Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

"ISIL" and "ISIS" redirect here. For other uses, see ISIL (disambiguation) and ISIS (disambiguation).

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant الدولة الإسلامية في العراق والشام  (Arabic) ad-Dawlah al-Islāmīyah fil 'Irāq wa ash-Shām
Flag Emblem
Motto: باقية وتتمدد (Arabic) "Bāqiyah wa-Tatamaddad" (transliteration) "Remaining and Expanding"
Anthem: Ummatī, qad lāha fajrun "My nation dawn has appeared"
Areas controlled by ISIL  (1 November 2014)      Territories claimed by ISIL       Rest of Iraq and Syria Note: map includes uninhabited areas. (as Google Earth)
Status		Unrecognized state
Capital		Ar-Raqqah, Syria (de facto) 35°57′N 39°1′E
Largest city		Mosul, Iraq
Government		Self-declared caliphate
-	Self-declared caliph	Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, "Caliph Ibrahim"
-	Field Commander	Abu Omar al-Shishani
-	Spokesman	Abu Mohammad al-Adnani
Establishment
-	formation (as Jamāʻat al-Tawḥīd wa-al-Jihād)	1999
-	declaration of an Islamic state	13 October 2006
-	declaration of caliphate	29 June 2014
Time zone		Arabia Standard Time (UTC+3)

Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
الدولة الإسلامية في العراق والشام (Arabic) Participant in the Iraq War, the Global War on Terrorism, the Iraqi insurgency, and the Syrian Civil War
Current military situation (1 November 2014)   Controlled by the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant   Controlled by other Syrian rebels   Controlled by Syrian government   Controlled by Iraqi government   Controlled by Syrian Kurds   Controlled by Iraqi Kurds See also: Derna, Libya (controlled by ISIL supporters in the Libyan Civil War)
Active	8 April 2013–present
Ideology	Anti-Shiaism, Salafist Jihadism Takfirism Wahhabism
Area of operations	Middle East: Iraq; Syria; Lebanon Turkey; Iran North Africa: Derna, Libya;
Strength	80,000–100,000 (up to 50,000 in Syria and 30,000 in Iraq) (SOHR est.) 20,000–31,500 (12 Sep. CIA est.)
Part of	al-Qaeda (Oct. 2004–Feb. 2014)
Battles and wars	List of wars and battles

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL /ˈaɪsəl/), also translated as the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS /ˈaɪsɪs/; ad-Dawlah al-Islāmīyah fīl-ʻIraq wa ash-Shām), also known by the Arabic acronym Daʿish and self-proclaimed as the Islamic State (IS), is a Sunni, extremist, jihadist group, unrecognized state and self-proclaimed caliphate based in Iraq and Syria in the Middle East.

The group originated as Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad in 1999 and this group was the forerunner of Tanzim Qaidat al-Jihad fi Bilad al-Rafidayn, commonly known as Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). Following the 2003 invasion of Iraq, AQI took part in the Iraqi insurgency against coalition forces and Iraqi security forces. In 2006, it joined other Sunni insurgent groups to form the Mujahideen Shura Council, which consolidated further into the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) shortly afterwards. At its height, the ISI gained a significant presence in Al Anbar, Nineveh, Kirkuk and other areas, but around 2008, its violent methods led to a backlash from Sunni Iraqis and other insurgent groups and a temporary decline.

In April 2013, the group changed its name to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. It grew significantly under the leadership of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, gaining support in Iraq in the context of perceived economic and political discrimination against Iraqi Sunnis. After entering the Syrian Civil War, it established a large presence in the Syrian governorates of Ar-Raqqah, Idlib, Deir ez-Zor and Aleppo. ISIL had close links to al-Qaeda until February 2014 when, after an eight-month power struggle, al-Qaeda cut all ties with the group, citing its failure to consult and "notorious intransigence".

The group's original aim was to establish an Islamic state in Sunni-majority regions of Iraq. Following its involvement in the Syrian Civil War, this expanded to include controlling Sunni-majority areas of Syria. It proclaimed a worldwide caliphate on 29 June 2014, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi—known by his supporters as Amir al-Mu'minin, Caliph Ibrahim—was named its caliph, and the group was renamed the Islamic State. As caliphate it claims religious authority over all Muslims worldwide, and aims to bring most traditionally Muslim-inhabited regions of the world under its legislative control, beginning with the Levant region, which approximately covers Syria, Jordan, Israel, Palestine, Lebanon, Cyprus, and part of southern Turkey.

The group has been designated as a terrorist organization by the United Nations, the European Union, the United Kingdom, the United States, Australia, Canada, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and Israel. The United Nations and Amnesty International have accused the group of grave human rights abuses, and Amnesty International has found it guilty of ethnic cleansing on a "historic scale". The group's actions, authority and theological interpretations have been widely criticized around the world and notably within the Muslim community.

History

See also: Timeline of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant events, Islamic State of Iraq § Timeline, Syrian Civil War § Course of events and Terrorist incidents in Iraq in 2014

Part of a series on the
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant  History
Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad (1999–2004) al-Qaeda in Iraq (2004–06) Mujahideen Shura Council (2006) Islamic State of Iraq (2006–13) Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (2013–14) Islamic State (2014–present)
By topic
Military Timeline List of battles
Category Portal

Names

The group has had a number of different names since it was formed, including some names that other groups use for it.

