The research on Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) by Quilliam, a London counter-extremism thinktank, is set to be published on Wednesday.
“The organization … focuses a large number of its efforts on indoctrinating children through an extremism-based education curriculum, and fostering them to become future terrorists. The current generation of fighters sees these children as better and more lethal fighters than themselves, because rather than being converted into radical ideologies they have been indoctrinated into these extreme values from birth, or a very young age,” The Guardian quoted parts of its findings on Saturday.
The study, compiled through investigating ISIS propaganda featuring children, added that these kids are not corrupted by living according to secular values, “making them stronger than the current” militants.
“The area of most concern” the report said was that ISIS “is preparing its army by indoctrinating young children in its schools and normalizing them to violence through witnessing public executions, watching …videos in media centers and giving children toy weapons to play with.”
It said ISIS also uses children to try to ‘normalize brutality, with the terror group encouraging children to hold up decapitated heads or play football with them.’
“The aim is to prepare a new, stronger, second generation of [militants], conditioned and taught to be a future resource for the group,” the report adds.
The research noted foreign recruits by the militant group represent a potentially significant number.
It said ISIS was quick to seize schools under its reign of terror, where boys between 10 and 15 received military trainings.
The terrorists also use fear as a recruitment tool, with media outlets within the ISIS warning that children who refuse to conform with orders will be flogged, tortured or raped.
Over the past months, ISIS has shown 12 child killers in its propaganda videos.
A recent video showed a four-year-old British boy apparently detonating a car bomb, killing four alleged spies trapped in the vehicle.
An estimated six million men, women and children are believed to be living under ISIS in Iraq and Syria.
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