JOSH BAKER: Before we begin I just want to let you know there are references to violence in this episode and some upsetting moments involving children.
MATTHEW: Yay, I’m out! I’m out, I’m free! Now I’m just going to throw it over there.
BAKER: Matthew’s just rescued his frisbee from the middle of a bush.
MATTHEW: Now I’m just going to throw it over there.
BAKER: We’re in a park with his dad Juan.
JUAN: It’s been great having Matt home… For a long time I didn’t even think they were around anymore.
BAKER: Do you remember the first time that you saw Matt?
JUAN: Yes. He was very skinny and malnutritioned..
MATTHEW: Skinny.
JUAN: Looked like a completely different person. No Hair. And he ran up, jumped in my arms and hugged me.
BAKER: How did you feel?
JUAN: Great.
MATTHEW: That day was nice. We just hang out. Like...
JUAN: Watched Harry Potter actually.
MATTHEW: Yeah we watched Harry Potter. That’s part of hanging out. Harry Potter is definitely a cool movie.
JUAN: Yeah.
BAKER: Matthew’s living with Juan now, he’s grown his hair and looks really well.
BAKER: If you remember I first met you in, when was it? I'm gonna say December 2017. In Syria.
MATTHEW: Jeez you look way different then I remembered.
BAKER: Totally, I was a lot bigger then. You’ve got bigger, I’ve got smaller. I can’t get over how much you’ve grown.
BAKER: Matthew jokes that I used to be buff. I guess following him around the world has taken its toll on me. It's been three years since we first met on a military base in Syria, longer still since he was forced to appear in the ISIS propaganda film.
MATTHEW: My message to Trump the puppet of the Jews: Allah has promised us victory and he has promised you defeat. This battle…
NEWSREEL: A ten-year-old American boy… Is featured in a new ISIS propaganda video… Threatening the United States and President Trump… Attempting to generate fear and anxiety in the US… Designed to capture the attention of America and Americans…
BAKER: Since then, Matthew’s had therapy to work through what happened in Syria and helped to readjust to life in America. But that video will always be just a Google search away, and Juan worries that as his son gets older, what the Islamic State group forced him to do could have an impact on his future. That’s why he supports Matthew’s decision to talk to me.
BAKER: Do you mind if I clip this to you here? Is that ok?
MATTHEW: I don’t care.
BAKER: I’ve come back to America to find out how Matthew and his siblings are doing now. And to hear what Matthew wants to say about his life with ISIS.
BAKER: At any point you don’t want to continue, you don’t want to talk about something, you just say can we move on and I’ll be like yeah. You only have to talk about what you want to talk about like at the end of the day like you’re in charge.
MATTHEW: Yeah, that’s okay I’m good.
BAKER: I just want you to know you’re the boss.
BAKER: I’m Josh Baker and From BBC Panorama and FRONTLINE PBS, this is “I’m Not A Monster.”
Episode 10: “It’s all behind me now”
BAKER: You good?
MATTHEW: Yeah.
BAKER: So just to begin with, do you remember when you first arrived in Raqqa?
MATTHEW: When we first arrived in Raqqa we were in the city. It was pretty noisy, gun shots normally and once in a while a random explosion like far away though. I didn’t really know what was going on but I thought of movies. Like for some reason the only thing that would go through my head was either Call of Duty or like some of the action movies.
BAKER: Matthew was just seven years old.
MATTHEW: We were able to go shopping and stuff but, like the food there was great, I loved the food there.
BAKER: So they had really good food in Raqqa?
MATTHEW: Yeah, like it wasn’t just like slap a burrito down, put some stuff in it, roll it up, call it good. No, they like, they took time and did it, like you could watch the meat cook and everything.
BAKER: As a child living in the heart of the Islamic State caliphate. What’s it like seeing ISIS around you?
MATTHEW: Normally when you’re talking to someone you don’t necessarily have to really think about what you’re saying but it’s like thinking of someone that basically has your life in their grasp, say one wrong thing and they could easily just kill you.