1. The group was founded in 1999 by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi under the name Jamāʻat al-Tawḥīd wa-al-Jihād, "The Organization of Monotheism and Jihad" (JTJ).
2. In October 2004, al-Zarqawi swore loyalty to Osama bin Laden and changed the name of the group to Tanẓīm Qāʻidat al-Jihād fī Bilād al-Rāfidayn, "The Organization of Jihad's Base in the Country of the Two Rivers" or "The Organization of Jihad's Base in Mesopotamia", more commonly known as Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).
3. Although the group has never called itself "Al-Qaeda in Iraq", this name has frequently been used for it through its various incarnations.
4. In January 2006, AQI merged with several other Iraqi insurgent groups to form the Mujahideen Shura Council. Al-Zarqawi was killed in June 2006, after which the group's direction shifted again.
5. On 12 October 2006, the Mujahideen Shura Council merged with several more insurgent factions, and on 13 October the establishment of the Dawlat al-ʻIraq al-Islāmīyah, Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) was announced. Abu Abdullah al-Rashid al-Baghdadi became the ISI's figurehead emir, but the real power lay with the Egyptian Abu Ayyub al-Masri. Both were killed in a US–Iraqi operation in April 2010 and were succeeded by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the current leader of ISIL.
6. On 8 April 2013, having expanded into Syria, the group adopted the name Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, also known as Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham. These names are translations of the Arabic name al-Dawlah al-Islāmīyah fī al-ʻIrāq wa-al-Shām, with the final word al-Shām providing a description of the Levant or Greater Syria. The translated names are frequently abbreviated as ISIL/Isil or as ISIS/Isis. The group has also used the names al-Dawlah ("the State") and al-Dawlah al-Islāmīyah ("the Islamic State"). These are short-forms of the Arabic name al-Dawlah al-Islāmīyah fī al-ʻIrāq wa-al-Shām.
7. The name Daʿish—pronounced /ˈdaːʕiʃ/ and transliterated as "Dāʻish", "Da-ish", "Dāʻish", or "Da-ish"—is used particularly by ISIL's detractors, such as those in Syria. It is based on the Arabic letters dāl, alif, ʻayn, and shīn, which form the acronym (داعش) of ISIL/ISIS's Arabic name al-Dawlah al-Islamīyah fī al-ʻIrāq wa-al-Shām. There are many different spellings of this acronym. ISIL considers the term "Dāʻish" derogatory and reportedly punishes with flogging those who use it in ISIL-controlled areas.
8. On 14 May 2014, the United States Department of State announced its decision to use "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" (ISIL) as the group's primary name. The debate over which of these acronyms should be used to designate the group, ISIL or ISIS, has been discussed by several commentators. The Washington Post concluded: "In the larger battlefield of copy style controversies, the distinction between ISIS or ISIL is not so great."
9. On 29 June 2014, the group renamed itself the Islamic State (IS) and declared its government a caliphate.

Foundation of the group (1999–2006)

Main articles: Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad, Tanzim Qaidat al-Jihad fi Bilad al-Rafidayn and Mujahideen Shura Council (Iraq)

A screenshot from the 2004 hostage video, where Nick Berg was beheaded by al-Zarqawi's group.

Following the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq, the Jordanian Salafi Jihadist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and his militant group Jama'at al-Tawhid wal-Jihad, founded in 1999, achieved notoriety in the early stages of the Iraq insurgency, by not only carrying out attacks on coalition forces but conducting suicide attacks on civilian targets and beheading hostages.

Al-Zarqawi's group grew in strength and attracted more fighters, and in October 2004 it officially pledged allegiance to Osama bin Laden's al-Qaeda network, changing its name to Tanzim Qaidat al-Jihad fi Bilad al-Rafidayn (تنظيم قاعدة الجهاد في بلاد الرافدين, "Organization of Jihad's Base in Mesopotamia"), also known as Al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI). Attacks by the group on civilians, the Iraqi Government and security forces continued to increase over the next two years—see list of major resistance attacks in Iraq. In a letter to al-Zarqawi in July 2005, al-Qaeda's deputy leader Ayman al-Zawahiri outlined a four-stage plan to expand the Iraq War, which included expelling US forces from Iraq, establishing an Islamic authority, as caliphate, spreading the conflict to Iraq's secular neighbors, and engaging in the Arab–Israeli conflict.

In January 2006, AQI merged with several smaller Iraqi insurgent groups under an umbrella organization called the Mujahideen Shura Council (MSC). This was claimed by Brian Fishman in the Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science to be little more than a media exercise and an attempt to give the group a more Iraqi flavour and perhaps to distance al-Qaeda from some of al-Zarqawi's tactical errors, notably the 2005 bombings by AQI of three hotels in Amman. On 7 June, al-Zarqawi was killed in a US airstrike and was succeeded as leader of the group by the Egyptian militant Abu Ayyub al-Masri.

On 12 October 2006, the Mujahideen Shura Council joined four more insurgent factions and the representatives of a number of Iraqi Arab tribes, and together they swore the traditional Arab oath of allegiance known as Ḥilf al-Muṭayyabīn ("Oath of the Scented Ones"). During the ceremony, the participants swore to free Iraq's Sunnis from what they described as Shia and foreign oppression, and to further the name of Allah and restore Islam to glory.

On 13 October 2006, the Mujahideen Shura Council declared the establishment of the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), comprising Iraq's six mostly Sunni Arab governorates, with Abu Omar al-Baghdadi being announced as its Emir. Al-Masri was given the title of Minister of War within the ISI's ten-member cabinet. The declaration of statehood was met with hostile criticism, not only from ISI's jihadist rivals in Iraq, but from leading jihadist ideologues outside the country.

A joint US–Iraqi training exercise near Ramadi in November 2009. The Islamic State of Iraq had declared the city to be its capital.

As Islamic State of Iraq (2006–2013)

Main article: Islamic State of Iraq

According to a study compiled by US intelligence agencies in early 2007, the ISI—also known as AQI—planned to seize power in the central and western areas of the country and turn it into a Sunni Islamic state. The group built in strength and at its height enjoyed a significant presence in the Iraqi governorates of Al Anbar, Nineveh, Kirkuk, most of Salah ad Din, parts of Babil, Diyala and Baghdad, and claimed Baqubah as a capital city.

However, by late 2007, violent and indiscriminate attacks directed by rogue AQI elements against Iraqi civilians had severely damaged the group's image and caused a loss of support among the population, thus isolating it. In a major blow to AQI, many former Sunni militants who had previously fought alongside the group started to work with the US armed forces. The US troops surge supplied the military with more manpower for operations targeting the group, resulting in dozens of high-level AQI members being captured or killed.

Al-Qaeda seemed to have lost its foothold in Iraq and appeared to be severely crippled. During 2008, a series of US and Iraqi offensives managed to drive out the AQI-aligned insurgents from their former safe havens, such as the Diyala and Al Anbar governorates and the embattled capital of Baghdad, to the area of the northern city of Mosul, the latest of the Iraq War's major battlegrounds. By 2008, the ISI was describing itself as being in a state of "extraordinary crisis". Its violent attempts to govern its territory led to a backlash from Sunni Iraqis and other insurgent groups and a temporary decline in the group, which was attributable to a number of factors, notably the Anbar Awakening.

