Home Fire

by

Kamila Shamsie

Teachers and parents! Our Teacher Edition on Home Fire makes teaching easy.

ISIS/The Islamic State Term Analysis

ISIS (also known as ISIL) is a terrorist militant group that follows a fundamentalist jihadist doctrine of Sunni Islam. ISIS gained global prominence in 2014 when it drove Iraqi government forces out of key cities, then captured Mosul. Since then, it has conducted attacks on government forces in Syria, and by December 2015, it held a large area from western Iraq to eastern Syria, enforcing sharia law there. In Home Fire, Parvaiz leaves to join ISIS in Syria.

ISIS/The Islamic State Quotes in Home Fire

The Home Fire quotes below are all either spoken by ISIS/The Islamic State or refer to ISIS/The Islamic State. For each quote, you can also see the other terms and themes related to it (each theme is indicated by its own dot and icon, like this one:
Islam, Nationality, and Identity. Theme Icon
).
Chapter 1 – Isma Quotes

Parvaiz was the person Aneeka talked to about all her griefs and worries, but it was Isma she came to for an embrace, or a hand to rub her back, or a body to curl up against on the sofa. And when the burden of the universe seemed too great for Isma to bear—particularly in those early days after their grandmother and mother had died within the space of a year, leaving Isma to parent and provide for two grief-struck twelve-year-olds—it was Aneeka who would place her hands on her sister's shoulders and massage away the ache.

Related Characters: Aneeka Pasha, Parvaiz Pasha, Isma Pasha, Adil Pasha
Page Number: 14
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 2 – Isma Quotes

“Parvaiz is not our father. He’s my twin. He’s me. But you, you’re not our sister anymore.”

“Aneeka…”

“I mean it. You betrayed us, both of us. And then you tried to hide it from me. Don’t call, don’t text, don’t send me pictures, don’t fly across the ocean and expect me to ever agree to see your face again. We have no sister.”

Related Characters: Aneeka Pasha (speaker), Isma Pasha (speaker), Parvaiz Pasha, Adil Pasha
Page Number: 44
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 5 – Parvaiz Quotes

Or Farooq would talk and Parvaiz would listen to those stories of his father for which he’d always yearned—not a footloose boy or feckless husband but a man of courage who fought injustice, saw beyond the lie of national boundaries, kept his comrades’ spirits up through times of darkness.

Related Characters: Parvaiz Pasha, Isma Pasha, Adil Pasha, Farooq, Zainab Pasha, Isma’s grandmother
Page Number: 130
Explanation and Analysis:

The ache in his back had begun to recede and he remembered how, before the pain had become too unbearable for any thought beyond his own suffering, he had turned his head toward the wall, toward the photograph of his father, and there was this understanding, I am you, for the first time.

Related Characters: Parvaiz Pasha, Adil Pasha, Farooq
Page Number: 142
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 6 – Parvaiz Quotes

He had survived military training, during which he learned that fear can drive your body to impossible feats, and that the men of his father’s generation who fought jihad in Bosnia, Chechnya, Kashmir, all went home to their families for the winter months. That piece of information had made him blubber into his pillow at night, not because it made him understand that his father had never loved him (though he did understand that) but because he finally saw that he was his father’s son in his abandonment of a family who had always deserved better than him.

Related Characters: Parvaiz Pasha, Isma Pasha, Adil Pasha
Page Number: 170-171
Explanation and Analysis:
Chapter 7 – Aneeka Quotes

The Turkish government confirmed this morning that the man killed in a drive-by shooting outside the British consulate in Istanbul yesterday was Wembley-born Pervys Pasha, the latest name in the string of Muslims from Britain who have joined ISIS. Intelligence officials were aware that Pasha crossed into Syria last December, but as yet have no information about why he was approaching the British consulate. A terror attack has not been ruled out.

Related Characters: Aneeka Pasha, Parvaiz Pasha, Isma Pasha, Hira Shah
Page Number: 192
Explanation and Analysis:
Get the entire Home Fire LitChart as a printable PDF.
Home Fire PDF

ISIS/The Islamic State Term Timeline in Home Fire

The timeline below shows where the term ISIS/The Islamic State appears in Home Fire. The colored dots and icons indicate which themes are associated with that appearance.
Chapter 4 – Eamonn
Familial Love, Protection, and Betrayal Theme Icon
...her because of Adil, she says that they’re watching her because of Parvaiz, who joined ISIS’s media unit the previous year. (full context)
Fathers, Sons, and Inheritance Theme Icon
...“a boy she was close to at school” who has gone to Syria to join ISIS. Karamat says he knows only one person who fits that description from Preston Road: Parvaiz... (full context)
Islam, Nationality, and Identity. Theme Icon
Stereotypes vs. Individuality Theme Icon
...meet her, but Karamat laughs at the idea that “the nexus of al-Qaeda and the Islamic State is just going to waltz in.” Eamonn is furious at his father for using this... (full context)
Chapter 7 – Aneeka
Stereotypes vs. Individuality Theme Icon
...Pervys Pasha, the latest name in the string of Muslims from Britain who have joined ISIS.” They report that they do not know why he was approaching the British consulate, but... (full context)
Familial Love, Protection, and Betrayal Theme Icon
Stereotypes vs. Individuality Theme Icon
...says that she and Aneeka were horrified upon learning that Parvaiz had gone to join ISIS. She notes that they informed Counter Terrorism Command immediately. She thanks the Pakistan High Commission... (full context)
Stereotypes vs. Individuality Theme Icon
...time of his death. It reports that Parvaiz was working with the media wing of ISIS, which is responsible for the recruitment of fighters and “jihadi brides.” It also says that... (full context)