Israeli-Canadian said kidnapped by IS says she is 'safe and secure'
Day after reports said Gill Rosenberg, who is fighting IS in Syria alongside Kurds, was abducted by terror organization, she posts on Facebook to discredit 'bullshit stories.'
Gill Rosenberg, the Israeli-Canadian, who joined Kurdish forces in their battle against the radical Islamic State terror group and was said to have been taken captive by the group, posted on her Facebook page Monday night to say that she was "safe and secure."
"I don't have Internet access or any communication devices with me for my safety and security," she wrote. "I can't reply regularly and only happened to have a chance to log in and see these buklshit (sic) news stories. Ignore the reports I've been captured."
Rosenberg finished her short post with "Yalla, Acharai!", a phrase combining Arabic and Hebrew which means "Come on, follow me!"
The reports began surfacing on Sunday on jihadi and Palestinian social media and forums, and claim Rosenberg was taken while fighting with the Peshmerga forces in Kobani, Syria.
Rosenberg, 31, is a civil aviation pilot who enlisted in an Israeli army search-and-rescue unit before being arrested in 2009, extradited to the United States and jailed over an international phone scam, one of her former lawyers said.
Gill's story was first reported by Israeli radio. She recounted how smugglers helped her cross from Iraq into Syria in order to join the Kurdish ranks. "They (the Kurds) are our brothers. They are good people. They love life, a lot like us, really," Rosenberg said, explaining why she joined up after contacting the guerrillas over the Internet.
Rosenberg said that she had made contact with the Kurds through Facebook, asking them to allow her to join the Kurdish People's Protection Units, commonly known as the YPG.
Rosenberg immigrated to Israel from Canada in 2006, after studying at the British Columbia Institute of Technology and left behind a promising career as a pilot of Boeing planes for civilian airlines.
On her Facebook page, Rosenberg shared her plans for her mission in Syria two months in advance, when she uploaded a picture from Jerusalem showing an Israeli flag next to an Islamic State flag, and continued posting images until November 1 - her final day in Israel.
She then promised to upload pictures of herself wearing the uniform of the Kurdish forces. "As soon as the tailor finishes customizing my uniform, I'll post the pictures," she wrote. The next day, she posted a picture of her red boots. "It's been a long time, but it feels great to wear them again."
She later posted pictures from Queen Alia International Airport in Amman, Jordan, and then from Erbil International Airport in Kurdistan. On November 9, she uploaded images from the Kurdish region of Syria and wrote, "In the IDF (Israeli army), we say 'aharai', After Me. Let's show ISIS (Islamic State) what that means." A friend wrote, "Take care of yourself, friend. You are one strong woman, and you'll destroy the Islamic State."
A source in the Kurdistan region with knowledge of the issue said Rosenberg was the first foreign woman to join YPG, the Kurds' dominant fighting force in northern Syria. She has crossed into Syria and is one of around 10 Westerners recruited by YPG, the source said.
Reuters, Michal Margalit and Ynetnews contributed to this report.
