"What matters most is that we're free from the ISIS nightmare. We remember things we went through and the constant fear we lived in.
Children who lost their innocence and started playing with guns instead of toys. Children who watched their mothers being killed. Sons who caused their fathers' deaths. Fathers who killed their sons. Fathers who saw their sons being killed.
The crimes committed were horrendous. We will always remember the tears of our fathers and mothers, and the children who were robbed of an education and a childhood. We will always remember our martyred comrades, and how we witnessed their deaths.
They will always be in our hearts."
Those are the words of Leila Mustapha, a 30-year-old Kurdish woman, an engineer on the city council of Raqqa. She's co-Mayor with an Arab. Their deputies represent Turks, Christians and Circassians. It's a union in utter contrast to their previous ISIS overlords who used heads of the innocent as ornaments on the fence posts of the town's main traffic circle.
How to stand up after your city has been destroyed? Watch '9 Days in Raqqa'.
Children who lost their innocence and started playing with guns instead of toys. Children who watched their mothers being killed. Sons who caused their fathers' deaths. Fathers who killed their sons. Fathers who saw their sons being killed.
The crimes committed were horrendous. We will always remember the tears of our fathers and mothers, and the children who were robbed of an education and a childhood. We will always remember our martyred comrades, and how we witnessed their deaths.
They will always be in our hearts."
Those are the words of Leila Mustapha, a 30-year-old Kurdish woman, an engineer on the city council of Raqqa. She's co-Mayor with an Arab. Their deputies represent Turks, Christians and Circassians. It's a union in utter contrast to their previous ISIS overlords who used heads of the innocent as ornaments on the fence posts of the town's main traffic circle.
How to stand up after your city has been destroyed? Watch '9 Days in Raqqa'.