(New York, NY) -- The Counter Extremism Project (CEP) today released ISIS’s Persecution of the Gay Community, a report that documents the brutal and sadistic execution of gay men in ISIS-controlled areas of Iraq and Syria.

ISIS-appointed courts have declared homosexuality a capital offense and order brutal punishments in line with an extremist reading of Islamic law. One of the most common punishments is throwing individuals off of high buildings. Human rights observers estimated in December 2015 that ISIS had executed at least 36 suspected gay men within its territory. In a single day in September 2015, ISIS executed 10 suspected gay men, including a 15-year-old boy.

While anti-gay sentiment predates ISIS rule, the terror group has cynically exploited these prejudices in order to ingratiate itself among the populations it controls and to further its hateful agenda in the wider Middle East and beyond. Survivors of ISIS’s persecution, a number of whom are profiled in the report, remain fearful, even while living outside ISIS-held territory.