In a historic Australian court hearing that marks the country’s first prosecution for slavery offences including crimes against humanity linked to the Islamic State (ISIS), a Melbourne mechanic has publicly condemned the terror group in unflinching terms as he pushes to secure bail for his accused niece, offering up a $75,000 financial guarantee and a permanent home in his household.
Self-employed tradesman Abraham Abbas took the witness stand on the second day of 31-year-old Zeinab Ahmad’s bail application at the Melbourne Magistrates Court on Friday. When asked directly about his stance on the terrorist organization, Abbas did not moderate his views. “I hate those bastards. Sorry Your Honour, I do,” he told the court. “Sorry for the language — they’re evil and they don’t represent anything we believe in Islam at all.” He confirmed he stood ready to house Ahmad and meet all bail conditions if the court granted her release.
Ahmad and her 54-year-old mother Kawsar Ahmad made international headlines when they touched down at Melbourne Airport on May 7 after more than 12 years living abroad. Both were immediately taken into custody on slavery and crimes against humanity charges — the first time such charges have been laid against suspects in Australia. Court documents outline that the pair had been held at the Al Roj displacement camp in northern Syria, alongside several minor family members, after surrendering to Kurdish forces following the collapse of ISIS’s final territorial stronghold of Baghouz in March 2019.
Prosecutors laid out the core allegations against the family during the opening days of the bail hearing, which began Thursday. They claim that Zeinab’s father Mohammed Ahmad, who remains detained in Iraq and has not yet been charged, purchased a 15-year-old Yazidi teenager as a slave for $10,000 in approximately June 2017. The victim was captured by ISIS as part of the terror group’s systematic ethnic and religious cleansing of the Yazidi community in northern Iraq, and was passed between 17 different ISIS fighters before being freed in 2019. In testimony before the court, Australian Federal Police (AFP) Senior Constable Marc Clendenning shared the victim’s account, which details repeated beatings, sexual assault, and forced unpaid labor at the hands of Mohammed Ahmad before she was resold to another ISIS fighter in late 2018.
While Zeinab Ahmad is not accused of directly assaulting the victim, prosecutors allege she participated in the enslavement by mistreating the teenager, ordering her to complete household labor, and failing to intervene during sexual assaults. Clendenning added that social media posts and private communications from Ahmad to relatives in Australia demonstrate what police describe as “open support for Islamic State activities, objectives, and ideological principles.”
Law enforcement has formally opposed bail, arguing that Ahmad poses an unacceptable risk to the Australian public, in large part because she has never publicly renounced her connection to the terror group. “The accused has never explicitly renounced or stated that she no longer supports the Islamic State since her surrender to Kurdish forces,” Clendenning told the court.
Court records confirm that Zeinab Ahmad first traveled to Turkey separately from her family, before relocating to Syria to join ISIS alongside her parents, husband, and other relatives in January 2015. Multiple family members, including her husband Dawod Elmir and two brothers, were killed by coalition forces between 2016 and 2017, according to testimony.
Defense lawyer Grace Morgan centered her cross-examination of Clendenning on the extreme constraints that women faced under ISIS rule, noting that Zeinab Ahmad was forced to marry three different ISIS fighters over a three-year period, a claim the officer confirmed. Morgan also pushed for details about the availability of state-backed reintegration programs and electronic monitoring that would allow for strict supervision of Ahmad if she is granted bail.
The bail application was adjourned until June 15 to allow the defense to question AFP Detective Sergeant Greg Adams, who recorded a statement from the enslaved victim in Iraq back in September 2019. The court also confirmed that domestic intelligence agency ASIO had alerted the AFP that Ahmad may hold information about another Australian family currently connected to conflict zones in the Middle East. Kawsar Ahmad, Zeinab’s mother and co-accused, is expected to file her own bail application later this June.