Doubletake: Hawler's story

HOST LES SILLARS: From WORLD Radio, this is Doubletake. I’m Les Sillars

AP AUDIO: [Celebrations in Damascus]

On December 8 the Islamist rebel group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham, known as HTS, overthrew the brutal regime of Bashar al-Assad in Syria.

Syrians celebrated in the streets. The Assad family had ruled Syria through force and fear for more than 50 years.

AP AUDIO: [Assad palace]

This AP video clip shows Syrian rebels walking in and out of the Assad presidential palace carrying appliances. They step past a poster lying on the ground of Bashar al-Assad.

Before Assad’s downfall, Syria was one of the most chaotic countries in the world. The Assad regime’s power was based in western Syria. But in northeast Syria, Arabs, Turks, Kurds, Russians, Americans, and Iranians carried on a simmering conflict amidst the remnants of ISIS.

Since Assad has fallen, it will very likely remain one of the most chaotic countries in the world. The leader of the coalition group that spear-headed the rebellion seemed in control initially. He’s former Al Qaeda and ISIS … Abu Mohammad al-Julani. He has told western media that he has left behind the Islamic extremism of his younger days.

But in late December Assad loyalists struck back at HTS, killing 14 fighters in an ambush. And the religious and ethnic lines that divided the country during Assad’s regime still exist. Now that they lack a common enemy, analysts worry that a power vacuum in Syria will heighten tension in the Middle East. And leave Christians and other religious minorities in serious danger.

Experts believe the big losers, after the Assad family, were Iran and Russia. Both had supported Assad, and both lost some influence in the region.

But in eastern and northern Syria, things aren’t really that much different. It’s still chaotic. And dangerous.

WORLD correspondent Caleb Welde is here to tell us what it’s like in that part of Syria. He traveled around northeast Syria in November of 2023. He was with the Free Burma Rangers. That’s a Christian aid group working in some of the world’s most dangerous war zones.

This is the first of two episodes based on Caleb’s reporting in Syria in 2023. Again, he was there about a year before the Assad regime fell to HTS. Today Caleb will tell us the story of a Syrian woman named Hawler Said Sheikhe. She was 13 years old when ISIS roared into Syria in 2014. And then swept into her town along the Euphrates River.

CNN: A large swath of northern Syria now controlled by ISIS, militants gloating on social media …
ABC AUSTRALIA: ISIS is now considered the most powerful military force in northern Syria …
CNN: ISIS has built a military strategy that relies on a detailed cataloging of terror to instill fear …

Hawler’s father installed windows and doors for a living. Her mom stayed home to look after Hawler and her younger sister.

Her family was Muslim, but not Islamic enough for ISIS. And soon after the terrorists arrived, her dad disappeared.

SHEIKHE: We stayed there, the only reason because we still have hope to see my dad again or, you know, to be able to hear something about him if anyone saw him or where he is in right now.

But eventually they fled to Iraq. After a few months there, Hawler did one of the riskiest things a Muslim woman can do in the Middle East: she became a Christian. Got involved in Bible studies. Started evangelizing in her neighborhood.

And then in November of 2023 Hawler did one of the few things even more dangerous than that: she went back to Syria.

Today on Doubletake, the story of a woman with unfinished business. Trying to live out her faith despite enormous risks.

Caleb will take it from here.

FREE BURMA RANGER: All right, guys, this is premiere right here, dude. This is what I wore through Mosul. I have the exact same version now, I’m a big fan …

CALEB WELDE: I met Hawler at a safehouse in Iraq. We were in a town we’re not going to name for security reasons. A Free Burma Rangers team was preparing to enter Syria from the east. They were putting on body armor.

FREE BURMA RANGER: …this flap right here goes inside. So rip off the other piece, and it’s going to overlap.

Former Army Ranger Dave Eubank started the relief group in Burma more than 25 years ago. It’s known for working in dangerous regions. Eubank began work in the Middle East when other organizations were either unable or unwilling to work near ISIS frontlines.

Hawler turned 23 the day before the planned border crossing.

FREE BURMA RANGERS: Happy birthday to you…

Unlike the rest of the team, Hawler would actually be returning … home. She’d been gone for 10 years. She struggled with the decision for several days, and finally talked with Dave Eubank about it.

SHEIKHE: What do you think?
EUBANK: We’ll just let you decide.

Dave knew she’d be endangering her UN refugee status, among other risks.

EUBANK: You’ve got to want to do it. You know Syria, your dad passed away there. I mean, people get killed there every day, well, almost every day …

She decided to go anyway. The next morning, the team prayed together in the pre-dawn light.

