Lashed for smoking, caged for card-playing: This was life under ISIS

Taking God's name in vain could lead to prison; smoking cigarettes, a public lashing; playing cards, being locked in a cage for days.

That was life under ISIS for residents of Tal Abyad, a dusty town on the Turkish-Syrian border and a gateway to the area of Syria ruled by the extremist militants.

Signs of ISIS atrocities lurk close to the surface here.

A traffic circle surrounded by a black fence seems non-descript, but talk to residents and they describe it as the "roundabout of death."

It is here that the harshest of punishments meted out by ISIS were executed. Beheadings, shootings and lashings, all part of ISIS' brutal interpretation of Islam.

Just down the road from the traffic circle sits a white cage. One man was put in the cage for three days, a resident says, simply for getting caught playing cards.

Kurdish forces have now liberated the frontier town but ISIS' merciless reign of terror is still evident in its semi-deserted streets.

Anticipating a violent battle between ISIS and advancing Kurdish YPG forces, most of Tal Abyad's residents fled to neighboring Turkey.

The Kurds had expected it would take them weeks to defeat ISIS in Tal Abyad. In the end, victory took just two days.

ISIS simply packed up and left for its stronghold of Raqqa, about 100 km south.

Now clusters of people can be seen on Tal Abyad's street corners. Residents -- mostly men -- gather on some, while others are occupied by YPG fighters.

There is a wary acceptance of the new force in town, but the Kurds will need to prove themselves to the town's Arab population.