In late 2009, the commander of the US forces in Iraq, General Ray Odierno, stated that the ISI "has transformed significantly in the last two years. What once was dominated by foreign individuals has now become more and more dominated by Iraqi citizens". On 18 April 2010, the ISI's two top leaders, Abu Ayyub al-Masri and Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, were killed in a joint US-Iraqi raid near Tikrit. In a press conference in June 2010, General Odierno reported that 80% of the ISI's top 42 leaders, including recruiters and financiers, had been killed or captured, with only eight remaining at large. He said that they had been cut off from al-Qaeda's leadership in Pakistan, and that improved intelligence had enabled the successful mission in April that led to the killing of al-Masri and al-Baghdadi; in addition, the number of attacks and casualty figures in Iraq for the first five months of 2010 were the lowest since 2003.

On 16 May 2010, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was appointed the new leader of the Islamic State of Iraq. Al-Baghdadi replenished the group's leadership, many of whom had been killed or captured, by appointing former Ba'athist military and intelligence officers who had served during the Saddam Hussein regime. These men, nearly all of whom had spent time imprisoned by the US military, came to make up about one-third of Baghdadi's top 25 commanders. One of them was a former Colonel, Samir al-Khlifawi, also known as Haji Bakr, who became the overall military commander in charge of overseeing the group's operations.

In July 2012, al-Baghdadi released an audio statement online announcing that the group was returning to the former strongholds from which US troops and their Sunni allies had driven them prior to the withdrawal of US troops. He also declared the start of a new offensive in Iraq called Breaking the Walls, which was aimed at freeing members of the group held in Iraqi prisons. Violence in Iraq began to escalate that month, and by July 2013 monthly fatalities had exceeded 1,000 for the first time since April 2008. The Breaking the Walls campaign culminated in July 2013, with the group carrying out simultaneous raids on Taji and Abu Ghraib prison, freeing more than 500 prisoners, many of them veterans of the Iraqi insurgency.

As Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (2013–2014)

Declaration and dispute with al-Nusra Front

Pair of armed anti-American insurgents from northern Iraq

In March 2011, protests began in Syria against the government of Bashar al-Assad. In the following months, violence between demonstrators and security forces led to a gradual militarisation of the conflict. In August 2011, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi began sending Syrian and Iraqi ISI members experienced in guerilla warfare across the border into Syria in order to establish an organization inside the country. Led by a Syrian known as Abu Muhammad al-Jawlani, this group began to recruit fighters and establish cells throughout the country. On 23 January 2012, the group announced its formation as Jabhat al-Nusra li Ahl as-Sham—Jabhat al-Nusra—more commonly known as al-Nusra Front. Al-Nusra grew rapidly into a capable fighting force with popular support among Syrians opposed to the Assad regime.

On 8 April 2013, al-Baghdadi released an audio statement in which he announced that al-Nusra Front had been established, financed and supported by the Islamic State of Iraq and that the two groups were merging under the name "Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham". Al-Jawlani issued a statement denying the merger and complaining that neither he nor anyone else in al-Nusra's leadership had been consulted about it. In June 2013, Al Jazeera reported that it had obtained a letter written by al-Qaeda's leader Ayman al-Zawahiri, addressed to both leaders, in which he ruled against the merger, and appointed an emissary to oversee relations between them to put an end to tensions. In the same month, al-Baghdadi released an audio message rejecting al-Zawahiri's ruling and declaring that the merger was going ahead. In October 2013, al-Zawahiri ordered the disbanding of ISIL, putting al-Nusra Front in charge of jihadist efforts in Syria, but al-Baghdadi contested al-Zawahiri's ruling on the basis of Islamic jurisprudence, and his group continued to operate in Syria. In February 2014, after an eight-month power struggle, al-Qaeda disavowed any relations with ISIL.

According to journalist Sarah Birke, there are "significant differences" between al-Nusra Front and ISIL. While al-Nusra actively calls for the overthrow of the Assad government, ISIL "tends to be more focused on establishing its own rule on conquered territory". ISIL is "far more ruthless" in building an Islamic state, "carrying out sectarian attacks and imposing sharia law immediately". While al-Nusra has a "large contingent of foreign fighters", it is seen as a home-grown group by many Syrians; by contrast, ISIL fighters have been described as "foreign 'occupiers'" by many Syrian refugees. It has a strong presence in central and northern Syria, where it has instituted sharia in a number of towns. The group reportedly controlled the four border towns of Atmeh, al-Bab, Azaz and Jarablus, allowing it to control the entrance and exit from Syria into Turkey. Foreign fighters in Syria include Russian-speaking jihadists who were part of Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar (JMA). In November 2013, the JMA's Chechen leader Abu Omar al-Shishani swore an oath of allegiance to al-Baghdadi; the group then split between those who followed al-Shishani in joining ISIL and those who continued to operate independently in the JMA under new leadership.

In May 2014, Ayman al-Zawahiri ordered al-Nusra Front to stop attacks on its rival ISIL. In June 2014, after continued fighting between the two groups, al-Nusra's branch in the Syrian town of Al-Bukamal pledged allegiance to ISIL.

In mid-June 2014, ISIL captured the Trabil crossing on the Jordan–Iraq border, the only border crossing between the two countries. ISIL has received some public support in Jordan, albeit limited, partly owing to state repression there, but has undertaken a recruitment drive in Saudi Arabia, where tribes in the north are linked to those in western Iraq and eastern Syria.

Conflicts with other groups

See also: Inter-rebel conflict during the Syrian Civil War

In January 2014, rebels affiliated with the Islamic Front and the US-trained Free Syrian Army launched an offensive against ISIL militants in and around the city of Aleppo in Syria.

