Main Argument: The Islamic state of Iraq and Syria has recently waged war on the two countries and annexed vast amounts of territory. Under the leadership of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the newly declared state has waged war in Iraq and in Syria that has caused the death and displacement of hundreds of thousands of people and massive damage to property. According to AL-QARAWEE, ISIS is the most recent re-creation of an outfit known as Tanẓīm Qāʻidat al-Jihād fī Bilād al-Rāfidayn formed in 2004. A critical analysis of the sectarian conflicts in the Middle East will point to the fact that the formation of ISIS has roots in the First World War. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire that had been a German ally in 1916, the British and French divided the Arab Ottoman lands into British and French spheres of influence. They then proceeded to create countries within these artificially created boundaries with names such as Iraq Jordon, Palestine, Saudi, Syria, Arabia and Kuwait. Factional sensitivities between Sunni, Shia, Kurd, Alawite, Yazidi and Druze were essentially overlooked. This was longstanding a practice of the colonial masters that has created tensions in various parts of their colonies that fester until today.
The Rise of the ISIS in the Middle East over Time
The division of the Ottoman lands in 1916, sowed seeds of hatred that blossomed into the Sunni- Shia conflicts that continues to date in the Middle East. The escalation of these conflicts in recent times has created a favorable ground for the rise of Jihadist Militants like the ISIS.
The rise of the ISIS in the region and its influence across the world has led to prolonged conflicts and increased terrorist attacks the world over.
The threat of radicalization has also grown over time and many people from other Muslim and recently non-Muslim countries are traveling to fight as Jihads.
The rise of the Islamic State as the group has recently rebranded can be blamed on failure of post-colonial states both after the First World War and the post Saddam Hussein Iraq. These were supposed to be models of inclusivity and social equality but they resulted into fragile states with deeply entrenched ethnic and ideological divisions which weakened the democracies.
The regimes which controlled Iraq and Syria have also fed to the conflict by practicing exclusionary politics which further fanned the flames of the Shia- Sunni conflict.
The western interventions in the Middle East by The United States in Iraq also fuelled the conflicts that have escalated in recent years.
The Islamic state of Iraq was formed after the 2003 U.S led invasion of Iraq as an Al Qaeda affiliate.
This outfit later rebranded itself as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria and acquired large swathes of land in Iraq and Syria, sparking a new wave of attacks and a deepening humanitarian crisis in the region.
The group is led by a 43 year old Sunni known as Awwad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri al-Samarrai though he has several aliases.
He had been a revolutionary preacher under the leadership of Saddam Hussein and was captured and imprisoned by the U.S after its invasion of Iraq.
He was imprisoned from 2005-2009 and was believed to have been radicalized further during his stay in prison.
He was quoted as saying to the soldiers that had kept him in captivity, upon his release that they would meet in New York.
President Barrack Obama has on an earlier interview with VICE news admitted that ISIS is a direct extension from Al Qaeda in Iraq that was formed due to the American invasion of Iraq in 2003. This renders evidence to the existence of a direct relationship between the western intervention in Muslim matters and the rise of intransigent armed militia groups in the region.
Western influence can also be blamed on the advancement of several other militia groups like the Taliban in Afghanistan after the NATO occupation of the land. The guerillas of South America were also as a direct result of the intervention by America in the region. There therefore seems to be a recurring pattern whenever the United States and other western powers try to interfere in the undertakings of other sovereign nations.
Some critics have argued that America intrudes into other states in pursuit of their own economic interests or with the hope of making geopolitical advancement with the invasion of Iraq being no exception. This view point is shared by many who were opposed to the invasion including the locals themselves.
Lots of Sunni militias sprung up after the US led invasion of Iraq in 2003 and these would later shift their focus from fighting the western invaders to the internal conflicts within their ranks and the ideological differences that emerged.
Abu Musab al- Zarqawi, helped to pull a section of these militant groups together and form the Al Qaeda which concentrated on inciting sectional hatred among the Sunnis and enlisting marginalized Sunnis into its ranks.
After Zarqawi’s death in an air strike in 2006, the group together with a number of other militia groups morphed to form the Islamic state in Iraq. The group’s prospects of success dwindled in 2007 when the US sent twenty thousand additional troops to Iraq, majority of whom went to secure Baghdad. The violence reduced considerably towards the end of 2007 after the IS suffered increased casualties in the violence. The United States gradually reduced its presence in Iraq and finally in 2011 completely pulled out its soldiers from Iraq.
