Fighting in the name of God is a story of Afghan refugees in Iran who goes to Syria to fight against ISIS they are known as Fatemiyon Brigade .The war in Syria began in 2011 and continue to this date.There are no official figures, available on the number of Afghans fighting in Syria but in 2016 Iranian state media, while not acknowledging direct Iranian involvement, said 20,000 Afghans were fighting against Takfiris in Syria. A Takfiris a Muslim who accuses another Muslim of apostasy.Iranian media and officials often refer to Isis fighters, as Takfiris.
Human rights groups accuse Iran of sending Afghans to the Syrian war with promise of money and citizenship, a charge Tehran denies.
During the ten-year war between the Soviet Union and Afghanistan, a group of young, Shiite, Afghans formed a small cell called “Sepah-e Mohammad” (Mohammad’s Army) and fought against Soviet forces in Afghanistan. When the Syrian war started in 2011, the group announced its existence again with 22 people as its founders; this time calling itself "Fatemiyoun Brigade". With Alireza Tavasolli (Abu Hamed) as their commander, they say their goal is to keep Muslims around the world safe from fundamentalists.
My project shows a series of Afghan families of the dead and live soldiers living in Iran. For this project I have searched couple of months in Tehran and cities around Tehran. At first I only had my baby sitter story about her 20 years old relative who asked his parents to go to Iran so he could continue his education and have a better life. Instead and without his parents knowing, he went to Syria and was martyred there.As I start meeting more Afghan refugees in Iran I explore more about each fighter and his family motivations and realized how their beliefs plays the main role on their decision to go to Syria.