BAKER: I have to remind myself, that the boy sitting in front of me is still only 13. I’m struck by how considered Matthew is. Before this conversation, I spoke at length to child welfare experts, an independent clinical psychologist, to Juan. We all agreed I wouldn’t ask Matthew what his mom, Sam, did or didn’t do. I’m not going to put him in that position. As he talks, I’m looking for any signs of trauma — fidgeting, sweating, a reluctance to answer. But he appears calm and thoughtful.
BAKER: And I want to talk a bit about, if it's ok with you, um, what was Moussa like living in Raqqa?
MATTHEW: He was a completely different person. Like it, as if his personality went from good to bad. As soon as we made it to Syria he was not the same person. Like thinking back to what he was…
MOUSSA: Ok look Matthew… You’re welcome buddy, you’re my best friend.
MATTHEW: Thinking back to what he turned in to. Yeah…
MOUSSA: Without a single mistake. Take apart this loaded AK and put it back together in less than a minute. Ready, set, go. Put it with force like a man.
BAKER: This was when Matthew was forced by his step father Moussa to take apart a loaded gun, and build a suicide bomb. It was all filmed.
MOUSSA: So what is missing?
MATTHEW: The detonator.
MOUSSA: Exactly. That’s an American grenade, that’s a five second fuse. Put it down.
BAKER: I’ve seen you taking apart the grenade.
MATTHEW: Yeah. That was a situation of if I mess up I’m either going to die or half die. Well, as long as I keep it toward my face at least if I do something wrong it’ll all just be over.
BAKER: And how did you feel when he was asking you to do that?
MATTHEW: Um, stressed, very um, a lot of pressure.
BAKER: So how did it come about, did he come to you and say, ‘I want you to make this video,’ or?
MATTHEW: No he didn’t say I want you to. He’s like, ‘You’re going to do this…’ Yeah he was like, ‘You’re going to do this and you’ll get to go on with your day.’ That’s how he would do it and he said if you didn’t then I either wouldn’t feed you or I would like do something random, I don’t know.
BAKER: If you said no to Moussa I don’t want to do this.
MATTHEW: Yeah.
BAKER: What would have happened?
MATTHEW: I don’t really know. Like I don’t know. Because I was generally pretty obedient as far as that goes. It was a situation of trying to guess what he would do and then it was a situation of do I really want to take that chance? Like at that point I could already tell that he was starting to lose it. He was mentally unstable…
BAKER: Was he ever angry towards you?
MATTHEW: More than enough.
BAKER: Do you feel comfortable telling me what he would do or would you rather not?
MATTHEW: I’d rather not.
BAKER: That’s okay.
MATTHEW: It was pretty bad.
BAKER: Yeah?
MATTHEW: Yeah.
BAKER: Do you want some water?
MATTHEW: Yes that would be nice.
BAKER: We can get you some water. Do you want water or Coke?
MATTHEW: When I drink soda or any type of sugary drink like that I drink it slowly, lasts longer.
BAKER: As I watch Matthew sip his drink, my mind starts racing through all the things I’ve heard about his life in Raqqa — what he endured as a child with ISIS. I think about my interviews with Sam, the voice messages she sent to her sister.
SAM SALLY: I don’t know when I’ll be able to talk to you next, it may be a while. Anyway, here in just a minute I’m going to let the kids send a message.
MATTHEW: Hi Lo—Lori, I miss you, and remember that day when you took me to the, the to the zoo? I miss you.
SAM: Keep making your prayers for us you don’t understand that here, instead of just leaving us be, all the time we hear the jets and bombs and it’s part of daily life here. You know.
BAKER: Sam told me that one of those bombs landed next to where they were living.
SAM: Our neighbor, the four story building got bombed, the whole place fell into our house.
BAKER: While you were inside?