The Iraqi army lacked the capacity to cope with the insurgence that would soon follow and this created a power vacuum. The IS took the opportunity to capitalize on the Sunni hatred for the Shi’ite Prime minister Nouri al-Maliki and his discriminatory policies.
The involvement by the Iranian government in Iraq especially after the withdrawal of the US has also contributed to the escalation of the conflict. The Iranian government is keen on keeping the Shiite controlled government in power with Tehran funding many Shi’ite militias who have gained more power than state forces in some areas. ISIS policy of exploiting existing tensions between the Shiite controlled government and the Sunni minorities has paid off handsomely with the group recruiting tribal leaders and taking advantage of the Iraqi army incompetence to take Falluja in January 2014.
The group later stunned the world with the capture of the Northern Iraqi city of Mosul in June 2014. In the face of the ever increasingly dangerous threat, the Iraqi army fled leaving many cities at the mercy of the ISIS. The group brutally wiped out any resistance to its advancement towards Baghdad and brought numerous cities and towns along the way under its control. It was in June 2014 that al- Baghdadi declared himself caliph of the newly formed Islamic State Caliphate governed in strict adherence to sharia laws and ultra-conservative Islamic practices.
The fall of Saddam Hussein made many Sunnis lose their power and influence in the region and therefore it is believed that many in the wider Sunni community offer their support and allegiance to the Islamic State.
The Kurdish community has been seeking political autonomy for long, and therefore it has been keen on fighting newly created ISIS influence and the newly created boundaries and protecting the region under its influence. The Kurdish people historically occupied the region around the Zagros Mountains, a region commonly referred to as Kurdistan. The region is however divided between four countries namely; Turkey, Iraq, Syria and Iran. The push for national identity and political autonomy has been a key element of Kurdish history and identity for some time. The targeting of Kurds by Isis could lead to further escalation of the tensions that have raged for long between Kurds and Arabs in the region with many Arab groups supporting Isis against its Kurdish rivals.
The Islamic state has acquired territory rich in oil and the proceeds of oil from the black market are largely contributing to the financing of the group’s operations. It has enabled them to recruit Jihads with the allure of handsome rewards and by radical extremism that has influenced many beyond the boundaries of the Islamic State. It is keen on defending the acquired lands from those who are contesting control of the land a move that has set it on a collision path with the Iraq and Syrian governments and waged a war that has rendered many parts of the two countries desolate and left entire cities in ruins. Owing to its Jihad perspective on the true Islamic Khilafat it can be expected that it will seek to bring more territory under its influence, a move that puts it in direct conflict with the western powers.
The group has many sympathizers in the Arab world and many of these are contributing to the groups financing through charities and individual contributions directly to the group or to one of its many affiliate groups.
As mentioned, Isis has acquired massive oil fields in Eastern Syria and has secured huge cash flows from the sale of the oil, some of which was ironically sold back to the Syrian government. The pillaged raw materials from Syria have been smuggled out and sold in the black market for big profits to the IS.
The IS has also looted antiquities in the regions it subdues including some that were over eight thousand years old. The group also looted military supplies in Mosul that raised their assets net worth to over two billion US dollars. Donors in the gulf region support the group out of unanimity with the Sunni community in Syria which has been subjected to a harsh sectarian rule under president Bashir al-Assad.
Conclusion: ISIS can be traced back to the First World War in 1914 when the Sunni- Shiite conflict started. The group has metamorphosed in recent years and has been more successful in its campaign than many former and current Jihad groups. The Western intervention in the affairs of the Middle East led to the escalation of the sectarian conflict in the region that created a fertile ground for the creation of ISIS. In recent years the group has gained more influence and power with an online presence and campaign that has been more successful than any other Jihad group. With the advancement of social media however, the platform for such information has since shifted to Whatsapp, Twitter, and Facebook with IS taking advantage of these platforms better than any other Jihad group. Its online brand has spread such a seductive storyline with powerful iconography that many men around the world are now inspired to join the group in its activities.
However owing to the ease of access to these platforms, IS has been unsuccessful in fully controlling what is shared in these platforms by its fighters who are often clumsy and quick to brag about their military conquests. These have on various occasions exposed details of the group that the leadership would have preferred to keep secret. There has therefore been increased censure by the leadership on the filming of beheadings and sentencing in Sharia courts as well as other group atrocities.
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