As Islamic State (2014–present)

See also: 2014 ISIL beheading incidents, American-led intervention in Syria, 2014 American-led intervention in Iraq, 2014 Iranian-led intervention in Iraq, 2014 military intervention against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, Northern Iraq offensive (June 2014) and Turkish involvement in the 2014 military intervention against ISIL

On 29 June 2014, ISIL removed "Iraq and the Levant" from its name and began to refer to itself as the "Islamic State", proclaiming itself caliphate and naming Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as caliph. The declaration as caliphate has been criticized and ridiculed by Muslim scholars and rival Islamists inside and outside the occupied territory.

Analysts observed that dropping the reference to region in its new name widened the group's scope, and terrorism analyst Laith Alkhouri concluded that after capturing many areas in Syria and Iraq, the Islamic State had felt this was a suitable opportunity to take control of the global jihadist movement.

In June and July 2014, Jordan and Saudi Arabia moved troops to their borders with Iraq, after Iraq lost control of, or withdrew from, strategic crossing points that had then come under the control of the Islamic State. There was speculation that Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki had ordered a withdrawal of troops from the Iraq–Saudi crossings in order "to increase pressure on Saudi Arabia and bring the threat of Isis over-running its borders as well".

In July 2014, Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau declared support for the new caliphate and Caliph Ibrahim. In August, Shekau announced that Boko Haram had captured the Nigerian town of Gwoza. Shekau announced: "Thanks be to God who gave victory to our brethren in Gwoza and made it a state among the Islamic states". Boko Haram launched an offensive in Adamawa and Borno States in northeastern Nigeria in September, following the example of the Islamic State.

In July 2014, the Islamic State recruited more than 6,300 fighters, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, some of whom were thought to have previously fought for the Free Syrian Army.

On 3 August 2014, the Islamic State captured the towns of Zumar, Sinjar and Wana in northern Iraq near the autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan.

The need for food and water of thousands of Yazidis, having fled up a mountain out of fear for approaching hostile ISIL militants, and the threat of massacre or genocide to Yazidis and others as announced by ISIL, together with protecting Americans in Iraq and supporting Iraq in its fight against the Islamic State, were reasons for the US to launch a humanitarian mission on 7 August to aid those Yazidis on that mountain and to start an aerial bombing campaign in Iraq on 8 August against the Islamic State. Nevertheless, the United Nations would conclude in September and October that ISIL had massacred thousands of Yazidis in that region in August.

At the end of October 2014, radical militants in control of the Libyan city of Derna pledged their allegiance to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, thus making Derna the first city outside Syria and Iraq to become part of the Islamic State caliphate. On 10 November, Egyptian group Ansar Bait al-Maqdis also pledged allegiance to IS.

Notable members

Mugshot of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi by US armed forces while in detention at Camp Bucca in 2004

Current known personnel (all use assumed names)

• Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi (Leader – declared emir of the Islamic State of Iraq in 2010 and caliph of the Islamic State on 29 June 2014)
• Abu Muslim al-Turkmani (Deputy Leader in Iraq)
• Abu Ali al-Anbari (Deputy Leader in Syria)
• Abu Mohammad al-Adnani (official spokesperson)
• Abu Omar al-Shishani (ISIL field commander in Syria)
• Abu Ayman al-Iraqi (ISIL senior commander in Syria)
• Abu Waheeb (ISIL militant in Al Anbar, Iraq)
• "Jihadi John" (ISIL member with British accent seen in beheading videos)
• Abu Yusaf (senior security commander)
• Abu Suleiman al-Naser (Minister of War, Islamic State of Iraq)

Former leaders

• Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (killed in 2006)
• Abu Ayyub al-Masri (killed in 2010)
• Abu Abdullah al-Rashid al-Baghdadi (killed in 2010)

Other former personnel

• Abu Anas al-Shami (killed in 2004)
• Abu Azzam (killed in 2005)
• Abu Omar al-Kurdi (captured in 2005)
• Abdul Hadi al-Iraqi (captured in 2006)
• Sheik Abd-Al-Rahman (killed in 2006)
• Hamid Juma Faris Jouri al-Saeedi (captured in 2006)
• Abu Yaqub al-Masri (killed in 2007)
• Haitham al-Badri (killed in 2007)
• Khaled al-Mashhadani (captured in 2007)
• Mahir al-Zubaydi (killed in 2008)
• Mohamed Moumou (killed in 2008)
• Huthaifa al-Batawi (killed in 2011)
• Abu Abdulrahman al-Bilawi (killed in 2014)
• Haji Bakr (killed in 2014)

Designation as a terrorist organization

Entity	Date	Authority	References
Multinational Organizations
United Nations	18 October 2004	United Nations Security Council
European Union	2004	EU Council (via adoption of UN Sanctions List)
Nations
United Kingdom	March 2001 (as part of al-Qaeda) 20 June 2014 (after separation from al‑Qaeda)	Home Secretary of the Home Office
United States	17 December 2004	United States Department of State
Australia	2 March 2005	Attorney-General for Australia
Canada	20 August 2012	Parliament of Canada
Turkey	30 October 2013	Grand National Assembly of Turkey
Saudi Arabia	7 March 2014	Royal decree of the King of Saudi Arabia
Indonesia	1 August 2014	National Counter-terrorism Agency BNPT (id)
Israel	3 September 2014	Ministry of Defense, Israel

Many world leaders and government spokespeople have called ISIL a terrorist group, without a formal designation by their countries. Media sources worldwide have also called ISIL a terrorist organization.

The United Nations Security Council in its Resolution 1267 (1999) designated al-Qaeda as a terrorist organization and established the al-Qaida Sanctions List, to which it added al-Qaeda in Iraq—now known as ISIL in UN documents—on 18 October 2004 (amended 2 Dec. 2004, 5 Mar. 2009, 13 Dec. 2011, 30 May 2013, 13 May 2014 and 2 Jun. 2014). The UN Security Council also includes various ISIL leaders on its list. The European Union adopted the UN Sanctions List in 2001 and regularly updates its own list to match it.

Ideology and beliefs

ISIL is a Sunni extremist group. It follows an extreme interpretation of Islam, promotes religious violence, and regards those who do not agree with its interpretations as infidels or apostates. Its aim is to establish a Salafist-oriented Islamist state in Iraq, Syria and other parts of the Levant.