SAM: While we were inside. My kids — I just knew they were dead, I knew they were dead. The bomb literally fell probably 20 feet away from them. The whole wall in their bedroom was blown in. Not even feet, a couple of feet away from them people died and they, they were fine. It’s amazing they’re not dead.
MATTHEW: I was just feeling my way out of the area because it was so dusty I couldn’t see anything, trying to feel for metal and once I felt metal that wasn’t hot enough to literally burn my skin then I knew that it was our car.
BAKER: When I was in Raqqa, I found the house where this happened.
BAKER: So Matthew was standing right here.
BAKER: A photo of Matthew and his sister was taken there. They're both standing in front of a fountain, covered in dust, these blank looks on their faces. His sister’s cradling an orange and white cat.
MATTHEW: That cat, that cat survived two bombings. I swear to god that cat’s immortal. It lived with us for a really, really, really long time actually. Like the whole time we were there we had almost lived with us the entire time. That cat’s immortal.
BAKER: Matthew says as the fighting escalated, food got increasingly scarce and he and Ayham, the young boy Moussa and Sam bought as a slave, were sent out to scavenge. They had to search through the rubble of Raqqa — abandoned buildings and bombed out houses.
MATTHEW: Like I would carry equipment and Ayham would carry supplies like if we bought a sledgehammer he would bring water and some snacks and then he would carry all the supplies that we got. Um, we had to watch out for EEDs, or what are they called?
BAKER: IEDs?
MATTHEW: Yeah IEDs. We had to watch out for mines and how we would do that is if we were to walk in a doorway we would take like a couple of small rocks and toss it where we would be walking and nothing would happen — we would go. Like the chances of me getting blown up by just like a random piece of bomb that just decided not to blow up, the chances were pretty high.
BAKER: And, where was your mom while you were off scavenging?
MATTHEW: Taking care of the house.
BAKER: It was as Raqqa was being destroyed that ISIS forced Ayham and Matthew to appear in the propaganda video.
AYHAM: One banana, two banana, three banana four. Four banana… You can listen? They learn me this, they learn me song.
BAKER: When I met Ayham in Iraq he told me he and Matthew were like brothers. And he wanted to show me the video, so he played it to me on his uncle’s phone.
BAKER: Is that you?
AYHAM: Yeah, they said to me to say like that. They put a gun on here and they say if we don’t talk, he’s going to kill us.
BAKER: So when they were making a video they pointed a gun at you?
AYHAM: Yeah. One he’s making the video and one he’s putting the gun on me and Yusef.
BAKER: Ayham told me that he didn’t like that day very much.
MATTHEW: No he didn’t like it. I just wanted to go on with my life. Just wanted to get back home, do my thing.
BAKER: Sounds like you worked out that you had to do this to keep going.
MATTHEW: Yeah.
BAKER: If you’re happy to talk about it, can you talk about the day Moussa died?
MATTHEW: Um, I was out scavenging. I came back, um, I was happy. Because I didn’t like him. Obviously. I don’t think I should’ve been because a person died, but I was. We were all crying out of joy.
BAKER: You know some people will have only seen the ISIS propaganda video of you. What is it that you would want people to understand?
MATTHEW: That not all kids actually want to do that. That a lot of times they’re forced.
BAKER: Weeks later, the family finally found a way out of ISIS territory.
MATTHEW: We made a deal with this guy, we still had some gold bars, they weren’t that big, but they were worth a couple of thousand, said, ‘We’ll give you this.’ And then he was like, ‘Okay my buddy here will help you but you have to be quiet.’ So then we got in our positions. Now I’m not sure why they didn’t put me inside the barrel sitting up but they decided to put me upside down.
BAKER: So, hold they put you in a barrel in the back of a truck?
MATTHEW: Yeah, so they could hide us. We hit a couple of checkpoints. It was pretty scary because then I got nervous and I had to just not move or even make a sound... I had to slow my heartbeat down because of how I was sitting because if I even moved around just a little bit I would just fall because I was right on the edge.
BAKER: What would have happened if ISIS had found you?
