to watch it at home as long as the files are not corrupted. allen fisher, al jazeera virginia. >> just a reminder you can keep up to date with all the news at our website at aljazeera.com. >> on "america tonight": growing up on the inside. the remarkable story of guantanamo's youngest detainee and how he would survive. >> they would tie me up to the bed. >> a canadian teenagers, his disturbing time in captivity and just how did he end up in guantanamo? also, inside a fight you've never seen up close before. an al jazeera exclusive, the

battle for mount sinjar and the unlikely force rising up against the fighters who call themselves the islamic state. thanks for joining us, i'm joie chen. they looked unstoppable. the fighters of the self proclaimed islamic state scooped up wide swaths of northern iraq, claiming territories far beyond, tens of thousands of nearly helpless yazidi people left starving and stranded in their home land, mount sinjar. you may recall the u.s. decision to step in with air support. but cushz kurdish fighters from correspondent carson stormer. >> my name is carson stormer

i'm a german freelance journalist and i've been covering the war in iraq and syria since the rise of i.s.i.l. left a trail of death in the wake, massacring thousands of the yazidi, leaving others in the mountains to die. credited with breaking the siege and saving the yazidi. but recently i spent a week with another group of fighters who deserve just as much credit for halting and preventing the further slaughter. they are the fighters from the pkk. the kurdish workers party considered a terrorist organization by the united states and most european countries. they may be sinjar's best hope for defeating i.s.i.l. jacko is the commander of the pkk

forces in sinjar. >> i.s.i.l. is on the offensive. we have built up a front line in the city, we are standing by and any movement from them we will act. >> while the siege of sinjar was broken last year, the city of sinjar remains mostly under i.s.i.l. control. >> translator: approximately 20% is under our control. all the strategic parts are under our control and i.s.i.l. can't move freely within 50% of the other parts. >> the pkk is holding i.s.i.l. at bay mainly with light weaponry. snipers are the pkk weapon of choice. jack o jack spends hours motionless until the i.s.i.l. arrives.

the stakes here are high. if the p comfortk lose control the yazidi again face slawrlt and i.s.i.l. slaughter.yet jacko and his fighters receive little outside help in their fight. >> translator: we are currently more or less alone on the front lines. there are no peshmerga with us they should listen first to the fighters on the front line but we understand this is a result of state politics. is. >> reporter: until a ceasefire in 2013 the pkk was in open conflict with turkey trying to win independence for the kurds. it can't buy weapons from the west and relies on old weapons that often fail to fire. >> translator: the weapons that we have now are good enough for guerilla style fighting but

in order to liberate sinjar we need better weapons. >> jack o watches. >> it is good the countries are arming the peshmerga, if half their weapons were in our hands we would be able to liberate sinjar. >> reporter: as one of the biggest disadvantages they face is an inability to coordinate directly with the u.s. led coalition air power flying overhead. jacko's forward locations of i.s.i.l. positions, accuracy surs with sometimes near deadly consequence is. yet, in spite of the obstacles jacko finds it easy to motivate his men and women. they come from turkey, iraq, iran and syria.

none are older than 25. all are united against what they consider an exifnlings be be existential existential threat. >> it destroyed all humanity. it answer against christianity judaism, the yazidis. it has to be removed. >> the woman sniper of the group is considered a particularly effective weapon. >> translator: life is difficult. but when you believe in and understand the goal of your fight, then it's not. >> many i.s.i.l. fighters fear being killed by a woman. some believe it would keep them from going to heaven. so the pkk taunts them whenever a female scores a kill.

this sniper in her earl 20s is unimpressed by her enemy. >> translator: they attack with heavy weaponry. without that, they are scared to attack. they are not strong fighters. >> the group's reputation on the front lines against i.s.i.l. has started to shift toads shift attitudes slightly in favor of the pkk. >> if they would look at the facts they would realize we aren't terrorists. >> jacko has kept photographs of his fallen come rats. 58 fell here in sinjar. >> these friends died in sinjar. i don't have photographs of all of them. our fight against i.s.i.l. is strong. not everyone gets to die with dignity. i'm glad our friends are able to. it's an honor.