ISIL's ideology originates in the branch of modern Islam that aims to return to the early days of Islam, rejecting later "innovations" in the religion which it believes corrupt its original spirit. It condemns later caliphates and the Ottoman Empire for deviating from what it calls pure Islam and hence has been attempting to establish its own caliphate.

ISIL's philosophy is well represented in the symbolism of its black flag, which first appeared as the flag of its parent organization, al-Qaeda. The flag shows the seal of the Muhammad within a white circle, with the phrase above it, "There is no God but Allah", depicted on a black flag, the legendary battle flag of Muhammad. Such symbolism has been said to point to ISIL's belief that it represents no less than the restoration of the caliphate of early Islam, with all of the political, religious and eschatological ramifications that this would imply.

According to some observers, ISIL emerged from the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood, the first post-Ottoman Islamist group dating back to the late 1920s in Egypt. It adheres to global jihadist principles and follows the hard-line ideology of al-Qaeda and many other modern-day jihadist groups. However, other sources trace the group's roots not to the Islamism of the Muslim Brotherhood and the more mainstream jihadism of al-Qaeda, but to Wahhabism. The New York Times wrote:

For their guiding principles, the leaders of the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, are open and clear about their almost exclusive commitment to the Wahhabi movement of Sunni Islam. The group circulates images of Wahhabi religious textbooks from Saudi Arabia in the schools it controls. Videos from the group’s territory have shown Wahhabi texts plastered on the sides of an official missionary van.

ISIL seeks to revive the original Wahhabi project of the restoration of the caliphate governed by strict Salafist doctrine, and following Wahhabi tradition, it condemns the followers of secular law as disbelievers, putting the current Saudi regime in that category.

ISIL's use of violence to purify the community of unbelievers comes from the Wahhabi tradition. Bernard Haykel has described Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi's creed as "a kind of untamed Wahhabism", saying, "For Al Qaeda, violence is a means to an ends; for ISIS, it is an end in itself". The destruction by ISIL in July 2014 of the tomb and shrine of the prophet Yunus—Jonah in Christianity—the 13th century mosque of Imam Yahya Abu al-Qassimin, the 14th century shrine of prophet Jerjis—St George to Christians—and the attempted destruction of the Hadba minaret at the 12th century Great Mosque of Al-Nuri have been described as "an unchecked outburst of extreme Wahhabism".

According to The New York Times, "All of the most influential jihadist theorists are criticizing the Islamic State as deviant, calling its self-proclaimed caliphate null and void" and have denounced it for its beheading of journalists and aid workers. ISIL is widely denounced by a broad range of Islamic clerics including Al-Qaeda-oriented and Saudi clerics

Salafists such as ISIL believe that only a legitimate authority can undertake the leadership of jihad, and that the first priority over other areas of combat, such as fighting non-Muslim countries, is the purification of Islamic society. For example, when it comes to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, since ISIL regards the Palestinian Sunni group Hamas as apostates who have no legitimate authority to lead jihad, it regards fighting Hamas as the first step toward confrontation with Israel.

Sunni critics, including Salafi and jihadist muftis such as Adnan al-Aroor and Abu Basir al-Tartusi, say that ISIL and related terrorist groups are not Sunnis, but modern-day Khawarij—Muslims who have stepped outside the mainstream of Islam—serving an imperial anti-Islamic agenda. Other critics of ISIL's brand of Sunni Islam include Salafists who previously publicly supported jihadist groups such as al-Qaeda, for example the Saudi government official Saleh Al-Fawzan, known for his extremist views, who claims that ISIL is a creation of "Zionists, Crusaders and Safavids", and the Jordanian-Palestinian writer Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi, the former spiritual mentor to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who was released from prison in Jordan in June 2014 and accuses ISIL of driving a wedge between Muslims.

Goals

Since 2004, the group's goal has been the foundation of an Islamic state in the Levant. Specifically, ISIL has sought to establish itself as a caliphate, an Islamic state led by a group of religious authorities under a supreme leader—caliph—who is believed to be the successor to Muhammad.

In June 2014, ISIL published a document in which it claimed to have traced the lineage of its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi back to Muhammad. That same month, ISIL removed "Iraq and the Levant" from its name and began to refer to itself as the Islamic State, declaring the territory that it occupied in Iraq and Syria a new caliphate and naming al-Baghdadi as its caliph. By declaring itself as caliphate, al-Baghdadi was demanding the allegiance of all devout Muslims according to Islamic jurisprudence—fiqh.

Shaykh Abu Muhammad al-Adnani al-Shami, spokesperson for ISIL, described the establishment of the caliphate as "a dream that lives in the depths of every Muslim believer" and "the abandoned obligation of the era", while ISIL stated: "The legality of all emirates, groups, states and organizations becomes null by the expansion of the khilafah's [caliphate's] authority and arrival of its troops to their areas." ISIL thus rejects the political divisions established by Western powers at the end of World War I in the Sykes–Picot Agreement as it absorbs territory in Syria and Iraq.

ISIL's current goal is to consolidate the territorial gains it has made, to establish an Islamic state, and to expand its caliphate throughout the Levant region.

Territorial claims

     Areas controlled  (20 October 2014)      Territories claimed  (2006)      Rest of Iraq and Syria Note: map includes uninhabited areas.

When the group announced the establishment of the Islamic State of Iraq in 2006, it claimed authority over the Iraqi governorates of Baghdad, Al Anbar, Diyala, Kirkuk, Salah al-Din, Nineveh, and parts of Babil. Following the expansion of the group into Syria in 2013 and the announcement of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, the number of wilayah—provinces—which it claimed increased to 16. In addition to the seven Iraqi wilayah, the Syrian divisions, largely lying along existing provincial boundaries, are Al Barakah, Al Kheir, Ar-Raqqah, Al Badiya, Halab, Idlib, Hama, Damascus, and the Coast. After taking control of both sides of the border in mid-2014, ISIL created a new province incorporating Syrian territory around Albu Kamal and Iraqi territory around Qaim. This new wilayah was named al-Furat—"Euphrates" province. In Syria, ISIL's seat of power is in the Ar-Raqqah Governorate. Top ISIL leaders, including Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, are known to have visited its provincial capital, Ar-Raqqah.

