Spare us the sob stories: This is why I have ZERO sympathy for Australia's ISIS brides: PVO

By PETER VAN ONSELEN, POLITICAL EDITOR, AUSTRALIA Published: 00:59, 8 May 2026 | Updated: 01:00, 8 May 2026 Adults who chose to travel into the orbit of Islamic State don’t get to rebrand themselves as passive victims the moment the caliphate collapses and the consequences finally catch up with them. The children deserve protection. The adults deserve to be investigated and, where the evidence supports it, prosecuted This was not a Contiki tour gone wrong. Islamic State was a death cult built on murder, rape, slavery and sectarian barbarism. These women knew that and played along. There should be no indulgent rewriting of history for adults who went anywhere near that organisation by choice. Australians watched what ISIS did.  They remember the beheadings, the massacres, the sex slavery and the propaganda videos killing innocents. Refusing to greet these women with sympathy is not bigotry, it’s moral clarity. Australians watched the beheadings, massacres and sex slavery carried out by ISIS - and many won’t accept attempts to recast adults who willingly travelled into the terror group’s orbit as helpless victims, writes Peter Van Onselen The children shouldn’t be abandoned, but nor should they be used as human shields to launder the reputations of the adults who deliberately raised them within the Islamic State nightmare. The soft left instinct will be to talk endlessly about trauma, context and reintegration. But what about the trauma of Yazidi women enslaved by ISIS?  These Australians attached themselves to a movement responsible for that. Labor might say it didn’t assist their return, but it won’t satisfy many Australians. The public wants to know why every possible legal mechanism wasn’t used to keep them out for as long as possible. Australia should protect the children, prosecute the adults where the evidence allows it, and stop pretending that living under a terrorist caliphate was just a complicated life choice. No comments have so far been submitted. Why not be the first to send us your thoughts, or debate this issue live on our message boards. By posting your comment you agree to our house rules. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual. Do you want to automatically post your MailOnline comments to your Facebook Timeline? Your comment will be posted to MailOnline as usual We will automatically post your comment and a link to the news story to your Facebook timeline at the same time it is posted on MailOnline. To do this we will link your MailOnline account with your Facebook account. We’ll ask you to confirm this for your first post to Facebook. You can choose on each post whether you would like it to be posted to Facebook. Your details from Facebook will be used to provide you with tailored content, marketing and ads in line with our Privacy Policy.