OFFICIALS ruled a teenager was not at risk of being drawn into terror offences less than a year before he was killed fighting in Syria, a report launched after his death has revealed.

The serious case review into two Brighton teenagers - Abdullah Deghayes, 18, his 17-year-old brother Jaffar - who died fighting in Syria in 2014 reveals at least two missed opportunities for services to intervene in the year before they died.

Three years on from their deaths, officials said there was "no evidence" as to how they were radicalised to fight for an Al-Qaeda affiliated terrorist group.

The report, published this morning, highlighted how reports from a school concerned with pupils converting to Islam and a second warning from a youth worker raising concerns about the way one of the Deghayes brothers spoke about Americans following a visit to Libya were not followed up.

It was also revealed that the family were the victim of racial abuse going back more than a decade, suffering from physical attacks, graffiti and stone throwing, at one point on a daily basis, which left the children showing signs of early trauma.

Reports of their father’s physical abuse of mother and children are also highlighted though the father claimed the charges, which were eventually dropped, was a "racial vendetta" by youth workers.

The findings are from a serious case review published by the this morning evaluating the response of Sussex Police, Brighton and Hove City Council and other agencies to the risk of radicalisation of “vulnerable young people” in the city between January 2012 and October 2014.

It was commissioned following the deaths of the two brothers, named as only W and X in the report, who were fighting for allies of Al Qaeda in Syria in 2014.

Both had contact with agencies in the city area before leaving the United Kingdom to fight in the bloody and brutal Syrian Civil War.

Abdullah  died soon after his 18th birthday and his younger brother Jaffar  was killed aged just 17.

The child’s mother told the report’s authors she had “no prior knowledge” of their plans to go to Syria in January 2014 and believed a third son was “delivering humanitarian aid”.

The father of the children refused to take part in the review and surviving siblings did not respond to invitations to do so.

The report said there were incidents of domestic abuse dating back to 1996 that had been investigated while the boys told youth club leaders in 2010 they had suffered physical abuse from their father for their lack of religious observance.

A protection plan was brought in after it was alleged the father made his five children wake up at 4.30am to study the Koran and would make them stand against a wall for seven hours and whip them with electrical wire if they were not studying properly.

The mother temporarily separated from her husband and moved away though charges were dropped after siblings’ retracted their witness statements.

Professionals said both teenagers were showing signs of “early trauma” but this could not be tackled because of the pressures of dealing with “constant incidents”.

The report also highlighted an organised right-wing group targeted the family and incidents of racism dating back to a protest in 2003 to stop a planned centre for asylum seekers.

Anti-Islamic graffiti appeared in the family’s neighbourhood from 2007 including an incident in 2009 where “Behead all Muslims” was written in 12 feet high lettering.

These incidents and the police’s response is likely to have had a “profound impact” on the children’s later behaviour, the report said.

The serious case review has identified 13 key findings including shortcomings in sharing data from police to safeguarding practitioners, “an atmosphere of suspicion” between counter-terrorism police and other agencies and perceptions there are inadequate efforts to address core issues of radicalisation.

Sussex Police data systems prevented details of the brothers’ contact with police being fully shared with other services meaning some professionals were unaware of the extent of their adolescent criminality, the report said.

The report said Brighton and Hove services had insufficient knowledge and understanding of minority ethnic and faith communities but that the problem of safeguarding adolescents involved in “risky behaviour” was not restricted to the city.

It also questioned whether there were sufficient resources for abused women and children from minority backgrounds, reported not all staff currently understand their responsibilities under the government’s counter-terrorism strategy, said there was an absence of effective ways to intervene in families suffering from long-term trauma and highlighted a “reactive” crisis management from services rather than tackling root causes of behaviour.

In the wake of the review, the Brighton and Hove Local Safeguarding Children Board (LSCB) is to contact the government to call for an overhaul of processes for children who go missing abroad – currently the investigation is left to the authorities in the country where the child has gone to.

The board has also called for a citywide campaign to highlight the risks of radicalisation as well as a drama production on the issue for high school pupils.

LSCB chairman Graham Bartlett said there remains “no evidence” as to how the two brothers were radicalised.

He added: “It is important to stress that this review has found that prior to the siblings travelling to Syria, the national intelligence and threat assessment did not suggest that young people were going abroad to fight.

“”Locally, professionals had not identified that the brothers were at risk of radicalisation or at risk of fighting overseas.

“There was and remains no evidence to indicate how they were radicalised.”