'To Document History, I Had to Stay Alive,' Says Iraqi Journalist Who Lived Under Islamic State Rule

Iraqi historian Omar Mohammed, now a researcher at the Program on Extremism at George Washington University, had just begun his career as a university professor when Mosul, his hometown, was captured by the Islamic State (ISIS) in 2014.

"To document history, I had to stay alive," he told Folha.

Omar Mohammed ( Foto: Reprodução/Oslo Freedom Forum no youtube ) - Reprodução/Oslo Freedom Forum no Youtube

For nearly two years, Mohammed worked as an underground journalist, anonymously documenting the group's brutal occupation, marked by public executions, systematic rape, forced marriages and the persecution of minorities, while complying with the rules imposed by ISIS on all men. He fled in December 2015 and revealed his identity in 2017 after Mosul was liberated.

Exiled for more than a decade, he says he cannot return to Iraq. "What's left of ISIS promised to kill me in ways humanity hasn't even discovered yet," he says with a laugh.