Governorate in Syria’s far northeast, Al-Hol’s population has surged from just a few hundred in 2016 to over 70,000 during the ISIS era.
About 136 kilometers away lies Roj camp, seeming similar to other refugee camps at first glance. But beyond its gates are high walls, surveillance cameras, and hundreds of tents housing jihadist women, fighters’ wives, and ISIS leaders.
While some women try to leave, others still hold onto beliefs that drew them to join the terror group, turning these camps into uncertain waiting grounds.
In the market of Al-Hol camp in eastern Syria, Iraqi and Syrian women shop for groceries, fruits, and even cosmetics. Some also get their phones fixed while vendors sell everything from dresses to Valentine’s Day gifts and perfumes, once banned under ISIS.
According to the UN refugee agency, the camp hosts 43,477 people, mostly Iraqi refugees followed by Syrian displaced persons, and around 6,500 foreign migrants, with women and children forming the majority.
Threats and Killings Persist in Al-Hol Camp
Al-Hol camp is run by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and their military branch, the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG). Despite security efforts, violence continues, with attempted mass escapes being stopped by security.
The camp director reported receiving complaints of armed men threatening and robbing organizations operating at Al-Hol during the day.
The Iraqi government has brought back 1,400 families from Al-Hol camp in six groups by the end of 2023. However, many countries refuse to take back their citizens, even in humanitarian cases.
Women Search for Missing Husbands
“I've been in the camp for 6, 7, or maybe 10 years... Honestly, I can't remember. We're tired of waiting,” said Noran, a seventy-year-old Iraqi woman in Al-Hol camp. She, like many others, can’t recall when she arrived, living without much hope.
She came to Syria in mid-2016 when the borders dissolved due to the conflict. Now, she lives with her widowed daughter and granddaughter; her daughter’s husband died in battles in Deir ez-Zor.
Speaking to Asharq Al-Awsat, Noran expressed her readiness to return to Iraq if given the chance because she’s endured enough suffering.
Raghad Rasool, another Iraqi refugee in Al-Hol camp for six years, left her hometown in 2015, unsure of her husband and four brothers’ fate. They were captured after the Baghouz battle five years ago. Raghad longs to see them again.
Rassol sat selling parsley, onions, and mint in the market to support her family of five.
At 54, wrinkles marked her face as she lamented her situation.
“There’s no safety, life is tough, and we know nothing about the prisoners. But seeing my children without a future is the hardest,” she told Asharq Al-Awsat.
Many Iraqi refugee women share Raghad’s pain, not knowing what happened to their husbands or male family members held by coalition forces and the SDF.
Azhar, 32, dressed in black with only her eyes visible, spoke in a low voice to Asharq Al-Awsat, fearing surveillance.
“My husband has been missing for five years. I don't know if he's alive or dead. I have the right to know his fate, but I fear him being taken to Iraq and tried for belonging to the organization (ISIS),” she said.
Azhar, the Iraqi refugee, recounted moving between several Syrian cities to escape ISIS until they ended up in Baghouz.
After the men surrendered, the women and children were taken to Al-Hol camp.
All my family is here, including my parents and 30 relatives with my children, the oldest being 18 and the youngest 10,” she added.
Survivors Speak Out Amidst 150 Murders in Al-Hol Camp
In a guarded section of Al-Hol camp, security forces stand watch, restricting access to only those with written permission. Known as the “safe zone,” it shelters 25 families who escaped ISIS retaliation.
Lina, 23, a displaced Syrian from Al-Safira, shares her ordeal. Married off at 12 to a Tunisian fighter 33 years her senior, she reflects on her mother’s death in childbirth and her stepmother’s pressure to marry quickly.
Moving between ISIS-held areas, Lina settled in Baghouz, where her husband died, leaving her with two children who later succumbed to illness.
“Now I'm alone, hoping for a safer place,” she told Asharq Al-Awsat.
In Al-Hol, threats from pro-ISIS groups haunted Lina, culminating in an assassination attempt that forced her into the safe zone.
Al-Hol has seen over 150 murders, with 36 in 2023 alone.
Dima, 28, from Manbij, shares her fear: “Even in the safe zone, I fear for my life as night falls.”
Her husband, once an ISIS nurse, refused their orders, leading to an assassination attempt on Dima’s life. She’s now sheltered in the safe zone, hoping for safety.

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Fear Stalks Tehran as Israel Bombards, Shelters Fill Up and Communicating Grows Harder

Shops remain shuttered Tehran's historic Grand Bazaar, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP)
Shops remain shuttered Tehran's historic Grand Bazaar, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP)
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Fear Stalks Tehran as Israel Bombards, Shelters Fill Up and Communicating Grows Harder

Shops remain shuttered Tehran's historic Grand Bazaar, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP)
Shops remain shuttered Tehran's historic Grand Bazaar, Monday, June 16, 2025. (AP)

The streets of Tehran are empty, businesses closed, communications patchy at best. With no bona fide bomb shelters open to the public, panicked masses spend restless nights on the floors of metro stations as strikes boom overhead.

This is Iran’s capital city, just under a week into a fierce Israeli blitz to destroy the country's nuclear program and its military capabilities. After knocking out much of Iran's air defense system, Israel says its warplanes have free rein over the city's skies. US President Donald Trump on Monday told Tehran's roughly 10 million residents to evacuate “immediately.”

