ISIS Crisis: The rise of Islamic State

After the death of Zarqawi the Islamic State in Iraq had been handed setback after setback When Abu Omar al Baghdadi head of the ISI was killed in 2010 it marked a turning point ISIrsquos new leader was born Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim Ali alBadri al Samarrai but he operated under the nom de guerre Abu Bakr al BaghdadiLOST INNOCENCE Afghan girls who fled from Kot district of the eastern Nangarhar province following threats from the IS to leave their homes look around a corner next to their temporary homes in Jalalabad IS fighters ordered families whose members were working for the government or Afghan National Security Forces to leave their homesHis life story is ambiguous sparse on details and few of those uncontested He was reportedly born in 1971 to a Sunni Arab family in the Iraqi city of Samarra a city just north of Baghdad His family was said to be directly descended from the Prophet MuhammadAccording to a disputed but widely distributed biography published under a pseudonym by Turki al Binali a Bahraini national who joined ISIS Baghdadi was born into an observant Salafi family and ldquohis brothers and uncles include preachers and teachersrdquoGUN HOUR Iraqi Shiite fighters supporting the Iraqi government forces fire towards Islamic State IS group positions PICSAFPAccording to Abu Ali a neighbour of the family Baghdadi remained in Samarra until he was eighteen when he moved to Tobchi a poor neighbourhood on the outskirts of Baghdad He lived in a rundown apartment attached to the local mosque and reportedly enrolled in the Islamic University of Baghdad eventually receiving a doctorate in Islamic culture and Shariah law Abu Ali described him as a ldquoquiet person and very politerdquo but also a ldquoconservative practitioner of Islamrdquo He was said to have led prayers at the local mosque from time to timeGORY STORY This photo shows bodies on the ground after an explosion in the town of Suruc on July 20 2015 not far from the Syrian border At least 20 people were killed and dozens injured with the origin of the explosion not immediately determined but many authorities and Turkish media claiming the attack to be carried out by a suicide bomberDuring this period Baghdadi was also a classmate of Ahmed al Dabash who later became the leader of the Islamic Army of Iraq a Sunni Arab insurgent group Dabash remarked that the young Baghdadi ldquodid not show much potentialrdquo He described Baghdadi as ldquoquiet and retiring He spent time alonehellip He was insignificantrdquoBaghdadi reportedly led a quiet life until the United States and its allies invaded Iraq In 2003 Baghdadi is believed to have begun on the path of jihadCAUGHT A capture take from a video provided by Spanish Interior Ministry shows a woman who was arrested on July 7 2015 on the Canary Islands and suspected of recruiting girls and teenagers for the Islamic State group escorted by two Spanish policewomen on a tarmacJamaat Jaysh Ahl al Sunnah waal Jamaah the Army of the Sunni People Group was an insurgent group operating in Samarra Diyala and Baghdad Baghdadi was a cofounder and the head of the grouprsquos Shariah committeeIn late 2004 or early 2005 an Americanled raid on a home near Fallujah led to the capture of many highlevel insurgents and a man who was described as an ldquoapparent hangeronrdquo The latter was registered at Camp Bucca detention center as Ibrahim Awad Ibrahim al BadriThere are conflicting accounts of Baghdadi from his time in Camp Bucca A Pentagon official described him as ldquoa street thug when we picked him up in 2004rdquo a characterisation that seems inconsistent with his backgroundAndrew Thompson who served at one of the USrun detention centres in Iraq wrote an article with Jeremy Suri a professor at University of Texas at Austin arguing that the structure of Camp Bucca facilitated further radicalization among the prisonersBefore their detention Mr alBaghdadi and others were violent radicals intent on attacking America Their time in prison deepened their extremism and gave them opportunities to broaden their following At Camp Bucca for example the most radical figures were held alongside less threatening individuals some of whom were not guilty of any violent crime Coalition prisons became recruitment centres and training grounds for the terrorists the United States is now fightingSmalltime criminals violent terrorists and unknown personalities were separated only along sectarian lines This provided a space for extremists to spread their message The detainees who rejected the radicals in their cells faced retribution from other prisoners through ldquoShariah courtsrdquo that infested the facilities The radicalisation of the prison population was evident to anyone who paid attention Unfortunately few military leaders didIn 2007 Major General Douglas Stone became the deputy commanding general of MultiNational Forces in Iraq with responsibility for incountry interrogation and detention In this capacity he was responsible for detainees at Camp Cropper Camp Bucca and Camp Ashraf He spent the following year reforming prison conditions and installing innovative deradicalisation rehabilitation and reintegration techniques which expedited the release of lowrisk prisoners and appeared to reduce recidivismMost of the individuals taken into detention did not need to remain for long periods of time or in many cases should not have been there in the first place he told us Many were not jihadists but were unemployed civilians paid or coerced into joining the resistance More than 80 per cent of the detainees tested illiterate and were largely ignorant about Islam which made them particularly susceptible to recruitment while in prisonIn interviews for this book General Stone recounted the reintegration processWe studied the detainees their tribal affiliations their education level their employment skills their purported crimes their leadership skills and the extent to which they subscribed to jihadi principles We decided to separate the hardcore jihadists from the casual insurgents Our biggest worry was that the real jihadists were using the prison as a terrorist training camp We wanted to release the individuals who shouldnrsquot have been there or who could be easily reintegrated into Iraqi society as quickly as possible We