1. I know of many Iraqis who resisted ISIS at great personal cost, but their families often don't talk publicly about these acts of bravery because they still fear retribution. I want to tell you about one of them—a boy in Mosul. Let's call him Ibrahim.
2. Ibrahim was 18 when ISIS took over the city. He loved playing football and going to the gym. He was polite and quiet. Everyone who knew him says he couldn't hurt a fly.
3. Not far from Ibrahim's house, ISIS had converted an abandoned home into a shop where it sold items stolen from Christians, Yazidis, and families who left.
4. One July night, a vandal burned down the shop and escaped without a trace. ISIS was enraged, but couldn't identify the culprit.
5. A month later, ISIS rebuilt the shop and stationed a guard and car outside it.
6. One morning, ISIS awoke to discover the car had been burned. Later that night, an unknown assailant burned down the stop.
7. Ibrahim had been nearby, and while fleeing the area, he dropped his cell phone.
8. A short time later, ISIS arrested Ibrahim and put him jail. His family couldn't get information about him, and relied on news from prisoners who'd been released.
9. People held with Ibrahim said he’d been tortured and sentenced to 100 days in prison for telling the judge that ISIS members were killers, thieves, and not Muslims.
10. His family waited the 100 days, but Ibrahim never came home. Instead, they found his name in morgue records. ISIS killed him. They never buried his body.
11. Friends from jail told his family what Ibrahim had told them: That he'd been the one who burned the shop, working in secret so his family wouldn’t be in danger.
12. Ibrahim said he did it because he loved his city, and couldn’t sit by and watch as barbarians killed people, stole their houses, and destroyed their history and culture. He just wanted to resist.
