ISIS has released a new video allegedly showing a teenage boy blowing himself up in a suicide bomb attack near the eastern city of Deir Ezzor, Syria.
An adult ISIS fighter appears to show the boy how to drive a vehicle laden with explosives, before sending him off to his death.
ISIS fighters in Deir Ezzor is currently under attack by Russian-backed Syrian government forces, believed to be the targets of the attack in the pictures.
Caliphate cub: The video allegedly shows a teenage boy carrying out a suicide mission for ISIS in eastern Syria
In the photograph, the teenager’s face does not show any emotion, indicating that he had been drugged.
In order to ensure their largely reluctant recruits give their all in battle, ISIS makes them take the anti-anxiety drug Zolam to make the fighters’ willing suicide bombers,
‘That drug makes you lose your mind… If they give you a suicide belt and tell you to blow yourself up, you’ll do it,’ a 15-year-old fighter who deserted ISIS told CBS in 2014.
Photos from drone footage shows Syrian military vehicles in the desert, before a huge explosion and mushroom cloud appears – allegedly caused by the boy.
It is possible that the teenager is one of the ‘Caliphate Cubs’, young boys brainwashed with ISIS ideologies and trained to fight and kill for the terror group once they reach their teens.
Jihadi mission: The images have been taken from a video which includes drone footage of what is said to be Syrian Army vehicles in the desert
The footage shows a large explosion, purported to be that of the boy’s suicide mission as he blows himself up after driving in among the army trucks
ISIS has released several videos showing young children carrying out brutal executions of adults, training with weapons, and pledging allegiance to ISIS.
The images emerged as Iraqi security sources reported that ISIS momentarily seized areas of around Ramadi, west of Baghdad, but these were soon retaken by the army.
The jihadist infiltrators briefly occupied three areas near the city, which is the capital of mainly Sunni Arab Anbar province. But after several hours of heavy fighting in which there were deaths on both sides, all three areas were retaken.
‘The security forces and the tribes retook control of the Al-Tash, Majr and Kilometre Seven districts,’ provincial police chief Major General Hadi Razij Kassar told reporters.
‘All the Daesh members were killed,’ he added, using an Arabic acronym for ISIS.
Desperation: ISIS fighters in Deir Ezzor is currently under attack by Russian-backed Syrian government forces, believed to be the targets of the attack in the pictures
The operation was likely to have been an attempt to divert the security forces from an offensive they launched last week against the jihadists’ last two footholds in Iraq, one of them a series of towns further up the Euphrates Valley from Ramadi.
A general who asked not to be identified told AFP government forces had killed 20 jihadists.
A military source in Ramadi hospital said two security personnel were killed and 18 civilians wounded.
‘A curfew has been imposed on the city of Ramadi and its surroundings to prevent any security breaches,’ the general said.
Troops and paramilitaries retook full control of Ramadi from IS in February 2016 but are still battling to clear the jihadists from elsewhere in Anbar province.
Last week saw the launch of twin offensives against the jihadists in the Euphrates Valley near the Syrian border and around the northern town of Hawija.
IS is now under attack in all of its remaining bastions in both the Iraqi and the Syrian arms of the so-called caliphate it declared in 2014.