>> jacko hopes the u.s. and others will come to accept them as a true ally against i.s.i.l. before it's too late. >> translator: if the americans joined us in the fight, we would be at the front lines even if we were just four fighters. and if the peshmerga were to join us it would be even better. that would show that the kurds are united. we hope they will come too. >> until then, he and his band of fighters struggle on alone even in the face of a mounting death toll. >> reporter: that report came to us from german journalist carston stormer. josh, maybe you can give us some better perspective on this. you know it's really hard to understand because the united states has labeled the pkk terrorists. are they? >> well, it depends on who you ask, i guess. they're not terrorists like al

qaeda is terrorists or anyone would think of them that way. i was there actually when the yazidi still were fleeing sinjar, it was mostly women and commanded by women. they've never had any kind of act of terrorism against the united states, or consuls or embassies. turkey considers them be terrorists because they want independence in southeast turkey and the international community calling them terrorists. >> we are both on the same side, both we and the pk would like to stop the advance of i.s.i.l. why not? why not reach out? why not cooperate with them? get information from them? >> there are a lot of the people against the side of the fight

of against i.s.i.l, i saw iranian artillery men working with the u.s., i was with the badr badr brigade. when they were in iraq, they were aided by u.s. air strikes that led them. there is a lot of conflict who is fighting i.s.i.l. and who we find ourselves in bed with. in terms of tactical and strategic strategical, what they are asking for for the u.s. to coordinate directly with them could have strategic effects by impacting the relationship between u.s. and turkey. and when you look at what's happening in iraq and syria the

major players are turkey iran and the u.s. >> thank you for joining us. >> thank you joie. >> who's behind a hack attack on america and why old enemies may be to blame. later a child soldier and how he ended up in america's feared detention center. >> he'd come back tired, exhausted, dazed. he was shaken very clearly by the interrogations. he was just a child whose mind they played with. >> growing up in guantanamo, ahead. and hot on "america tonight's" website now in what's shaping up to be a long hot summer, the city of brotherly love tries a new tactic forcing young people to force the grim reality of death on the streets. that's at aljazeera.com/"america tonight." >> "inside story" takes you beyond the headlines, beyond the

quick cuts, beyond the sound bites. we're giving you a deeper dive into the stories that are making our world what it is. >> ray suarez hosts "inside story". only on al jazeera america.

>> we fast forward now to hacking america. you may have heard this week about what the government admits is one of the largest breaches of its computers ever. the massive hacks exposed the records of millions of current and former federal workers. threatening our security and as "america tonight" contributor lindsay moran tells us, a power. >> you're telling me, as someone preparing a battlefield against the u.s., you bet it is. >> david and hastuna are husband and wife team, a type of malwear that has

invaded certify wear. >> particularly the industrial control systems in western energy producing exeafns. companies. >> the malwear is dubbed black energy. in 2007 the idaho national laboratory launched aurora, a simulated attack to see if researchers could physically damage a power plant by hacking into its control system. the attack destroyed a power generator common throughout america's grid. experts worry that black energy could do something similar. >> black energy seemed to be more geared towards the control rather than siphoning the energy. >> fire eye a cyber security term in northern virginia, her

team hunts down hackers whose level of sophistication hints at the involvement of a nation state, an old adversary of the of the u.s. >> how can you sure these are russian actors? >> developed by russians in the underground. there is a lot of telltale signs that there was nexus to russia. >> attributing it directly to the kremlin is difficult. >> that makes us more difficult to tease out, is this something nation states bought from criminals? >> the digital fingerprints, is. >> call back home, to another known russian group, that was also observed targeting a lot of western governments. nato, some u.s. academics and so

the same group that was conducting political-military espionage was also using black energy to get into critical infrastructure. >> how high does this go? >> i think we have to say this unequivocally, it goes to vladimir putin. there is no benign explanation how somebody in russia is interested how the lights go on and off in ohio. >> smith and his wife were in before russia's 2008 invasion. >> i was advisor to the minister's office, we actually we all experienced this cyber attack. >> while the cyber attacks had the fingerprints of a russian cyber gang, the timing pointed to the russian government. >> people kept trying to find, who did it who did it? was it criminals, the government? the answers to both are yes, the

russian government using criminal groups. >> using the criminal group, the russian government can contaminate into tap intoa highly effective group. >> quite skillful scheme that they utilize. >> like having a reserve force and not paying a penny for it. it's honing its own skills buying its own equipment, even making money, because it's involved in all sort of cyber crime. when you need them, you have an expert core of cyber criminals to go when whenever you need them. >> they allow them to work with impunity but with a catch. >> as long as you don't attack the interest of the russian state, other than that, you can pretty much do this. and the deal is, you do your thing and when we need your help we'll ask for your help.

