Berlin court jails IS supporter who returned from Turkey for 3 years, 3 months

The Kammergericht Berlin on Friday convicted a 35-year-old German woman of membership in a foreign terrorist organisation and sentenced her to three years and three months in prison. The court found she left Berlin about twelve years ago out of a radical Islamist outlook and travelled to Syria to join the Islamic State (IS), as her husband had done shortly before.

According to the verdict, she radicalised quickly in 2014 after leaving her family's home following serious conflicts. She found new connections among young women attending Islamic classes at a mosque in Berlin-Neukölln, married a man of Chechen descent through an intermediary, and travelled via Istanbul to IS territory in December 2014. She supported her husband's IS activity by running their household until about February 2015. After they separated, she stayed in IS women's houses and urged a friend in Berlin to join. The friend left in June 2015 and has been missing since 2019; the court said she most likely died in Syria.

Kurdish forces detained the woman in March 2019, ending her IS membership, and she was held in the al-Hol camp. In January 2020 she escaped to Turkey with help from her ex-husband and paid smugglers, and lived there under false identity until April 2026. Her return was coordinated with German authorities, and federal police arrested her at Berlin-Brandenburg Airport on 23 April. The court said she yielded to pressure from her mother.

Presiding judge Delia Neumann said that, despite her confession, the court saw no convincing distancing from radical views. The defendant said she thought she had been radical and regretted her conduct. Prosecutors sought three years and eight months; the defence argued for a suspended sentence. The ruling is not yet final.