Governance

The group is headed and run by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, called caliph, with a cabinet of advisers. There are two deputy leaders, Abu Muslim al-Turkmani for Iraq and Abu Ali al-Anbari for Syria, and 12 local governors in Iraq and Syria. Beneath the governors are local councils on finance, leadership, military matters, legal matters—including decisions on executions—foreign fighters' assistance, security, intelligence and media. In addition, a Shura council has the task of ensuring that all decisions made by the governors and councils comply with the group's interpretation of sharia.

Ar-Raqqah in Syria is the de facto capital of the Islamic State and is said to be a test case of ISIL governance. As of September 2014, governance in Ar-Raqqah has been under the total control of ISIL where it has rebuilt the structure of modern government in less than a year. Former government workers from the Assad regime maintain their jobs after pledging allegiance to ISIL. Institutions, restored and restructured, are providing services. The Ar-Raqqah dam continues to provide electricity and water. Foreign expertise supplements Syrian officials in running civilian institutions. Only the police and soldiers are ISIL fighters, who receive confiscated lodging previously owned by non-Sunnis and others who fled. Welfare services are provided, price controls established, and taxes imposed on the wealthy. ISIL runs a soft power program in the areas under its control in Iraq and Syria, which includes social services, religious lectures and da'wah—proselytizing—to local populations. It also performs public services such as repairing roads and maintaining the electricity supply.

Exporting oil from oilfields captured by ISIL brings in tens of millions of dollars. One US Treasury official has estimated that ISIL earns US$1 million a day from the export of oil. Much of the oil is sold illegally in Turkey. Dubai-based energy analysts have put the combined oil revenue from ISIL's Iraqi-Syrian production as high as US$3 million per day. ISIL also extracts wealth through taxation and extortion.

British security expert Frank Gardner has concluded that ISIL's prospects of maintaining control and rule are greater in 2014 than they were in 2006. Despite being as brutal as before, ISIL has become "well entrenched" among the population and is not likely to be dislodged by ineffective Syrian or Iraqi forces. It has replaced corrupt governance with functioning locally controlled authorities, services have been restored and there are adequate supplies of water and oil. With Western-backed intervention being unlikely, the group will "continue to hold their ground" and rule an area "the size of Pennsylvania for the foreseeable future", he said. Further solidifying ISIL rule is the control of wheat production, which is roughly 40% of Iraq's production. ISIL has maintained food production, crucial to governance and popular support.

Diktats, influences and pressures

In Mosul, ISIL has implemented a sharia school curriculum which bans the teaching of art, music, national history, literature and Christianity. Although Charles Darwin's theory of evolution has never been taught in Iraqi schools, the subject has been banned from the school curriculum. Patriotic songs have been declared blasphemous, and orders have been given to remove certain pictures from school textbooks. Iraqi parents have largely boycotted schools in which the new curriculum has been introduced.

After capturing cities in Iraq, ISIL issued guidelines on how to wear clothes and veils. ISIL warned women in the city of Mosul to wear full-face veils or face severe punishment. A cleric told Reuters in Mosul that ISIL gunmen had ordered him to read out the warning in his mosque when worshippers gathered. ISIL ordered the faces of both male and female mannequins to be covered, in an order that also banned the use of naked mannequins. In Ar-Raqqah the group uses its two battalions of female fighters in the city to enforce compliance by women with its strict laws on individual conduct.

ISIL released 16 notes labeled "Contract of the City", a set of rules aimed at civilians in Nineveh. One rule stipulated that women should stay at home and not go outside unless necessary. Another rule said that stealing would be punished by amputation. In addition to banning the sale and use of alcohol—which is customary in Muslim culture—ISIL has banned the sale and use of cigarettes and hookah pipes. It has also banned "music and songs in cars, at parties, in shops and in public, as well as photographs of people in shop windows".

According to The Economist, dissidents in the ISIL capital of Ar-Raqqah report that "all 12 of the judges who now run its court system ... are Saudis". Saudi practices also followed by the group include the establishment of religious police to root out "vice" and enforce attendance at salat prayers, the widespread use of capital punishment, and the destruction of or conversion to other uses of Christian churches and non-Sunni mosques.

Christians living in areas under ISIL control who want to remain in the "caliphate" face three options: converting to Islam, paying a religious levy, jizya, or death. "We offer them three choices: Islam; the dhimma contract – involving payment of jizya; if they refuse this they will have nothing but the sword", ISIL said. ISIL had already set similar rules for Christians in Ar-Raqqah, once one of Syria's more liberal cities.

Human rights abuses

In early September 2014, the United Nations Human Rights Council agreed to send a team to Iraq and Syria to investigate the abuses and killings being carried out by the ISIL on "an unimaginable scale". Prince Zeid bin Ra'ad, the newly appointed UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, urged world leaders to step in to protect women and children suffering at the hands of ISIL militants, who he said were trying to create a "house of blood". He appealed to the international community to concentrate its efforts on ending the conflict in Iraq and Syria.

War crimes accusations and findings

In July 2014, the BBC reported the United Nations' chief investigator as stating: "Fighters from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (Isis) may be added to a list of war crimes suspects in Syria." By June 2014, according to United Nations reports, ISIL had executed hundreds of prisoners of war and killed over 1,000 civilians.

In August 2014, the UN accused ISIL of committing "mass atrocities" and war crimes, including the mass execution of up to 250 Syrian Army soldiers near Tabqa Air base. Other known executions of military prisoners took place in Camp Speicher (1,095–1,700 Iraqi soldiers shot and "thousands" more "missing") and the Shaer gas field (200 Syrian soldiers shot).

Religious and minority group persecution

See also: Persecution of Assyrians by ISIL and Persecution of Yazidis by ISIL

ISIL compels people in the areas it controls, under the penalty of death, torture or mutilation, to declare Islamic creed, and live according to its interpretation of Sunni Islam and sharia law. It directs violence against Shia Muslims, indigenous Assyrian, Chaldean, Syriac and Armenian Christians, Yazidis, Druze, Shabaks and Mandeans in particular.