Thousands have fled, spending hours in gridlock as they head toward the suburbs, the Caspian Sea, or even Armenia or Türkiye. But others — those elderly and infirm — are stuck in high-rise apartment buildings. Their relatives fret: what to do?

Israeli strikes on Iran have killed at least 585 people and wounded over 1,300, a human rights group says. State media, also a target of bombardment, have stopped reporting on the attacks, leaving Iranians in the dark. There are few visible signs of state authority: Police appear largely undercover, air raid sirens are unreliable, and there’s scant information on what to do in case of attack.

Shirin, 49, who lives in the southern part of Tehran, said every call or text to friends and family in recent days has felt like it could be the last.

“We don’t know if tomorrow we will be alive,” she said.

Many Iranians feel conflicted. Some support Israel's targeting of Iranian political and military officials they see as repressive. Others staunchly defend the country and retaliatory strikes on Israel. Then, there are those who oppose Iran’s rulers, but still don't want to see their country bombed.

To stay, or to go? The Associated Press interviewed five people in Iran and one Iranian American in the US over the phone. All spoke either on the condition of anonymity or only allowed their first names to be used, for fear of retribution from the state against them or their families.

Most of the calls ended abruptly and within minutes, cutting off conversations as people grew nervous or because the connection dropped. Iran’s government has acknowledged disrupting internet access. It says it's to protect the country, though that has blocked average Iranians from getting information from the outside world.

Iranians in the diaspora wait anxiously for news from relatives. One, an Iranian American human rights researcher in the US, said he last heard from relatives when some were trying to flee Tehran earlier in the week. He believes that lack of gas and traffic prevented them from leaving.

The most heartbreaking interaction, he said, was when his older cousins with whom he grew up in Iran told him “We don’t know where to go. If we die, we die.”

“Their sense was just despair,” he said.

Some families have made the decision to split up.

A 23-year-old Afghan refugee who has lived in Iran for four years said he stayed behind in Tehran but sent his wife and newborn son out of the city after a strike Monday hit a nearby pharmacy.

“It was a very bad shock for them,” he said.

Some, like Shirin, said fleeing was not an option. The apartment buildings in Tehran are towering and dense. Her father has Alzheimer’s and needs an ambulance to move. Her mother's severe arthritis would make even a short trip extremely painful.

Still, hoping escape might be possible, she spent the last several days trying to gather their medications. Her brother waited at a gas station until 3 a.m., only to be turned away when the fuel ran out. As of Monday, gas was being rationed to under 20 liters (5 gallons) per driver at stations across Iran after an Israeli strike set fire to the world's largest gas field.

Some people, like Arshia, said they are just tired.

“I don’t want to go in traffic for 40 hours, 30 hours, 20 hours, just to get to somewhere that might get bombed eventually,” he said.

The 22-year-old has been staying in the house with his parents since the initial Israeli strike. He said his once-lively neighborhood of Saadat Abad in northwestern Tehran is now a ghost town. Schools are closed. Very few people even step outside to walk their dogs. Most local stores have run out of drinking water and cooking oil. Others closed.

Still, Arshia said the prospect of finding a new place is too daunting.

“We don’t have the resources to leave at the moment,” he said.

Residents are on their own

No air raid sirens went off as Israeli strikes began pounding Tehran before dawn Friday. For many, it was an early sign civilians would have to go it alone.

During the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s, Tehran was a low-slung city, many homes had basements to shelter in, and there were air raid drills and sirens. Now the capital is packed with close-built high-rise apartments without shelters.

“It's a kind of failing of the past that they didn’t build shelters,” said a 29-year-old Tehran resident who left the city Monday. “Even though we’ve been under the shadow of a war, as long as I can remember.”

Her friend's boyfriend was killed while going to the store.

“You don’t really expect your boyfriend or your anyone, really to leave the house and never return when they just went out for a routine normal shopping trip,” she said.

Those who choose to relocate do so without help from the government. The state has said it is opening mosques, schools and metro stations for use as shelters. Some are closed, others overcrowded.

Hundreds crammed into one Tehran metro station Friday night. Small family groups lay on the floor. One student, a refugee from another country, said she spent 12 hours in the station with her relatives.

“Everyone there was panicking because of the situation,” she said. “Everyone doesn’t know what will happen next, if there is war in the future and what they should do. People think nowhere is safe for them.”

Soon after leaving the station, she saw that Israel had warned a swath of Tehran to evacuate.

“For immigrant communities, this is so hard to live in this kind of situation,” she said, explaining she feels like she has nowhere to escape to, especially not her home country, which she asked not be identified.

Fear of Iran mingles with fear of Israel

For Shirin, the hostilities are bittersweet. Despite being against the theocracy and its treatment of women, the idea that Israel may determine the future does not sit well with her.

“As much as we want the end of this regime, we didn’t want it to come at the hands of a foreign government,” she said. “We would have preferred that if there were to be a change, it would be the result of a people’s movement in Iran.”

Meanwhile, the 29-year-old who left Tehran had an even more basic message for those outside Iran:

“I just want people to remember that whatever is happening here, it’s not routine business for us. People’s lives here — people’s livelihoods — feel as important to them as they feel to anyone in any other place. How would you feel if your city or your country was under bombardment by another country, and people were dying left and right?”

“We are kind of like, this can’t be happening. This can’t be my life.”