Abderrozak Benarabe is also known as Big A. He’s a gangster from Denmark who turned his back on a life of crime after his brother’s cancer diagnosis, turning to Islam and then, eventually, jihad in Syria.
European Jihadi follows Big A from the streets of Copenhagen to Syria and back again. Directed by Nagieb Khaja, it shows how adventure is the motive for some who find themselves on the frontline.
Following his Syrian commanders around wearing a grey t-shirt, khaki shorts and pumps, he looks more like a tourist that wandered into a war zone by mistake than a battle-ready combatant. He is a man out of place and out of his depth; no longer the big gangster fish in a criminal pond.
When he first arrives, the battalion does not have enough guns to go around and he complains, saying that he will tell the commander he’ll go home if he doesn’t see any action. After a number of men are killed in a shoot out, he finally gets his gun, and a smile creeps over his face as he takes it. In contrast, the faces of his Syrian companions are blank, a visible sense of emptiness hanging behind their eyes. These are men tired of the fighting. Some not even men.
After four days of fighting and bragging about his wealth back home, the commander tells Big A that he will be more useful back home in Denmark raising money than in Idlib fighting. He is furious.
Big A returns to Copenhagen, raises €67,000, and drives a mini bus full of medical and military supplies back to Syria. He is quite the big man showing off the night vision goggles and bullet proof vests he has smuggled over the Turkish border.
During his time in Copenhagen, Big A met up with his estranged daughter who asked why he was going to Syria. Surely, she asked, there were people closer to home that could benefit more from his help if he really wanted to put right his past misdemeanours. It’s not the same, he told her.
Cut to footage of Big A on a Danish beach. His version of reality was that he had to come home to sort out a turf war threatening his patch in Copenhagen. But this films paints a picture of a man in search of adventure for whom Syria was little more than a combat theme park; sulking until he got a gun; furious when asked to contribute off the battle field rather than on it; and whose commitment to the cause evaporated as soon as his status and revenue at home were at risk.
There are many theories about why Europeans are travelling to Syria. As ISIS declares itself a caliphate now known as IS and its leader speaks of furthering the Muslim cause, it is worth remembering that not all those who find themselves on the frontline have this kind of focus. Many will be young men and women, bored of life in Europe, in search of adventure. And like Big A, many could be dissuaded given the right deterrents and disincentives.