Revealed: The 13 Australians who could face the death penalty in Iraq

A number of Australias could face the death penalty after the government of Iraq announced it was moving to prosecute former participants in Islamic State for terror offences.

Thirteen Australian men – including one who was taken to Syria by his family as a boy – are in Iraq’s Al-Karkh Central Prison after surviving the fall of Islamic State in 2019, then being transferred earlier this year from prisons in Syria.

Six of the men are from Sydney, four from Melbourne and one each from Perth and Adelaide. Among them is a young man, Yusuf Zahab, who was a 12-year-old boy when his parents took him to Syria, and 15 when Islamic State fell and he became a prisoner. He has come to adulthood behind bars and is now 22.

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke has previously said the government would give “absolutely none” of the men any assistance to return home if they were freed by Iraqi authorities, and another minister, Clare O’Neil has said one of the detainees, Tareq “Dr Jihad” Kamleh, could “rot in jail”.

Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade policies say government should support and advocate for Australians sentenced to death or at risk of the death penalty overseas. Approached on this question on Wednesday, the department had no comment, emphasising the government would not repatriate the men.

Iraq’s Supreme Judicial Council announced on Tuesday that its courts had completed the interrogation phase of its post-IS investigation and moved into the “judicial phase”, under which thousands of foreign nationals would face trial.

Under Iraq’s Counter-Terrorism Law No. 13, “perpetrators, accomplices and those who incite, plan, fund or enable” terror offences can be sentenced to death. Those who conceal terrorist acts or harbour terrorists are liable for life sentences.

An American, a Finnish man, seven Iraqis and 457 Syrians have been released because there was insufficient evidence against them, the announcement said, suggesting all the Australians will proceed to trial.

The Iraqi authorities said six defendants were suspected of direct connection to the enslavement of Yazidi women, but did not identify the nationalities of the suspects.

When Melbourne grandmother Kawsar Abbas and her daughter Zeinab Ahmad were repatriated to Australia, they were charged with allegedly keeping a Yazidi teenager as a slave. They deny the allegations. Abbas’ husband, Mohammed Ahmad, is one of the Australian men now facing trial in Iraq.

The Australians in prison in Iraq are:

Tareq Kamleh: The so-called “Dr Jihad,” Perth-born pediatrician Kamleh, was until recently thought to have been dead. During IS’s reign of terror, the former playboy made at least one propaganda video for the terror group declaring “we love death more than you love life”.

Mohammed Ahmad: Formerly of Melbourne, Ahmad travelled to Turkey in 2012 with his charity Global Humanitarian Aid Australia, which is suspected to have been a front to fund the family’s entry to the caliphate. His wife Kawsar Abbas and daughter Zeinab Ahmad returned to Australia recently. Both face slavery-related charges in Melbourne, which they deny. Another daughter, Zahra Ahmad, faces no charges.

Hicham Zahab: Originally from Sydney, Zahab and his wife, Aminah, have blamed their older sons – who died fighting for Islamic State – for luring them into Syria. Hicham has denied he was an active IS member, saying he had worked in Syria looking after his many grandchildren, and also as a mechanic. In 2015 the federal police successfully used proceeds-of-crime legislation to try to claw back proceeds of the sale of his western Sydney house, which they said was intended for IS.

Yusuf Zahab: The youngest son of Hicham and Aminah Zahab. They took him into Syria in 2015 when he was 12 years old. In an interview with SBS Dateline in 2024, he said he did not understand what was going on and spent most of his time at home playing PlayStation and watching movies on a laptop. At 15 he was captured at the fall of IS, separated from his mother and imprisoned with the men of IS.

Hamza Elbaf: From Sydney, Elbaf is the last of four brothers who travelled to Syria in late 2014, after the other three were killed. His parents tried unsuccessfully to get Australian authorities at the time to stop the brothers leaving the country. In interviews in 2019, Elbaf said he had never fought for IS, but had worked as a chef.

Mohammad Noor Masri: A former Sydney tradesman, Masri told this masthead he had been misled when he went to Syria, and had never hurt anyone on behalf of IS. Masri said he worked in a hospital fixing fridges and airconditioners. He is the husband of Shayma Assad, who was taken to Syria at the age of 15, met Masri there and had her first child with him at 16. Assad returned to Australia in 2022.

Mahir Absar Alam: Alam was among a group of three friends who went to Syria in 2014. The South Australia-based son of Bangladeshi parents has said he was a nurse in Syria, not a fighter.

Jamil Ahmed Shqeir: Accused by Kurdish authorities of training foreign fighters, Shqeir said he had been attracted to Syria by a local religious community in Melbourne.

Deniz Hasan: A former private schoolboy from Melbourne, and the son of Turkish Cypriot parents. He admitted to The Australian in 2022 to being an Islamic State fighter and undergoing military training.

Nabil Kadmiry: Went to Syria from a family holiday in Morocco with his much younger wife, Kirsty Rosse-Emile. Kadmiry, a Moroccan immigrant and dual citizen, attended the infamous al-Furqan prayer room in Melbourne before becoming an IS fighter.

Ahmad Assaad: Originally from Sydney, Assaad took his family, including three young daughters, to Syria claiming he wanted to rescue two sons doing charity work. In interviews, he has said it was a “big mistake” to travel to Syria.

Majeed Raad: An alleged participant in Australia’s largest terror plot, masterminded by Abdul Nacer Benbrika in 2004, Raad was tried and acquitted of criminal charges. He joined IS in 2013 and survived to be captured near the caliphate’s last redoubt of Baghouz in 2019.

Missing, presumed dead, Yusuf Mohammad Yusuf: A Melbourne-born man of Somali heritage, Yusuf was interviewed by Kurdish authorities in 2019 and said he had been influenced by another man, Sharky Jama. Kurdish authorities said he died in Syria, and was not transferred to Iraq.

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Michael Bachelard is a senior writer and former deputy editor and investigations editor of The Age. He has worked in Canberra, Melbourne and Jakarta, has written two books and won multiple awards for journalism, including the Gold Walkley.Connect via X or email.AdvertisementAdvertisement