MATTHEW: Oh we would just all get killed. It was just that simple.
BAKER: When you left Syria and came back to America, how did that feel?
MATTHEW: It’s like… It’s like being in tight clothes or tight socks and shoes all day and then just taking it off and just feeling nice and just chilling in a hot bath. That’s what it felt like. Like sweet relief. It felt good. Felt good to finally be back.
BAKER: Is there anything you’d like to tell me? Anything you remember that you would like to bring up?
MATTHEW: Hmm… No. I’m all good.
BAKER: You’re all good
MATTHEW: Yep.
BAKER: We are done. Now for me to play frisbee.
MATTHEW: Alright, you go first.
JUAN: You go first.
MATTHEW: No, you go first… I’m trying to actually throw… Good throw!
BAKER: You’ve got this, I believe in you, you can do it.
BAKER: Being with his dad Juan has given Matthew stability for the first time in years. And the chance to be a child again.
BAKER: Oh wow… That was some good height!
[phone ringing]
RICK SALLY: Yeah Josh.
BAKER: Hey, Rick, how you doing?
RICK: I'm good.
BAKER: I'm, I just wanted to give you a call because I'm about, I think I’m about 10 or 15 minutes away.
RICK: Okay.
BAKER: Is now a good time? Are you still free now?
RICK: Yes. I’m just sitting out here on the porch. The kids are out playing…
BAKER: Brilliant. I’m really looking forward to seeing you all.
BAKER: I’m on my way to see Rick and Lisa, Matthew's grandparents. His two younger sisters, and younger brother are living with them. They’re the children Sam had with Moussa.
BAKER: Here we go. Wow, I feel nervous. There’s their house. That's Matthew’s sister. Oh my god, they’re so much bigger than they were. And there’s Rick out on the porch. Rick!
RICK: Hello Josh.
BAKER: How you doing? You look so well, you’ve got some nice sun on your face.
RICK: Retirement.
BAKER: It’ll do that to you I guess.
RICK: Do you want some coffee or anything?
BAKER: Oh, I'd love some of your coffee.
RICK: Sit down. Any cream or sugar?
BAKER: Both.
BAKER: With our coffees Rick and I go for a walk around his garden, past the swings that Sam and Lori used to play on.
RICK: Josh you can go over there and swing on it. I swing on it.
BAKER: It looks amazing.
RICK: We've done a little bit of reconstruction on it. Yeah, I've redone the ladder in the back so you can get up and down. It's just not a straight up and down a ladder now.
BAKER: Do the kids play on it a lot?
RICK: Oh, yeah.
BAKER: I mean, it's a beautiful place you have here there's plenty of space…
BAKER: For years all Rick knew of his youngest grandchildren was what he heard in the voice messages from Raqqa.
SAM: Say how are you.
GIRL: How are you.
SAM: Say can’t wait to see you…
GIRL: Can’t wait to see you.
SAM: Say make me food.
GIRL: Make me food.
SAM: Say, I’m a poop head…
GIRL: I’m poop head.
RICK: The emotional roller coaster that we've been on since this all started is really unbelievable. The highs and the lows that we get. The times that me and my wife had sat down and cried.
BAKER: I’m not recording Matthew’s siblings and I’m not going to reveal their names. But as Rick and I sit on the porch the eldest is busy with a colouring book. The two youngest, who were born in Raqqa, run about chasing each other.
BAKER: What was it like the first time you saw the kids?
RICK: First time we ever saw them, the oldest girl was kind of standoffish, but the little boy, he was two at the time. He just come up to me and put his hands up. And I picked him up and then the youngest girl she was like one, done the same thing with my wife. And they would not let us put them down. We just held them to lay their heads on our shoulders.
BAKER: How are they, how are they doing? Coming home from Syria?
RICK: I'll give you a story. Fourth of July….
BAKER: Rick tells me he had just put the children to bed when the neighbors started letting off fireworks to celebrate Independence Day.
RICK: I said I gotta go check on these kids. The two little ones, they were fast asleep.