FREE BURMA RANGERS: …Deliver us from evil. For thine is the Kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever and ever. Amen.
EUBANK: Alright, Load ‘em up!

Morale was high as the group traveled west. But it was mixed with some nerves for the first-timers and even for seasoned veterans. “It gets harder each time,” one family man told me.

We passed through the Iraqi red tape at the border in record time. Just 3 hours. The process included X-rays of all vehicles leaving the country. The sun was directly overhead … when our seven armored Land Cruisers slowly made their way onto a pontoon bridge. The Tigris River .. had a greenish hue. A Syrian soldier with an AK-47 awaited us on the other side.

The Syrian passport office was less organized. Each team-member waited under a canopy until their name was called. Instead of stamping their passports, the guards gave each person a piece of paper. “Lose it,” they said, “and you won’t be leaving the country.”

We reached our destination after several more hours of driving. It was dark. We set up for the night in a friendly compound. For security reasons, I can’t tell you exactly where this one was, either.

After dinner, a few people went to the roof, but then it started to rain. So we ruled that out as a sleeping spot.

And then, sometime after 9 p.m., Hawler … disappeared.

Hawler grew up in northern Syria. ISIS reached her town in 2014. The same year Americans learned what had become of a journalist kidnapped by ISIS.

NBC: Awful tragic news from overseas late today, its about James Foley. He went missing in Syria two years ago …

Eventually ISIS posted a video of Foley’s beheading.

SKY NEWS: This is James Wright Foley, an American citizen … Sky News has chosen not to broadcast this video, it’s too graphic.
OBAMA: Today the entire world is appalled by the brutal murder of Jim Foley …
SKY NEWS: But it shows journalist Jim Foley in the final minutes of his life, on his knees …

That year ISIS began a startling rise. It declared a worldwide caliphate.

CHANNEL 4: A new video shows them literally bulldozing the Syrian Iraqi border.
CNN: … a pile of bloody bodies …
ON DEMAND NEWS: ISIS militants have declared the completion of an Islamic state with a new caliphate …
CNN: Cataloging and posting, in near real time, their war crimes.
NBC: US officials believed Foley was being held at the ISIS stronghold in Raqqa in northern Syria, along with other captured western journalists and aid workers.
EURONEWS: Thousands of Christian Iraqis have fled Sunni militant attacks in their villages …
CNN: ISIS has repeatedly shown cruelty, utter brutality, and no mercy to anyone who stands in its way.

ISIS seized control of the region and even began minting its own currency. Many local officials promptly joined up. Some agreed with the group’s aims. Others were just trying to stay alive.

SHEIKHE: A lot of them they just being involved with the ISIS because it's their chance to be in controlling on there. They thought they have a power and authority you know, and they control on the town or the country that we are in.

Hawler’s family was used to some discrimination in Syria due to their Kurdish heritage. They also held to a more liberal interpretation of Islam. They were not prepared for ISIS.

Hawler was then 13. Her sister was 7 … And her mom was expecting. Twins.

SHEIKHE: And yeah just like one day my dad just disappeared and we just called him, my mom called him many times and he didn't answer the phone and we just like went to the shop that he was working in and the door was open and nobody on it. And nobody knows what happened to him.

The family began going around to police stations, searching desperately for him.

SHEIKHE: And we just to be many police stations And hey, you know, my mom said My husband is just like disappeared. We don't know what happens to him and nobody's know and was complaining a lot and nobody, you know, care about it because we are Kurdish.

Venturing out was very risky for a pregnant woman and her two daughters.

SHEIKHE: Some people, they just like take many ladies and after they doing bad things to them …

ISIS fighters were just grabbing women off the street.

SHEIKHE: … they just like they sold them to other people to you know, using them for bad things. They have their coins, the rules and even they just like take many ladies, their wife and they just like what I saw it was kind of weird. They just like touching their hair and they say Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar, Allahu Akbar, you now are my wife.

Kurdish women were particularly vulnerable. Sharia law actually promotes the assault of infidels as a virtuous act?! For Hawler’s mother,

SHEIKHE: She has to protect us you know it was hard to have a daughter at that time they just taking them and using them. They don't know if they are still child or or not. You know? I still like have when I'm just talking right now telling you the story or remembering and the the images and the picture that I saw, you know, 9, 10 years ago and I'm just seeing it right now. It was like horrible man, you know, so much is going on.

Still, the family kept searching.

SHEIKHE: And one day we was outside and looking and you know, asking a question if anyone saw this guy, and showed the picture of my dad, and when we came back, and we just like our house is just bombed, you know, everything is destroyed …

Did ISIS finally get tired of their questions? Who knows? It’s the kind of thing that happened in Syria.

