Aqsa Mahmood (1993February 2019) was a citizen of the United Kingdom, from Glasgow, who stirred controversy in 2013 when she was one of the first UK women to voluntarily travel into ISIL territory in Syria, when she was 20 years old. She was reportedly killed in February 2019 and has not been referenced or seen since.
Mahmood was born in Glasgow to Pakistani immigrant parents (her father Muzaffar was the first Pakistani to play cricket for the Scottish cricket team). Mahmood attended Craigholme School for five terms before attending Shawlands Academy in Glasgow for a year. At the time she left the UK for Syria, she was taking a course in diagnostic radiography at Glasgow Caledonian University.
Mahmood's parents believe she was convinced to join ISIL by Adeel Ulhaq. They found out Mahmood was communicating with Ulhaq in May 2013, and her father told him to leave her alone. That summer, Mahmood ran away from home and told her family she wanted to marry Ulhaq, but her family convinced her to postpone the decision to marry and to return home, as she hadn't completed her education and neither she nor Ulhaq had jobs.
Her mother stated Mahmood had begun dressing more religiously before she left, and had wanted to wear the niqab. She had also become increasingly interested in politics and became emotional when she watched news reports about the Syrian civil war.
In November 2013, Mahmood didn't come home one night. Her mother later stated she called Ulhaq's mother and asked where her daughter was, and was told Mahmood no longer wanted to stay with her family. Her mother then contacted one of Mahmood's university friends and was told Mahmood had gone to Syria.
Mahmood herself called her mother after her arrival in Syria four days after her departure, telling her, "I will see you on the day of judgment, and I want to be a martyr." A month after she left Scotland, she reportedly married an ISIL fighter.
She kept in touch with her family over social media after arriving in Syria. She had a Tumblr blog and used a Twitter account under the name Umm Layth and urged Muslims to join ISIL or to commit terrorist acts, tweeting, "If you cannot make it to the battlefield then bring the battlefield to yourself." Her blog mentioned Mauritian ISIL blogger Zafirr Golamaully, and he mentioned her on his blog. She published a guide on how to reach Syria, warning women that if they traveled to ISIL territory they would have prepare for widowhood as their fighter husbands were likely to be killed. Mahmood is also believed to have been a member of the Al-Khansaa Brigade.
In June 2014, Mahmood praised motherhood in a post online, saying, "Feeling ungrateful to your mother? Are you irritated by her nonstop talking and asking about you? You feel like just shutting your door and stop her from entering your room? Wallah, youâÂÂre such a shame. How can you do and be like that to your mother?" Her parents made a public appeal for her to return home in September, ten months after she left. In 2015, Mahmood's family challenged the allegation that she played a role in recruiting three teenage girls, the Bethnal Green trio, to follow her example. Mahmood's family stated she had told them she wasn't in touch with the girls and did not recognize their names.
Early in 2015, Mahmood posted a photo of herself, standing next to young children and holding the severed head of an executed Syrian man. In April that year, Mark Rowley, the Assistant Commissioner for Specialist Operations of the Metropolitan Police Service and the concurrent Chair of the National Police Chiefs' Council Counter-Terrorism Coordination Committee, told the UK House of Commons Home Affairs Committee that security officials were close to compiling enough evidence to charge Mahmood, if she returned to the UK, or to request extradition, if she tried to settle elsewhere.
On 28 September 2015 the United Nations placed her on its sanctions list, reserved for those with ties to Al Qaeda. UK authorities rescinded her passport, to prevent her return to the United Kingdom.
Ulhaq was never charged in connection with Mahmood's case. But in 2016, he and two other British men were convicted of preparation of terrorist acts and Ulhaq was also convicted of funding terrorism, for helping a 17-year-old boy, Aseel Muthana, join ISIL. Muthana arrived in Syria in March 2014, joining his older brother who had gone there three months before him. During his trial, Ulhaq testified that he had considered going to Syria to bring Mahmood, whom he called his ex-girlfriend, home. Since his release from prison in 2018 he has been returned to prison twice for breaching the terms of his parole.
In February 2019, The Mirror reported that Mahmood was believed to have died in the warzone.