BAKER: But he says the oldest was wide awake — she thought they were being bombed.
RICK: Yeah, she had her head covered up in bed crying.
BAKER: Wow.
RICK: And I brought her out here. She sat out there for quite a while watching. She got used to ‘em. She thought they were really neat once she learned what they were. And we heard a couple gun shots off in the distance, rifle shots. And she said, ‘Now them are not fireworks, them are guns.’ She knew the difference right away.
BAKER: And how old is she?
RICK: She was six at that time.
BAKER: Six years old. She knows what gunshots are compared to fireworks.
RICK: And I thought that was very sad.
BAKER: You know there's still so many kids stuck in Syria who were taken there by their families and or were born there. And I guess what's incredibly rare and lucky about these kids is they are going to get a second chance, to be children.
RICK: That's it and try to have a halfway normal life.
BAKER: Rick and I talk a little longer, he tells me they’re planning an extension to the house to give the kids more space. I have one last coffee, before I start a long drive back to Matthew and his dad.
BAKER: Oh wow they’re all playing on the swingset, Rick’s pushing the kids. That’s so cute. Bye guys! Aw the kids are waving, that’s so sweet. God what a different reality from where we started. They dreamed of this and now it’s happened.
BAKER: Just pulled over on my way home, just for a break. And because I feel pretty weird after seeing Sam's three youngest kids. And the kids seem great, like they're back in a home in a family environment that's got a few acres that they can run about in and a playset. And they’re talkative and they're happy. But I kind of just, I find myself at points as I was sat there talking to the kids, and Rick and Lisa really struggling because you know, I couldn't help think about the choices that their father had made. And some of the choices that Sam had made. It's great that they're home. But this is in some ways, just the beginning.
BAKER: Matthew and Juan have invited me on a fishing trip.
MATTHEW: Can you hear that? It sounds like a cat.
JUAN: It’s probably a cat fish meowing.
BAKER: I like that idea.
JUAN: I am sticking with it.
MATTHEW: Dog fish barking.
BAKER: Juan has made his own rods that he hammers into the riverbank, bits of plastic tubing he’s taped fishing wire to.
BAKER: This is the simplest and coolest and seemingly most energy efficient way of fishing ever.
MATTHEW: It’s also very effective because then you don’t have to watch like 18 poles because they would be all lined on the bank and worried about getting them tangled up. Just put them there.
JUAN: It’s basically just bait the hook and throw it in.
MATTHEW: Yep.
BAKER: They set up camp on a small island.
JUAN: Let’s turn it. I want the entrance towards the river so go around. Yep.
BAKER: Juan places two deck chairs at the water's edge. The sky is glowing red and the sun is just about to dip below the horizon. It’s as idyllic as it sounds. By a weird coincidence, this podcast launched exactly four years to the day I survived the ISIS truck bomb in Mosul. It was because of that that I was shown the video of a young boy being forced to build a suicide bomb. And here I am on a fishing trip with the same boy. And right now, Matthew is happy, healthy and safe.
JUAN: How come you didn't catch an otter today?
MATTHEW: How come you didn't get anything?
JUAN: I was waiting for you to catch an otter.
MATTHEW: Sir what would we do with an otter?
JUAN: Eat it. It would otter-this-world.
MATTHEW: Stupid… Like if we were in Raqqa we wouldn’t be able to do this right here. Like talking just chilling out, we wouldn’t be able to do that. They always said, ‘One day you’ll be back home, one day you’ll be back home.’ Never happened. So I was like, ‘Yeah, I’m just never coming home.’
BAKER: What’s the best thing about being home?
MATTHEW: Everything. Just everything. Like there isn’t a best part. Yeah, there isn’t. It’s just being here is nice.
BAKER: What would you like people to understand about what you lived through.
MATTHEW: That… That you can pull through. That’s really it. Like no matter how bad the situation is, you can always get through it. It all happened, and it’s done. It’s all behind me now.
END