>> meanwhile, other nations are discovering america's akill america's achilles heel. >> it isn't the only mall wear that's been in the wear -- the only malwear in the area. >> 50 different types of malwear that target energy companies and 37% of businesses in the u.s. energy sector have been infiltrated with viruses like black energy. >> fast forward and going after those outside attackers the obama administration secretly expanded the nsa's controversial warrant list surveillance program thus tapping into the worldwide web for evidence of overseas hack attacks. the government has already blamed china for the hack of that federal employee data. next, guantanamo's child.

america imprisoned him as a teenager. now a rare inside look at what kept hip alive. and an investigation into a health care tragedy. next week on "america tonight," mothers too poor to deserve proper care from doctors? >> they knew it was wrong. they knew they were preying upon a vulnerable population and they just feel they could be sacrificed. >> the indiana hospital now under scrutiny for their role in the damaged lives of babies. correspondent lori jane gliha investigates next week on "america tonight." >> on hard earned, inspiring new beginnings... >> these workers got the fight in them, they just don't know it. >> facing up to old demons... >> i am really really nervous... >> lives hanging in the balance... >> it's make or break... i got past the class... >> hard earned pride... hard earned respect... hard earned future...

a real look at the american dream hard earned only on al jazeera america

he was the youngest detainee at guantanamo. a 15-year-old canadian. accused of throwing a grenade. he moved to afghanistan as a young boy but how he ended up in a 2002 firefight, has been clouded by the fog of war and the conditions of his detention. after eight years at guantanamo cotter pleaded guilty to five counts, and he conveniently went back to canada to serve out his sentence. last year, omar was released on bond. now 28, he lives in edmonton canada. at the home of his lawyer.

they have quite a story to tell, guantanamo's child, we do warn you some of the images in this are graphic. >> the first time i saw him, he was really bad off. he had a really large hole in his chest. , yes, ityes, it was in his chest and he had shrapnel all over his face. i don't know how he lived through it. >> i saw stitching all over his body. he looked like an autopsy was being performed on him when he was alive. >> if i was in there, it was really creep creepy, it looked like something horrible went down there. >> calling him a murderer, calling him a killer calling him a scum bag. they said he was responsible for the death of an american soldier. they were filled with hatred. >> they would tie me up to like

the bed. >> taking him out of the cell, getting him while while his hands are shackled while he has got all these wounds on his chest to lift up these crates of water, kick them down and pile them unagain and again. >> you could hear people screaming again and again, you would hear a guy for days screaming screaming screaming, then he would come back just a destroyed person. so you can only imagine what happened to him. >> they always called me the monster. i have a very deep, loud voice and you know it was basically yelling and throwing furniture around. you're going in there and performing astage play and this is the character you have to be. well, you know i'm going to be that. >> he had, people he

had to interrogate, would come in and tell me horror stories. >> they were using stress positions, the most common was to have them on their knees with their hands straight up in the air. pretty painful your knees start to really hurt, your whole body hurts, slaps to the face, kicks to the head, extremely cold situations, uncontrollable shaking of the whole body. doing everything but threatening them and then pouring some miracle grow on it and letting their minds take over. >> he would come back tired exhausted, dazed. he was shane shaken very clearly by the interrogations, he was just a child whose mind played. >> sexual abuses . people were drugged.

humiliated water-boarded, sleep deprivation, they throw at you the whole book. >> the most critical i would see him is when he would sit and weep with a voice that is almost audible, just enough that he doesn't get punished. it put the rest of us to shame because people are always trying to complain about something or the other. i never saw this boy complain. >> i remember just looking at him and that was the first time i ever really had any of the moral contemplation of how just a war is that this happens to a a child that he gets wrapped up in something like this. >> and the criteria to go to guantanamo was speaking a western language. some general somewhere decided that hey if they speak a western language they're up to no good

and it's way above my pay grade that was decided at, it was one of those things i thought it was ridiculous but sorry, you have to go to guantanamo. they would shave their heads completely shave the beards, burn their uniforms that they were wearing there, and put them into these blue jump suits and then they would get these goggles that had green duct tape on them. oven mitts on their hands. and then they would be double-shackled on the hands one around their waist and leg shackled on leg shackles, and they would put them on 130 or c-17 and they would cargo strap the prisoners to the floor but handcuffed to their back. pretty wild. they're human beings they're doing that to.

yeah. >> you can hear the rest of omar cotter's story his life as a child soldier in afghanistan and then later as a detainee in the documentary guantanamo's child here on al jazeera america. tell us what you think, at aljazeera.com/americatonight. come back when we'll have more of "america tonight." >> protestors are gathering... >> there's an air of tension right now... >> the crowd chanting for democracy... >> this is another significant development...

>> we have an exclusive story tonight, and we go live... saudi arabia says it's repelled one of the biggest houthi attacks in its territory since the rey fighting fighting in yemen began. >> welcome to are al jazeera from our headquarters in doha, i'm elizabeth peranem. tariqtariq aziz dies at 79.