Fourteen families from Spain have joined the ranks of ISIS in Syria

The call to fight jihad in Syria and Iraq is not just attracting single youths and family men, who leave their wives and children behind to take up the cause of the Islamic State (ISIS).

Instead, entire families are moving to combat zones, where they are rewarded with bonus payments of as much as €20,000.

Fourteen families whose members are either Spanish or resident in Spain have joined the ranks of ISIS, whose dream of a new caliphate requires not just thousands of foreign combatants to topple the governments of Syria and Iraq, but also women and children to form the foundations of a new society.

Spanish law enforcement investigators said that among the 115 jihadists who have traveled there from Spain, there are 14 families and 20 minors.

“The total tally is actually higher because we didn’t count children or babies,” said an anti-terrorist source familiar with the situation.

ISIS leaders are seeking unconditionally loyal families who will bow to their stringent goals and rigid lifestyle.

“[ISIS] are raising taxes and murdering religious leaders in the conquered villages,” says a high-ranking official with Spain’s security forces. “The local people fear and occasionally hate them. These families who come from abroad are dependent on ISIS, and work as a counter-balance to that rejection.”

The 14 families who moved from Spain to Syria and Iraq are attracted by the jihadist dream, but also by the money.

“There is a reward for people who move there with wives and children,” explains Dolores Delgado, the High Court prosecutor in charge of international terrorism. “They get paid up to €20,000 if the family has four members. Proportionally it is a lot more than what they give women who travel to get married there, which is between €1,200 and €1,400.”

Loyalty is the most highly prized quality.

“One of ISIS’ goals is to settle and consolidate the population,” says Delgado. “[The foreign families] are not direct combatants but they play an essential role. Those who come from abroad are much more loyal and valuable than the locals. They contribute power, status and security.”

This displacement of entire families to a newly conquered territory had not been seen since the 1990s, when Osama Bin Laden created the first Al Qaeda camps in Afghanistan. But ISIS has changed all that.

“It is unprecedented. The idea of living in an Islamic state, the umma [community]... Entire families are going,” says one police official.

The 26 jihadists who have returned to Spain – 15 of whom are in prison – and security service confidants all provide the same picture of what awaits a family who decides to move to Syria or Iraq.

“They give them a house and pay them a monthly salary. In some cases the families gain more stability than they might have in the countries where they were residing earlier,” says one security expert. “The hook works.”