Senior clerics fighting for the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq have issued a diktat banning pigeon breeding on the roofs of houses as they claim the sight 'reveals the genitals', an idiom which is said to suggest dishonourable activity. Jihadis operating in the group's 'Euphrates province', which stretches from Anbar in Iraq to Dier ez Zour in Syria, told pigeon breeders they had one week to stop the practice or face public flogging. The announcement isn't the first time ISIS has targeted the apparently blasphemous practice of pigeon breeding - a popular pastime in the Middle East. Earlier this year it was claimed that 15 boys had been arrested and at least three of them executed by ISIS militants in Iraq's eastern Diyala governate after fighters took exception to their pigeon breeding hobby on the grounds that it stopped them spending their time worshipping Allah. ISIS' latest ban on pigeon breeding was revealed in an official document released by senior administrators in the group's self-declared Euphrates province. Written in Arabic script on paper headed with the terror group's chilling black and white logo, the short document begins with a warning to locals who keep pigeons on the roof of their houses.
