His own three-year-old son,Alae,would fall asleep clutching an empty date packet as a teddy bear in the hole covered by tarpaulin that Masri had set up to shelter his family.
Masri,who is in a Kurdish detention facility for captured IS members,wants to come home to face justice and has pleaded for his Sydney-born wife and their three children,who were all born in Syria,to also be brought to Australia.
He insists he travelled to Syria in January 2015 without knowing the true nature of the terrorist group – despite the widespread media reports and internet videos depicting its extreme violence – and worked as a tradesman rather than a fighter.
As the IS extremists made their last stand in Baghouz,Masri said thousands of people made up of IS fighters and members,as well as civilians,were in makeshift camps in the village as the battle raged. Ample food was being sourced but it was reserved for fighters.
"There was kids that were dying from malnourishment. I seen kids die actually,seen it with my eyes,"he said."Kids died because they didn’t have food to eat. They were keeping that for their fighters."
He said there was a black market operating. Some fighters would take food and then resell it at massively inflated prices.