Essays on Mosul

The Bagdad Taxi, a documentary movie directed by Frederic Tonnoli sends chills down the spine of everyone who watches it, at least mine had chills. The setting of the film was months after the end of the tenure of the American troops in Iraq. The movie revolves around a filmmaker who sojourns the country of Iraq right from one far end to the other, in a taxi with Khalid, who doubled as both his friend and a cab driver. The journey covered over ten Iraqi towns with a good number of over a hundred police checks, as the filmmaker ...

Introduction

Since the American troops stormed the deserts of Iraq in an object to reassure peace and order in the country amidst the political chaos, the country is still battling its internal issues starting with the dried up national wealth, political dysfunction, to constant resistance of the Islamic State (ISIS). These problems are causing further damage to the country’s political, social and economic well being and will continue to inflict more problems if left unresolved. The discussion will examine the aforementioned problems and provide insights as to what the government of Iraq should do with its persisting issues moving ...

GROUP DISPLACEMENT ACROSS THE MIDDLE EAST

Latest decades have seen an alarming growth on involuntary displacements of populations due to a wide set of reasons. In the Arab World, most literature has agreed upon focusing towards population movement caused by political conflicts that led to war. The extent of this phenomenon becomes evident after realizing its scope: Syrians, Palestinians, Lebanese and Egyptians have been the target of displacement caused by wars fought by the Arab and Israeli. It’s important not to look at this phenomenon as a mere isolated event, but more of a process that keeps developing. More recently, the occupation of parts ...

Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

Background The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is a terrorist group that was formerly known as the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). The group gained ground during and after the Syrian civil war between 2012 and 2014 where they got new recruits and resources (Wood, 2015). The group had close ties to Al-Qaeda that is another terror organization and was officially formed in April 2013 from it. Since then, ISIS has broken ranks with Al-Qaeda and has become one of the main jihadist organizations fighting the Iraqi and Syrian governments. The group also took ...

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 ...

The Islamic State must not be regarded as a terrorist organization alone. The group has evolved into a well-run political machine and a potent military force. The group believes in a twisted translation of Islamic law as an anchor political belief and demands that this particular world view be imposed on Muslims as well as peoples of other ‘inferior’ religious beliefs. Founded by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the group was originally called as the “Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), the first regiments of the IS fought against the US military in the aftermath of the downfall of Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein. The IS ...