Caliphate · The New York Times

Chapter Four: Us vs. Them

May 10, 2018·27 min·1 clip

An ISIS recruit describes the moment he couldn't pull the trigger — then did anyway.

A correction comes first. The feed says the Times later reexamined claims from the man it called Abu Huzaifa al-Khanadi, after Canadian police charged Shairoz Chowdhury with perpetrating a hoax. It also says the Times found a history of misrepresentations and no corroboration that he committed the atrocities he described. That warning sits over the whole chapter. The show lets a source talk at length, but it keeps reminding the listener where verification runs out. The interview is rough, and the roughness mostly comes from how plain it is. The source says he was present after killings. He talks about looking at feet instead of a head because the full scene was too much. He says he vomited. He remembers the smell on his hands. The host keeps asking about bodies, a truck, breaks, and who moved them afterward. Nobody needs to dress this up. The sequence does the damage. Then the chapter turns to ideology. He says sadness, sickness, and fainting from blood were treated as feelings to swallow because the act was framed as duty to God. He says he did not question it. The exchange treats brutality as something trained into him, at least in his account, rather than as a sudden switch. After that, he pulls back. He says he called in sick for days before a Libyan commander visited and pushed him toward another role. Muhajir becomes a status word, a way to turn immigration into loyalty and use. The ending opens the frame. Tape about fantasies of attacks sits beside news reports from Paris, a stadium, a concert, hostages, and support systems for cells across Europe. The result is cold and careful. Private fantasies, alleged battlefield experience, and public terror are placed together, while the correction keeps one person's story from carrying more weight than it can bear.

As heard by us

A grave chapter that tests a violent claim against the reporting around it.

It tracks Abu Huzaifa's claim that he was in ISIS and says he committed multiple murders, while staying careful about what the reporting can actually support.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

Hear the chapter that puts Abu Huzaifa al-Khanadi's ISIS claims under the reporting that tried to verify them.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

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