Yunus Susam was born in a village in Amed’s Çermik district in 1992, and immigrated to Germany with his family when he was 3 months old. Yunus was brought up in a pious family. He met two people in the Turkish mosques in Germany, and found himself in meetings called “davet” (“invitation”) held by German scholars.

Speaking to ANF, Yunus said the following on what happened next: “One of them was Afghan and the other was from Diyarbakır. Through them, I was introduced to Ebu Hamza and other radical organizations. I checked out their invitations. I used to go to the Turkish mosque, later I started going to the Arab mosque. After I switched to the Arab mosques, I started to attend the invitations organized in these mosques. These mosques are opened by individuals and associations like cultural associations. I started to attend meetings held in these mosques. I also went to other meetings. These meetings were held by the German scholar known as Ebu Hamza.

I know Ebu Hamza’s real name to be Biewolf. He held big meetings in various cities in Germany. With them -their ideology is close to ISIS- we started to watch ISIS videos. Their ideology is practically the same with ISIS. We took whatever was in the videos. We thought they were doing good work, so we didn’t really think.

FRANKFURT WAS THE HUB

ISIS members also attended these invitations. They recruited people, some managed to go join ISIS and some didn’t. For example, they used to come from all over to meet in Frankfurt. They invited people, then they met them. They didn’t trust the newcomers at first. They quickly organized people and sent them off.

TO RAQQA AFTER A FEW MONTHS

In Frankfurt, I first met a man called Ebu Cenna over Facebook. He invited me to ISIS. I started to think like them. Then I went from Frankfurt to Istanbul. I stayed in the place and the hotel Ebu Cenna told me for 2 weeks. It was a hotel in the Fatih district. Two weeks later, he sent me a smuggler. We went to Hatay in a car with 4-5 people. The people in the house we stayed in in Hatay were all ISIS members. We stayed there for one day. Then the smuggler crossed us over to the Idlib side. We crossed into Jabhat Al Nusra territory in Idlib. They work with each other. We stayed in the house of the Afghan man we crossed the border with and a Pakistani Jabhat Al Nusra militant for 3 days. Then we crossed into Idlib, and stayed in a house there.

Then a car came, it was related to Ebu Cenna. We went to the ISIS group called Liva Aqsa in Hama with that car. I was there for a while, then I went into Raqqa. I received one month of military training in Raqqa. Then I returned to Hama, and I took another month of military training there.

LESSONS ON JIHAD BY EBU HANZALA

I didn’t read many books, but they showed a lot of videos. The books were lessons on tawhid, by Halis Bayuncuk - also known as Ebu Hamza. Ebu Hanzala’s books have been distributed throughout all territories where Turkish is spoken. The ‘invitations’ and books spread so much because of the videos. It’s not only in Turkish, there are people translating them into German an English as well. They have spread all over Europe, Azerbaijan and Turkey - and places where Turkish is spoken in particular.

SEARCH FOR ESCAPE FROM RAQQA

I went to the houses called Mafaza in Raqqa and stayed there for a week. We wore civilian clothes. A month later, I left them and started to sleep in mosques. Then I started to look for a way out of Raqqa. My family was insisting I go back. After I stayed in mosques for a month, I fled and sought refuge with the YPG. I actually wanted to leave during the military training, but they killed the deserters.”

COME SURRENDER TO THE YPG

Susam said there are a lot of people who want to escape inside ISIS and issued the following call: “Come and surrender to the YPG. You won’t be burdened in any way. You will be treated well. You will be sent where you want to go. I was always treated well here.”

Susam said he wants to return to his normal life afterwards and added: “Out of all my family, I missed my mother the most. I missed my relatives, my brothers, my family. I want my brothers, mother and father to know that I am in good hands.”