The IS caliphate fell in 2019 and many of the Swedish citizens who left Sweden for Syria have since returned.
Today, several of them work as nannies, teachers, youth leaders, social workers and personal assistants.
Expressen has reviewed 83 confirmed IS returnees and can now state that 21 of them have been employed in Sweden, where they somehow work with young people, children or vulnerable people.
The widow repents
The newspaper has spoken to several of the former IS members who today distance themselves from their time in Syria.
Among other things, they interviewed a widow of a high-ranking IS fighter who started working as a preschool teacher when she came back to Sweden.
– You can make slips in life, and people can become brainwashed and join cults of various kinds. Then you should still be able, if you leave it, to have the opportunity to get a second chance and live a normal life. I’m as far away from this life as it gets right now. I live a completely different life, she tells Expressen.
Säpo must stop radicalization
The security police, Säpo, is tasked with following up people who, for violent extremist reasons, went to conflict areas, such as Syria for example. Fredrik Hultgren-Friberg, press secretary at Säpo, says that the authority does not see IS returnees as a homogeneous group.
– On the general level, one of the main tasks of the Security Police when it comes to violent extremism is to reduce the space and reduce the long-term growth in the form of radicalization, recruitment and propaganda, says Fredrik Hultgren-Friberg to Expressen.