hired one hundred and fifty imams from around the globe to preach mainstream Islam We offered them job training After a couple of years we were able to release most of the prisoners with less than two percent ever returning to the fight That left only the true problem cases Only about five thousand were left The majority were either former regime Baathists former criminals or serious takfiri ideologies followers of Zarqawirsquos extreme beliefs regarding declaring other Muslims to be apostates Even in American detention these takfiris were killing other detainees cutting their eyes out and trying to impose a version of Shariah that most Muslims would find quite abhorrentBaghdadirsquos time in detention would only have made him more effective General Stone said pointing out that the individuals who spent time in Guantanamo pose a similar problem Jihadists who get out of US detention develop a kind of aura when reintegrated into their home communities he said making it easier for them to recruit others or to symbolise defiance against a Western powerBaghdadi was probably systematically organising while he was in detention Building up IOUs getting to know whom to trust He must have been plotting while he was incarcerated mdash he must have planned the whole rollout of the Islamic StateIf you look at how Badghdadi has set up the top leadership of ISIS you can see how skilled he is The guys at the top are all very skilled managers Many of them are former Barsquoathists And to me a most important thing mdash hersquos actually designated someone to run ISIS detainee operation He learned from being in detention himself that if you donrsquot manage the prison well the detainees will just organise themselves against you And sure enough his strategy has been to recruit his cadres from the prisons where jihadis were detained He knows thats where to find hardcore radicals But even if Baghdadi is ultimately replaced the ideas that he is promoting will be with us a long timeBaghdadi left Camp Bucca as an outspoken jihadi and immediately joined the ranks of the ISI then under the leadership of Abu Omar al BaghdadiWhen a United StatesIraqi joint air strike targeted and killed Zarqawis successors in April 2010 it wiped out the ISIrsquos senior leadership With its leadership in disarray and its relevance waning ISI sought out a leader with both religious authority and a track record of strategic successesAbu Bakr al Baghdadi fit these criteria His education in Islamic law far exceeded the leaders of al Qaeda Osama bin Laden studied business in college his degree was reportedly in public administration Ayman al Zawahiri was a surgeon And the strength of Baghdadis strategies would soon become clearIn May 2010 he ascended to lead the Islamic State in Iraq ISI Baghdadis first priority after becoming leader was his own personal safety With ISI in shambles Baghdadi set out to rebuild the organisation eliminating potential critics and replacing them with trusted allies many of whom spent several years with Baghdadi in Camp BuccaAmong them were several Barsquoathist leaders Although AQI and ISIS are motivated by an ideological commitment to reviving an Islamic state based on their understanding of the Shariah they formed an alliance with the former Barsquoathists who had lost their jobs and status thanks to deBarsquoathification According to some reports the ldquoBarsquoathificationrdquo of ISIS may have been the brainchild of a former colonel in Saddam Husseins army who spent time with Baghdadi at Camp BuccaldquoIn the early days of the alliance the Barsquoathists may have had the upper hand as they brought military and organisation skills and a network of experienced bureaucrats that AQI and then ISI lackedrdquo says Richard Barrett of the Soufan GroupThe Barsquoathists became a critically important part of the ISID Baghdadi chose many of them to full top organisational positions including Abu Muslim al Turkmani who became Baghdadirsquos second in command until he was reportedly killed in late 2014 and the senior leader of the military council Abu Ayman al Iraqi According to Barrett atleast eight of ISIrsquos senior leadership members are former inmates at Camp BuccaLearning from past leadersrsquo mistakes Baghdadi disguised his identity from the earliest days even in the presence of his closest advisors Abdul Rahman Hamad an ISIS fighter who spoke to Time magazine stated ldquohe knew how men can be seduced by money so he never shared his secrets with anyonerdquo He became known among his men as the ldquoinvisible sheikhrdquo or the ldquoGhostrdquo With between 800 and 1000 fighters in his ranks Baghdadi would lead Iraq into its deadliest years since 2008Under Baghdadirsquos leadership ISI escalated its violence throughout 2010 and 2011 including using coordinated suicide attacks in several locations on the same day In October 2011 the US Rewards for Justice program instated a reward of up to 10 million for information leading to the arrest or capture of BaghdadiBy July 2012 in an atmosphere of growing sectarianism fueled in no small part by the policies of Prime Minsiter Maliki Baghdadi had rebuilt the organization so substantially that he apparently felt no qualms about publicly announcing his next move mdash a campaign called ldquoBreaking Down the Wallsrdquo in which Baghdadi promised to liberate Iraqi prisons overflowing with insurgents and jihadistsUsing covert channels to communicate with prisoners in advance ISI spent the next year making good on Baghdadirsquos promise The insurgents attacked eight prisons using improvised explosives They freed hundreds of prisoners many of whom were senior leaders of ISI and its predecessors or experienced fighters who subsequently joined the organisation During the same oneyear period Baghdadi had courted the wrath of Al Qaeda by declaring an expansion of the ISI into neighbouring Syria which was now engulfed in civil war In defiance of al Qaedarsquos emir Ayman al Zawahiri the Islamic State in Iraq was to be known as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria using the now notorious acronym ISISFrom the ashes of neartotal defeat a new and virulent jihadist idea had emerged and it aimed to terrorise the world with its brutal ambitionBook ISIS The State of TerrorAuthors Jessica Stern and JM BergerPublished by Harper CollinsPrice Rs 450