An Al-Qaeda front group in Syria has reportedly issued a fatwa, which states that girls in a village under its control will not be allowed to attend school unless they wear Islamic clothing.
The news comes on the heels of the group, called the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), torching statues and crosses inside churches in northern Syria.
A British-based monitoring group, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, also revealed that boys in the village of Tweihineh were told to dress in what ISIL considers Islamic clothing.
According to News24, the monitoring group said that the ISIL has forbidden girls in primary education and above from attending school unless they wear fully Islamic clothing including an abaya (gown), gloves and a veil.
The Observatory, which relies on activists, doctors and lawyers across Syria for its information, further said that the boys must wear 'traditional Pakistani clothing and a cap'.
The report mentioned that almost half of Syria's children do not go to school, with UNICEF saying that more than 3, 000 schools have been damaged or destroyed in the 30-month conflict, and nearly 900 are being used to house displaced families.