Amnesty International has found ISIL guilty of the ethnic cleansing of ethnic and religious minority groups in northern Iraq on a "historic scale". In a special report released on 2 September 2014, it describes how ISIL has "systematically targeted non-Arab and non-Sunni Muslim communities, killing or abducting hundreds, possibly thousands, and forcing more than 830,000 others to flee the areas it has captured since 10 June 2014". Among these people are Assyrian Christians, Turkmen Shia, Shabak Shia, Yazidis, Kaka'i and Sabean Mandeans, who have lived together for centuries in Nineveh province, large parts of which are now under ISIL's control.

Among the known massacres of religious and minority group civilians carried out by ISIL are those in the villages and towns of Quiniyeh (70–90 Yazidis killed), Hardan (60 Yazidis killed), Sinjar (200–500 Yazidis killed), Ramadi Jabal (60–70 Yazidis killed), Dhola (50 Yazidis killed), Khana Sor (100 Yazidis killed), Hardan (250–300 Yazidis killed), al-Shimal (dozens of Yazidis killed), Khocho (400 Yazidis killed and 1,000 abducted), Jadala (14 Yadizis killed) and Beshir (700 Shia Turkmen killed), and others committed near Mosul (670 Shia inmates of the Badush prison killed),and in Tal Afar prison, Iraq (200 Yazidis killed for refusing conversion) The UN estimated that 5,000 Yazidis were massacred by ISIL during the takeover of parts of northern Iraq in August 2014.

In late May 2014, 150 Kurdish boys from Kobani aged 14–16 were abducted and subjected to torture and abuse, according to Human Rights Watch.

In the Syrian towns of Ghraneij, Abu Haman and Kashkiyeh 700 members of the Sunni Al Sheitaat tribe were killed for attempting an uprising against ISIL control. The UN reported that in June 2014 the Islamic State had executed a number of Sunni Islamic clerics who refused to pledge allegiance to it.

Treatment of civilians

During the Iraqi conflict in 2014, ISIL released dozens of videos showing its ill treatment of civilians, many of whom had apparently been targeted on the basis of their religion or ethnicity. Navi Pillay, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, warned of war crimes being committed in the Iraqi war zone, and disclosed one UN report of ISIL militants murdering Iraqi Army soldiers and 17 civilians in a single street in Mosul. The United Nations reported that in the 17 days from 5 to 22 June, ISIL killed more than 1,000 Iraqi civilians and injured more than 1,000. After ISIL released photographs of its fighters shooting scores of young men, the United Nations declared that cold-blooded "executions" by militants in northern Iraq almost certainly amounted to war crimes.

ISIL's advance in Iraq in mid-2014 was accompanied by continuing violence in Syria. On 29 May, ISIL raided a village in Syria and at least 15 civilians were killed, including, according to Human Rights Watch, at least six children. A hospital in the area confirmed that it had received 15 bodies on the same day. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that on 1 June, a 102-year-old man was killed along with his whole family in a village in Hama province.

ISIL has recruited to its ranks Iraqi children, who can be seen with masks on their faces and guns in their hands patrolling the streets of Mosul.

Sexual violence and slavery allegations

Main article: Sexual Violence in the Iraqi Insurgency

See also: Islamic views on slavery and Ma malakat aymanukum

According to one report, ISIL's capture of Iraqi cities in June 2014 was accompanied by an upsurge in crimes against women, including kidnap and rape. The Guardian reported that ISIL's extremist agenda extended to women's bodies and that women living under their control were being captured and raped. Fighters are told that they are free to have sex and rape non-Muslim captive women. Hannaa Edwar, a leading women’s rights advocate in Baghdad who runs an NGO called Iraqi Al-Amal Association (IAA), said that none of her contacts in Mosul were able to confirm any cases of rape. However, another Baghdad-based women's rights activist, Basma al-Khateeb, said that a culture of violence existed in Iraq against women generally and felt sure that sexual violence against women was happening in Mosul involving not only ISIL but all armed groups.

During a meeting with Nouri al-Maliki, British Foreign Minister William Hague said with regard to ISIL: "Anyone glorifying, supporting or joining it should understand that they would be assisting a group responsible for kidnapping, torture, executions, rape and many other hideous crimes". According to Martin Williams in The Citizen, some hard-line Salafists apparently regard extramarital sex with multiple partners as a legitimate form of holy war and it is "difficult to reconcile this with a religion where some adherents insist that women must be covered from head to toe, with only a narrow slit for the eyes".

Haleh Esfandiari from the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars has highlighted the abuse of local women by ISIL militants after they have captured an area. "They usually take the older women to a makeshift slave market and try to sell them. The younger girls ... are raped or married off to fighters", she said, adding, "It's based on temporary marriages, and once these fighters have had sex with these young girls, they just pass them on to other fighters." Speaking of Yazidi women captured by ISIS, Nazand Begikhani said "[t]hese women have been treated like cattle... They have been subjected to physical and sexual violence, including systematic rape and sex slavery. They've been exposed in markets in Mosul and in Raqqa, Syria, carrying price tags." Yazidi girls in Iraq allegedly raped by ISIL fighters have committed suicide by jumping to their death from Mount Sinjar, as described in a witness statement.

A United Nations report issued on 2 October 2014, based on 500 interviews with witnesses, said that ISIL took 450–500 women and girls to Iraq's Nineveh region in August where "150 unmarried girls and women, predominantly from the Yazidi and Christian communities, were reportedly transported to Syria, either to be given to ISIL fighters as a reward or to be sold as sex slaves". In mid-October, the UN confirmed that 5,000–7,000 Yazidi women and children had been abducted by ISIL and sold into slavery. In its digital magazine Dabiq, ISIL explicitly claimed religious justification for enslaving Yazidi women.

Criticism

The group has attracted widespread criticism internationally for its extremism, from governments and international bodies such as the United Nations and Amnesty International.

ISIL has been at the receiving end of severe criticism from other Muslims, especially religious scholars and theologians.

