The mother of a young man reported to be the first white Briton to join Islamic State has said it is ridiculous to suggest her son is a terrorist.
Sally Letts said her son Jack, 20, from Oxford, was not a member of the Islamist organisation and had gone to Syria to do humanitarian work.
In an interview with the Guardian, she confirmed her son had been in Raqqa, the headquarters of Isis, but said newspaper reports that he had married, had a baby boy and was going by the name Ibrahim or Abu Mohammed were all false. Since the allegations appeared in the media, Jack Letts has posted denials on his Facebook page.
His father, John, said newspapers made up the nickname “Jihadi Jack” because it suited their agenda. “It’s so ridiculous,” he said. “It was made up. Everything is alleged.
“People hear what they want to hear. They can’t resist the alliteration of Jihadi John and Jihadi Jack,” he added, in reference to the Isis terrorist Mohammed Emwazi, who was killed by a drone attack in November.
It was reported at the weekend that Jack Letts, who converted to Islam while living in the UK, was one of 750 Britons to have joined Isis. The Mail Online said he was “a frontline fighter for the brutal terror group and lives with his Iraqi wife and his son Muhammed after moving to the Iraqi city of Fallujah from Raqqa”.
However, his mother said: “We spoke to him yesterday and he said he had never had a weapon in his life.