SHEIKHE: … and we just like in second, we don't have anything at all.

Their neighbor’s house survived. So Hawler, her mom and her sister accepted their offer of protection. From the elements. And, from ISIS.

SHEIKHE: There is no choice. So we have to be able to go the other building, which is the building beside us, to be living with the neighbors for a while to see if there is any results, my dad will come back. We still have a hope after three months. But the man over there that we was staying in with his family, and he was Arabic too and he tried to do bad things with my mom. So, we just, because they hate us.

They stayed because they had nowhere else to go. Eventually, though, the stress proved too much for Hawler’s mother. She had a miscarriage. Lost both twins.

SHEIKHE: We lose everything and we just like wow, and even my mom she was just like pregnant and she just like had a lot of stress and she just miscarriage she had twins and that was so hard for her.

It had been three months since Hawler’s father disappeared. But after the miscarriage, they decided to flee north to Hawler’s paternal grandfather.

SHEIKHE: And he just to start to blame my mom, you are the reason my son being disappeared. And you know, those kinds of things. And he tried to beat my mom many times.

They stayed in that northern Syrian town for the next several years. Then in 2019, Hawler’s mother began looking for ways to escape Syria altogether.

SHEIKHE: So we asked, and we got the smugglers number and he said the three of you guys … if you will be able to cross the border, I will take $100 in that time. And we don't have even $100. …

They were still Muslim, and they prayed that Allah would save them.

SHEIKHE: And we thought and we prayed a lot. As Muslims, we prayed. And we couldn't find it, you know, and we just like lose hope at all. And then the last thing that I have from the my dad is a necklace, as a gift, and we just like sold it for $100.

They went back to the smuggler.

SHEIKHE: And we give it to him the $100 all the things that we have to be able to cross the border to come to Iraq.

Hawler, her mother, and sister were told to go to a house near the Iraqi border after dark. There, they met a dozen others waiting to cross. Around 9 p.m.,

SHEIKHE: Three smugglers come and they just like say, Are you guys ready?

The smugglers wore masks. They led them into the desert on foot.

SHEIKHE: And it's raining, you know, it was raining a lot. And it's just like, running and running.

One child, missing his mother, wouldn’t shut up. He almost got them caught.

SHEIKHE: And use all the time saying Mom, mom, you know, in the louder voice.

Everyone was carrying either a child, or a piece of luggage. Maybe an hour into the walk, the smugglers informed them that they’d go on alone. One of them pointed toward a distant glow in the eastern sky.

SHEIKHE: And he said, Okay, guys, okay, guys, just like cross you know. And when you just like, get to the good light over there. You will be in Iraq, and everything will be fine.

He didn’t tell them they had to cross a dark, mountainous region filled with Syrian soldiers.

SHEIKHE: But yeah, just just keep, you know, keep straight going. And you will see.

Then, the smugglers were gone.

SHEIKHE: He just, like, left us! He didn't say, you guys in Iraqi land. You know, he just like left us when he was in Syrian land.

The group pressed on through the rain toward the glow. They could hear dogs barking as they neared a town around five in the morning.

SHEIKHE: And, like, suddenly one of the soldiers just like comes to my face. And I just like, I thought he’s Syrian government. I just like turn back to Syria. And he said, Hey, we are Iraqi government. You know, you are welcome, guys.

The Iraqi authorities gave them snacks while they searched their belongings. Then they bussed them to Dohuk. A city of around 350,000 in western Iraq. Most people there, like Hawler’s family, are Kurdish.

SHEIKHE: And everyone's going because they have families or they have connections and we just like, Oh, what, what we'll be doing here, you know?

Hawler and her family knew no one. They wandered the streets for several hours and eventually went to sleep next to a soccer stadium. Ten days later, they met a street evangelist from Switzerland.

SHEIKHE: We told him the story that we been through it, and he gave it to us in that time $200. And he said, Hey, come on, we have a place, and a base, you know, couple American ladies they are staying in so you guys can be able to just like come and stay with them.

One of those ladies was a missionary working with the Free Burma Rangers in a city in western Iraq.

Again, for security reasons, we can't say which city.

She invited the homeless trio in. The woman asked if they’d like to go to church and gave them a book. Hawler had always enjoyed reading.

SHEIKHE: And my mind exploded and I just like studying the Bible after they gave it to me. Guys and who is Peter who was John who is Jacob who was you know, James and those guys?

Hawler, her mom, and her sister lived with the missionary for about two months. Then, they moved in with the pastor's family. Hawler worked first as a hairstylist, then as a hotel receptionist. Her mom cleaned houses. Even before she became a Christian, she says, she was having visions of Jesus.

