American woman joined Islamic State group ‘to fit in and be cool’: FBI witness

Prosecutors say Halima Salman trained alongside other wives of IS fighters in an all-female battalion. BROOKLYN (CN) — An American woman accused of training with the Islamic State group as a teenager in Syria told FBI agents she never got involved with the terrorist organization and was just trying to “fit in,” according to federal court testimony on Friday.Halima Salman was 17 when her father moved the family to Turkey and, soon after, to IS territory in Syria. At 18, she married Abu Ali, a German-Afghan IS fighter. Salman doesn’t dispute the marriage, but her attorneys say her father had her “married off” into a tightly controlled life she could not leave on her own.As IS fighters surrendered in droves to the U.S.-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces in spring 2019, Salman was transferred to a detention camp in northeast Syria. She remained there until May 2024, when the U.S. State Department repatriated her with her mother and siblings. Her father was killed in a rocket strike, Salman told U.S. officials.But when Salman and her family of 10, the “largest single repatriation” of Americans from northeast Syria, then-Secretary of State Antony Blinken said, arrived at JFK airport, she was arrested and charged with knowingly receiving military-type training from a foreign terrorist organization. Prosecutors accuse her of training with Nusaybah Katiba, an all-female battalion primarily composed of IS fighters’ wives.On the stand Friday, FBI Special Agent John Maurer described interviewing Salman in Syria on May 6, 2024, the day before her arrest. He said Salman told investigators she was excited to reunite with her brothers, whom she hadn’t seen in more than five years while detained in gender-segregated camps.Salman’s attorney, Mia Eisner-Grynberg of the Federal Defenders of New York, pressed Maurer on whether he had deceived Salman, knowing she would be arrested upon returning to the U.S. as she spoke of looking forward to seeing her grandmother in New Hampshire and resuming her education.“Halima thought she was going home, right?” Eisner-Grynberg. “You told her that she was going to be reuniting with the brothers she hadn’t seen in over five years?”“That’s accurate; she was meeting them at the repatriation site,” Maurer replied.During the heated cross-examination, Eisner-Grynberg zeroed in: “You lied to her, right?”“We were engaged in a pre-arrest subject interview,” Maurer said.An image from the cell phone of Abu Ali, Halima Salman's husband (left) and its English translation (right). (U.S. Department of Justice)Maurer said Salman denied receiving IS training or weapons and was “shocked” when shown evidence central to prosecutors’ case: a document purportedly issued by IS authorizing her to receive an AK-47 assault rifle, two magazines and 150 bullets. Investigators found a photo of the handwritten document on Abu Ali’s phone.Salman told Maurer she never received any weapons and initially thought the document was a marriage license.She confirmed she appeared in photos from Ali’s phone with an IS flag in the background, including one that appears to be a wedding photo. Salman remarked on how much younger she looked and on her makeup, wearing heavy eyeliner in the old photos but appearing fresh-faced in court.Salman said “she had been brought there, she really wasn’t participating in anything, and that she really was just trying to fit in and be cool,” Maurer said in his direct testimony.Trial began on Tuesday and will continue into next week.Salman, now 27, is the first American woman accused of joining IS to face trial in the U.S. She is out on bond and faces up to 10 years in prison if convicted.Subscribe to our free newslettersOur weekly newsletter Closing Arguments offers the latest about ongoing trials, major litigation and rulings in courthouses around the U.S. and the world, while the monthly Under the Lights dishes the legal dirt from Hollywood, sports, Big Tech and the arts.Additional Reads