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Wali likes to say he will be going to Syria with a gun in one hand and a camera in the other.

But of the two weapons the camera will be the more powerful, when it comes to defeating the Islamic State.

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“This war is an image war,” says Wali, 33, a former sniper with the Canadian Forces. “I don’t want to just be a fighter — I won’t make that much of a difference as a fighter. But if I can convince people from Canada and Quebec to send troops and equipment, that would make a huge difference.”

The sniper turned filmmaker from Montreal uses the name given to him by the Afghan people while on one of two tours of duty with the Royal 22nd Regiment, so as not to be identified.

He won’t say exactly when he’s going to Syria — sometime around the beginning of August — or how he’ll get there, for security reasons.

But security concerns do not seem to have factored into his decision to take up arms in one of the most dangerous and brutal war zones, with none of the protections usually provided to Canadian soldiers.