SHEIKHE: Yeah, I was Muslim. And after then I become a believer and this is the reason why blah, blah, blah to become a believer. And God showed me himself many times. And even I don't know him. But yeah, I was just a praying in Jesus and I don't believe in him, just I was seeing Jesus and praying.

Eventually Hawler became a Christian herself. So did her mom and sister.

SHEIKHE: We completely understand is there is a big difference between the Muslim life and Christianity life and it was so good. After we becoming a Christian we just like have a peace and in every step that we doing and just like, God, do you want us to do this step? It’s your will, it's not our will. You know, we don’t have any desire, it’s your desire.

The Sunday gatherings were great but Hawler and her family wanted more. They began to meet with others on a weeknight. The meetings started to get larger.

SHEIKHE: When we started just one family, two family and I'm one of the families but right now we have maybe 100 150. Depends.

An American pastor came in to help lead the group. They met once a week with sessions lasting 2 hours or so. They’d worship together, hear a sermon, and then share a meal.

SHEIKHE: … and the end of the two hours we just like eating dinner. All the time we're visiting each other. We have the group on the WhatsApp, they have any problem, they happy, they are sad, they need something, bla bla bla you know, we just continue with them and visiting the families.

The vast majority are Muslim.

This is an American who helps with the Bible study. It’s best if we don’t name him.

PASTOR: They're fleeing from Syria to seek refuge here in northern Iraq. And they're just so open to the Gospel, because they're sick of Islam. They're sick of wicked government. And they have nothing. Many of them leave Syria, professionals, doctors, lawyers, engineers, and they come here, and none of that works here. And they're not being hired. There's racial issues between the Kurds and Iraqis and Syrians.

Hawler’s faith blossomed in Iraq. She began going to school for a job in health care. But, news traveled.

SHEIKHE: Unfortunately my dad's family and my mom's family, they are still in Syria in Quamishli still Islamic. They heard about us, we go into the church and we becoming believer and things like that. And I'm sharing the gospel. And theyjust like all the time, my uncle is calling my mom on the phone, hey, come back to Syria, if not coming back, I will come to Iraq and kill you. He just all the time threatening us.

This was her mother’s brother. Hawler and her family didn’t know if he was serious or not. In February of 2023, Hawler and her family had just come home from an evening service.

SHEIKHE: And they just like knocked the door, maybe they watching us. They was behind us, they watching, and they see where is the house. We didn't know that, and someone knocked the door. And unfortunately, at that time, our neighbor downstairs, they are just moved to another place. Nobody heard us what's going on, you know, we are in the second floor. …

Three men burst in

SHEIKHE: … And they just beating us and three guys, about, we didn't see their faces, you know, they are covered. And they say hey, if you guys go to the church again, we will come to kill you this time. And we just still continue to believe in Jesus and serving Jesus and loving people.

Hawler believes her uncle sent them.

SHEIKHE: That was really horrible. … So yeah, our body was bruised.

But Hawler and her family went to church the next Sunday anyway. And they kept on going.

Hawler continued bringing new friends to church. One Sunday, she looked over to see one of them talking with a wiry American. Her friend called her over and introduced her to Dave Eubank. She talked about her desire to be a missionary. He talked about what FBR was doing … in Syria. Her first impression: This guy has no fear! Her second impression, “Really, God? My first mission trip to a place they’re trying to kill me!?”

That was in 2020. Three years later…

SHEIKHE: I said, Okay, God, is your will to go back to Syria after six years? Let's do it.

But Hawler’s decision to go back to Syria was too much for her mother.

SHEIKHE: And my mom said to me, don't go. … because she's kind of scared. She's really good. She's really strong believer. But as a mom, she's just like, you know, scared about the kids. And because we are still kids …

Hawler’s mother spent the last night in the Iraqi safehouse with her before the planned crossing. The worry was written on her face.

SHEIKHE: she said it to me if you're going to Syria I'm not talking to you anymore, the situation, and your uncle, for sure you will be killed.

What Hawler hadn’t told her mother– or anyone else on the team–

SHEIKHE: I prayed about it. And God told me to just go and share the gospel with him, you know?

That’s where Hawler was headed when she disappeared into the rain that first night in Syria. Right after our team had crossed the border.

To visit her uncle. The same uncle who’d sent three men to beat up her and her family because they’d become Christians.

She’d asked one of the Free Burma Ranger fixers to give her a ride. He thought she was just going for tea with family. He dropped her off at her uncle’s house.

