Bahrain Mirror: The Fourth High Criminal Court in Bahrain has sentenced to 3 years in prison three defendants from one family who joined the terrorist ISIS organization, for the purpose of harming the state's unity, promoting terrorist operations and spreading Takfiri (extremist) ideas by distributing publications and hanging posters on public property, with the intention of creating chaos and causing sedition. The first defendant is 52 years old, and he is related to the second and third defendants.

The details of the case revealed that the beginning of the defendants' fall was when the security services monitored a number of unknown persons distributing and pasting leaflets on the outer walls of some homes, and on public roads, containing terrorist language glorifying "ISIS" and bearing its logo.

Investigations were conducted revealing the identities of the defendants, who were found to be related and adhere to the militant terrorist ideology. The first defendant had a record of embracing the ideas of terrorist organizations and had previously traveled to Syria in 2013 under the guise of providing humanitarian aid.

Investigations also revealed that at that time he joined the ranks of Al-Nusra Front, and worked on promoting their ideas and instilling them in the minds of the second and third defendants, who are his nephews, until they embraced the terrorist ideology, and decided to promote their terrorist ideas by distributing leaflets calling for hatred and glorifying their ideas as well as writing and printing a leaflet bearing the ISIS logo, as it turned out that the second and third defendants were trying to find a way to communicate with the terrorist organizations in preparation for joining their ranks and pledging allegiance to them.

The first defendant confessed to possessing and issuing publications, explaining that during the 1990s he was interested in following up jihadist groups, and with the beginning of the events in Syria, he went and joined the so-called "Tawhid Team" to provide humanitarian aid and then returned to Bahrain. He learned from the second and third defendants that they spread extremist ideas and wrote expressions in support of these ideas on walls in public, and then directed them to print leaflets and distribute them to homes and once joined them while they distributed them.

The two defendants also confessed to distributing leaflets of jihadi organizations, as one of them said that he started following the news of those organizations about 7 years ago, and he was promoting those ideas on social media platforms, adding that his account was deactivated more than once because his tweets glorifying the leaders of those organizations. He further stated that he started talking with his cousin about these topics and their uncle encouraged them until they decided to write on the walls and distribute leaflets that support their ideas, while the statements of the other defendant included the same context.

Arabic Version