British glamour model, 28, reveals how prolific ISIS recruiter brainwashed her on Facebook before grooming her to move to Syria and become the ‘next White Widow’
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glamour model, 28, reveals how prolific ISIS recruiter brainwashed her on Facebook before grooming her to move to Syria and become the ‘next White Widow’
A glamour model has revealed how an ISIS recruiter brainwashed her on Facebook before grooming her to move to Syria to become the next White Widow.
Kimberley Miners, 29, from London, claims she embarked on an online affair with British ISIS recruiter Naweed Hussain and almost ended up in Syria as his wife.
Hussain’s fiancée was Britain’s youngest female ISIS terrorist Safaa Boular, 18, who was the head of the UK’s first all-female terror cell and planned a grenade and gun attack on the British Museum with the help of her mother and sister.
Miss Miners, a former topless model, said she was groomed to become the next ‘White Widow’ and follow in the footsteps of Sally Jones, a British mother of one who was killed in a US airstrike on the convoy she was travelling with in June 2017.
In stark contrast to the glamour shots of her past Miss Miners posted a picture of herself in a full face veil at the height of her self-confessed obsession with Hussain and Islam.
But she was arrested by anti-terror police last year after they discovered correspondence between her and Hussain which included a bomb-making manual.
She said: ‘It’s embarrassing now but I liked the attention. I’d been so lonely. Now I felt I finally belonged’.
She told The Sun she believed ISIS wanted to use her as a new version of Jones. Miss Miners, who was released after security chiefs realised she had been duped, said she had ‘totally fallen for it’.
Hussain, a British Pakistani who joined ISIS in Syria in June 2015, also urged Boular, 18, to attack the Palace of Westminster before he died in an air strike.
Boular, her older sister and her mother – who together formed Britain’s first all-female ISIS terror cell were jailed for a total of at least 22 years last week for a terror plot dubbed ‘The Mad Hatter’s Tea Party’.
She described how Hussain flattered her and boosted her confidence, even convincing her to change her name to Aisha Lauren al-Britaniya.
Miss Miners told the newspaper she was lonely after suffering a miscarriage and breaking up with her fiance.
She said she didn’t use social media properly until she became single and through loneliness, began making friends with people in Syria after sympathising with the plight of refugees.
Miss Miners said: ‘I was upset by what was happening in Syria to the children. I wanted to do something to help.
‘I started sharing videos of bomb attacks in the hope of showing people what was going on.
‘I soon started receiving lots of friend requests from people in Syria. They’d message me on Facebook.
‘It’s embarrassing now but I liked the attention. I’d been so lonely. Now I felt I finally belonged.
‘I craved the attention, the respect and the offers of friendship.’
Hussain first got in touch after IS spotted that Kimberley had been using social media to highlight the plight of children caught up in the Syrian civil war.
Hussain, who used the name Abu Usamah Al-Britani with IS, got in touch Miss Miners and the pair began discussing the Syrian civil war.
Among Kimberley’s new social media friends was East Londoner Amira Abase, 15, who travelled to Syria with two school friends — and the now notorious Sally Jones.
Jones, a former punk from Kent, had moved to Syria with nine-year-old son Jojo to join IS after meeting a British jihadist online.
By the end of 2015 police were aware of her online activity and visited her at home.
She attended a terrorism prevention course and was monitored weekly. She also attended therapy sessions to identify possible triggers for her behaviour.
But she dropped out of the course. And Hussain, who had initially been in contact on Facebook, told her to open an account with Telegram, the encrypted messaging service.
The single mother of one, said Hussain invited her to Turkey where he said he would meet her and take her to Syria.
Shortly after anti-terror police pounced and arrested her. They discovered all the correspondence between the pair and a bomb manual she had been sent.
Miss Miners was told she faced ten years in prison but was later released from bail without any further action in January. A few weeks later Hussain was killed in a drone strike.
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