A fundamental question is always asked, and we never find a rational answer for it:
Why does the SDF detain children?
Footages published by SANA shows the release of detainees under the age of 18, who were being held by the SDF in Al-Aqtan Prison in the city of Raqqa.
These are not just “detainees” — they are sons and daughters, stolen moments of childhood, faces that should have been in classrooms and playgrounds, not behind prison walls.
Every single one of those young faces carries a story of fear, separation, and lost innocence.
No slogan, no justification, no security reason can ever explain why a child ends up in a cell. The very fact that we are forced to ask this question, again and again, is a wound in the conscience of humanity.
Seeing them walk out of Al-Aqtan Prison is a moment of relief mixed with heartbreak: relief that they are finally out, and heartbreak that they were ever there in the first place.