Iraq court sentences woman to life in prison for ISIS membership

BAGHDAD — The Central Criminal Court on Tuesday sentenced a woman to life in prison after finding her guilty of membership in the Islamic State group, according to a statement from Iraq’s judiciary.

The court said the woman had been active within ISIS sleeper cells and operated multiple social media accounts to spread the group’s ideology and mislead security forces.

ISIS declared a caliphate in 2014, seizing Mosul, Tikrit, and other Iraqi cities before being defeated by Iraqi forces, Kurdish Peshmerga, and a U.S.-led coalition in 2017. Its last stronghold in Syria fell in 2019, though remnants of the group continue to operate in remote areas of Iraq.

In late October, Iraq’s National Security Service announced the arrest of an ISIS member in Baghdad accused of involvement in attacks that killed 19 members of the army and the Popular Mobilization Forces, including an officer with the rank of captain. Earlier that month, the Karkh Criminal Court sentenced another ISIS member to death for participating in armed assaults in Nineveh governorate in 2014, according to the Supreme Judicial Council.