Recipe tips for fighters' wives - Islamic State's latest way of attracting women to the militant cause

LONDON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - Islamic State's propaganda arm is telling its followers' wives how to cook tasty snacks that will keep their fighting men strong on the battlefield, using social media websites to send out its message.

Online tipsheets published by the Zora Foundation for jihadi wives and sisters tells them how to prepare fast, nutritious, battle-friendly food, and advises them to keep their home clean and do sewing for their men.

The militant Sunni Muslim group has declared an Islamic caliphate across large swathes of Syria and Iraq it captured earlier this year and has driven out, killed or oppressed minorities such as Christians, Yazidis and Shi'ite Muslims.

The Zora website has a recipe and photos showing wives how to make a snack using dates, flour and butter for their fighting husbands to eat with coffee between battles.

"They contain significant calories and extend the mujahideen's energy and strength," the website says. The recipe is "useful, nutritious, fast and easy," it adds.

"The blurb on the website suggests that there will be more and the recipe is referred to as the 'first recipe', I would expect more to emerge if the site isn't taken down," said Charlie Winter, programme officer at the Quilliam Foundation.

Female followers of the Zora Foundation shared links on Twitter and offered their own advice on substituting ingredients.

Winter says this is not the first time that female Islamic State supporters have shared food tips on social media sites.

Earlier this year young British Muslim women who had travelled to Syria to join Islamic militias "were talking about how much they like Nutella and discussing where they can buy it," Winter told the Thomson Reuters Foundation.

(Editing by Tim Pearce)

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