SHEIKHE: And I said, Okay, bro, when I call you just come back to take me you know? And he said, Okay.

She approached the house and knocked on the door, and…

SHEIKHE: And he open it when he saw me he just slapped me. And yeah, he kicked me out, just go out. He slapped me when I was just like, he opened the door and saw me and slapped me.

She pushed past him into the dining room and opened her Bible. She’d picked out some verses to read. But he kept after her.

SHEIKHE: I opened like, looking for the Scriptures that I already prepared. And that time he just like beat me on my shoulders and things like that.

Hearing the commotion, his wife and three children came in. Hawler was determined to witness to them about Jesus.

SHEIKHE: In Quran, you know, they just, like talk about him as a prophet. But I just make it clear for him. He's like, Son of God.

Mohammed is also considered a prophet in Islam– the greatest of the prophets.

SHEIKHE: I just like shared that with him, Did Muhammad, God send it to him as a son? Did he sacrificed for us? Did he, in the third day raised up? And he covered our sins and forgive us? And being, as, you know, Lang? and I just like, shared all of those things to him. And he just like say, stop, stop, stop. He don't wants to hear that.

The boys watched while their dad went into the kitchen.

SHEIKHE: And he just like, brought a knife and he wants to kill me. He’s just like, don't wants to hear that. And he’s just like being in the kitchen and bring back the knife. It just like, wants to stop me.

Hawler’s aunt stepped in.

SHEIKHE: And yeah his wife was just like, trying to just like, say, to stop, let her talk! And yeah, and the kids was seeing him unfortunately, their dad being violent like that.

After a bit, her uncle calmed down. Hawler kept talking.

SHEIKHE: Jesus is great, you know, and he, even we don't deserve it. Because his great God, he just like was suffering and he is just like, lamb and sacrifice for our sins, you know, … So the only thing that we can do to just like worship God to love him, … and this is the reason why I'm here. Because my sins being covered and forgiven.

Hawler also shared her story.

SHEIKHE: … and His Holy Spirit is in us and he's leading us here. That's why I'm just here. That's why I never like afraid. if you wants to kill me, kill me, you know, I'm just come here by God, because His Holy Spirit led me to be here, you know, in every step that I did to be at your place, this is God's steps, this is not me.

She stayed for almost 2 hours. Then her phone rang.

SHEIKHE: … the local, Are you ready? We are outside. And I said it, Okay.

She pulled out some money as she left.

SHEIKHE: I gave it to his family $100 to help them, his wife.

Over a month’s salary.

SHEIKHE: And yeah, I just kissed her and kissed the three kids that he has. … and promise me God that promise me guys that we will be praying and you know, remember Jesus and his wife say that, okay, I promise we need every problem that I have. And we just pray and I say Jesus, and yeah I just kiss them and say that Jesus love you.

Hawler pondered what had just happened as the Land Cruiser splashed through the mud puddles. Back toward the Free Burma Rangers camp.

SHEIKHE: And when I just like, finished everything, I just, I just realized, Oh, I'm still alive. You know, I didn't know what I'm doing. I'm still alive? That was incredible experience that I've been through that or you know, at. It's just like, wow, after I finished it, and you said, Okay, if you wants to kill me again, kill me. You know, I know who's my God, I realize I'm not I'm alive. I'm still alive. And I was just, like, more more powerful, you know? And it's just like, kick me out. And maybe God just like, stopped him! To, you know, to kill me! It just like was really honest to kill me.

She settled into her sleeping bag around midnight.

SHEIKHE: But the only thing in that time when I was sharing the gospel of God, if I will be died in this time by my uncle, you know, please take care of my family. But I was not afraid to be killed. Because like, as a evangelism, and that the only thing that I can do, because I love God, and He loves me so much. And even I don't deserve the God that I have, you know, so the only thing that I can do for God to just like, bring this guy to Christianity life, even if I've been killed, and being persecuted.

SILLARS: Caleb Welde reported and wrote this episode. I’m Les Sillars, and I produced it.

In the next episode we’ll join Hawler, Caleb, and the rest of the Free Burma Rangers as they travel around Syria.

SOUND: [Bomb explosion]

And there was no guarantee they’d make it back to Iraq.

JOHN: If something happens to me on this trip you can tell people that I love my son so much. It had nothing to do with that. You make it out of here and I don't. The one thing I would ask of you is to tell my son when he's old enough, and find him, that I loved him so much. But I had to listen to God's voice and that it's okay.

That’s next time.

Please don’t forget to rate and review us on your favorite podcast app. And let us know how we’re doing by writing or sending a voice message to us at editor@wng.org Thanks for listening. And we’ll see you soon.

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