In preparation for the assault on Mosul, the United States and its allies are trying to weaken the Islamic State by cutting its supply lines. Kurdish forces, backed by American-led air power, have recently positioned themselves near an important crossroads at Kiske, 25 miles west of Mosul. “The isolation of Mosul is going on now,” said the official at Central Command.
.. Another challenge will come if the city is retaken. While Mosul is overwhelmingly Sunni, the Iraqi attacking force is likely to be overwhelming Shiite, which may create friction with the local population. The Sunni Arab population could be alienated if their neighborhoods were held by Shiite-dominated units or pesh merga forces.
As I explained last year when I cited an article by the Lebanese paper Al-Akhbar on the topic, a hadith (a saying attributed to the Prophet Muhammad), asserts that the “long-awaited Hour (of Resurrection)” will not arrive for believers until after the Byzantines have landed in al-Amaq (Southern Turkey), or in Dabiq (a Syrian village located to the north of Aleppo). Indeed, there is a conviction that is widely held across disparate sects (including Christians) in the Middle East today that the foretold signs, prefiguring the coming of redemption, are evident in contemporary world events. ISIS’ followers take their understanding of the Dabiq “saying” by the prophet to mean that the great battle will take place between the “Crusader West” and Islam — and that this struggle has been made imminent by ISIS’ declaration of the khilafah (caliphate).
.. ISIS differs from al Qaeda in a number of ways, but particularly in respect to the ordering of conflict. The principle that Islamic State soldiers follow is that: “fighting nearby ‘apostates’ is more important than defeating faraway infidels [such as Israel or the West].” Thus defeating the “apostates” in Jordan takes ISIS a step closer to the stage when it might confront the “faraway infidel.”
Al Qaeda, by contrast, orders conflict vice versa.
IT WILL not be easy to defeat the brutal jihadists of Islamic State (IS), as the American-led coalition against the group aims to do. IS is one of the best-financed terrorist organisations in the world, except for state-backed ones.
.. Without this wealth, IS, the latest evolution of al-Qaeda in Iraq, could not have expanded so rapidly.
.. Although IS receives donations, especially from Gulf-based financiers, they are a relatively insignificant contributor to its coffers. Instead the bulk of its money comes from oil revenues from fields under its control in western Iraq and eastern Syria. American officials estimated that it was making $2m a day from oil before air strikes started (locals reckon it was more) but in December an official said the strikes, some of which have been against oil facilities in Syria, meant the group’s oil revenues had “significantly” dropped. Controlling so much land also helps IS make money from extortion and taxing people in the areas it controls.
THE WEST IS DRAMATICALLY UNDERESTIMATING THE THREAT EMANATING FROM ISIS, and ISIS’ fighters are much more intelligent and dangerous than our politicians realize. The Islamic State is drenched in almost infectious enthusiasm and confident of victory – something I have never before experienced in a warzone. More importantly, the ISIS fighters are convinced that their totalitarian faith and demonstrative brutality will help them move mountains. In Mosul, less than 400 ISIS fighters routed many as 25,000 Iraqi soldiers and militias despite their ultra-modern equipment. Within months, the ISIS has conquered a territory larger than Great Britain and dwarfed Al Qaeda.
.. ISIS ISN’T JUST AIMING AT CONQUERING THE MIDDLE EAST AND, EVENTUALLY, THE REST OF THE WORLD. RATHER, THEY WANT THE LARGEST “RELIGOUS CLEANSING” IN THE HISTORY OF MANKIND. With the exception of the so-called “religions of the book” – that is, ISIS’ version of Islam, Judaism, and Christianity – ISIS wants to kill non-believers and apostates and enslave their women and children. This means that all of the Shiites, Yazidis, Hindus, Atheists and Polytheists are supposed to die, and that hundreds of millions of people would be eliminated in the course of this “ethnic cleansing”.
.. THE MODERATE SUNNI ARABS ARE THE ONLY ONES WHO CAN STOP ISIS, NOT THE WEST. That’s exactly what the Sunnis did 2007. Back then, they chased away the “Islamic State in Iraq” (ISI) – the predecessor of ISIS, which was much weaker than today’s ISIS.
However, the moderate Iraqi Sunni would only oppose ISIS if they were allowed to completely re-integrate into Iraqi society, from which the Americans and the Iraqi Shiites had excluded them after the US’ 2003 invasion of Iraq. It doesn’t currently look like things are going to change anytime soon. Yet, this is the only conceivable solution to stop ISIS.
THE MODERATE SUNNI ARABS ARE THE ONLY ONES WHO CAN STOP ISIS, NOT THE WEST. That’s exactly what the Sunnis did 2007. Back then, they chased away the “Islamic State in Iraq” (ISI) – the predecessor of ISIS, which was much weaker than today’s ISIS.
However, the moderate Iraqi Sunni would only oppose ISIS if they were allowed to completely re-integrate into Iraqi society, from which the Americans and the Iraqi Shiites had excluded them after the US’ 2003 invasion of Iraq. It doesn’t currently look like things are going to change anytime soon. Yet, this is the only conceivable solution to stop ISIS.