In late September 2014, 126 Sunni imams and Islamic scholars, primarily Sufi, from around the Muslim world signed an open letter to the Islamic State's leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, explicitly rejecting and refuting his group's interpretations of Islamic scriptures, the Qur'an and hadith, used by it to justify its actions. "[You] have misinterpreted Islam into a religion of harshness, brutality, torture and murder ... this is a great wrong and an offence to Islam, to Muslims and to the entire world", the letter states. It rebukes the Islamic State for its execution of prisoners, describing the killings as "heinous war crimes" and its persecution of the Yazidis of Iraq as "abominable". Referring to the "self-described 'Islamic State'", the letter censures the group for carrying out massacres and acts of brutality under the guise of jihad—holy struggle—saying that its "sacrifice" without legitimate cause, goals and intention "is not jihad at all, but rather, warmongering and criminality". It also accuses the group of instigating fitna—sedition—by instituting slavery under its rule in contravention of the anti-slavery consensus of the Islamic scholarly community. Other scholars have described the group as not Sunnis, but Khawarij.

Kurdish demonstration against ISIL in Vienna, Austria, 10 October 2014

The group's declaration of a caliphate has been criticized and its legitimacy disputed by Middle Eastern governments, other jihadist groups, and Sunni Muslim theologians and historians. Qatar-based TV broadcaster and theologian Yusuf al-Qaradawi stated: "[The] declaration issued by the Islamic State is void under sharia and has dangerous consequences for the Sunnis in Iraq and for the revolt in Syria", adding that the title of caliph can "only be given by the entire Muslim nation", not by a single group.

The group has been referred to as a cult in a Huffington Post column by Steven Hassan, a notable authority on the subject of cults.

There have been many reports of the group's use of death threats, torture and mutilation to compel conversion to Islam, executions of clerics who refuse to pledge allegiance to the Islamic State, mass executions of prisoners of war and civilians, and sexual enslavement of Iraqi women and girls, predominantly from the minority Christian and Yazidi communities.

Two days after the beheading of Hervé Gourdel, hundreds of Muslims gathered in the Grand Mosque of Paris to show solidarity against the beheading. The protest was lead by the leader of the French Council of the Muslim Faith, Dalil Boubakeur, and was joined by thousands of other Muslims around the country under the slogan "Not in my name". French president François Hollande said Gourdel's beheading was "cowardly" and "cruel", and confirmed that airstrikes would continue against ISIL in Iraq. Hollande also called for three days of national mourning, with flags flown at half-mast throughout the country and said that security would be increased throughout Paris.

The Islamic State is mocked on social media websites such as Twitter and YouTube, with the use of hashtags, mock recruiting ads, fake news articles and YouTube videos. One parody, by a Palestinian TV satire show, portrays the Islamic State as "buffoon-like hypocrites", and has had more than half a million views on YouTube.

"Islamic State", criticism of use of this name

Many countries do not recognize the group by the name "Islamic State", owing to the far-reaching political and religious authority which that name implies. The United Nations Security Council, the United States, Canada, Turkey, Australia, Russia, United Kingdom and other powers generally call the group "ISIL", while much of the Arab world and France use the Arabic acronym "Dāʻish".

In late August 2014, a leading Islamic educational institution, Dar al-Ifta al-Misriyyah in Egypt, advised Muslims to stop calling the group "Islamic State" and instead refer to it as "Al-Qaeda Separatists in Iraq and Syria" or "QSIS", because of the militant group's "un-Islamic character". However, despite widespread news coverage of al-Misriyyah's proclamation, the name "QSIS" failed to become commonly used.

When addressing the United Nations Security Council in September 2014, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott summarized the widespread objections to the name "Islamic State" thus: "To use this term [Islamic State] is to dignify a death cult; a death cult that, in declaring itself a caliphate, has declared war on the world". The group is very sensitive about its name. "They will cut your tongue out even if you call them Isis—you have to say 'Islamic State'", said a woman in ISIL-controlled Mosul.

On mid October 2014 representatives of the Islamic Society of Britain, the Association of British Muslims and the UK's Association of Muslim Lawyers proposed that "'Un-Islamic State' (UIS) could be an accurate and fair alternative name to describe this group and its agenda" further stating, "We need to work together and make sure that these fanatics don't get the propaganda that they feed off."

Propaganda and social media

The logo of al-Hayat Media Center

ISIL is known for its use of propaganda. Its flag and Emblem that have symbolic meaning in the Muslim world were clearly carefully designed.

In November 2006, shortly after the group's rebranding as the "Islamic State of Iraq", the group established the al-Furqan Institute for Media Production, which produces CDs, DVDs, posters, pamphlets, and web-related propaganda products. ISIL's main media outlet is the I'tisaam Media Foundation, which was formed in March 2013 and distributes through the Global Islamic Media Front (GIMF). In 2014, ISIL established the al-Hayat Media Center, which targets a Western audience and produces material in English, German, Russian and French. From July 2014, al-Hayat began publishing a digital magazine called Dabiq, in a number of different languages including English. According to the magazine, its name is taken from the town of Dabiq in northern Syria, which is mentioned in a hadith about Armageddon. In 2014 ISIL also launched the Ajnad Media Foundation, which releases jihadist audio chants.

ISIL's use of social media has been described by one expert as "probably more sophisticated than [that of] most US companies". It regularly takes advantage of social media, particularly Twitter, to distribute its message by organizing hashtag campaigns, encouraging Tweets on popular hashtags, and utilizing software applications that enable ISIL propaganda to be distributed to its supporters' accounts. Another comment is that "ISIS puts more emphasis on social media than other jihadi groups. ... They have a very coordinated social media presence." In August 2014, Twitter administrators shut down a number of accounts associated with ISIL. ISIL recreated and publicized new accounts the next day, which were also shut down by Twitter administrators. The group has attempted to branch out into alternative social media sites, such as Quitter, Friendica and Diaspora; Quitter and Friendica, however, almost immediately worked to remove ISIL's presence from their sites.

On 19 August 2014, a propaganda video showing the beheading of US photojournalist James Foley was posted on the Internet. ISIL claimed that the killing had been carried out in revenge for the US bombing of ISIL targets. The video promised that a second captured US journalist Steven Sotloff would be killed next if the airstrikes continued. On 2 September 2014, ISIL released a video purportedly showing their beheading of Sotloff. In the video the executioner says, "I'm back, Obama, and I'm back because of your arrogant foreign policy towards the Islamic State, because of your insistence on continuing your bombings and on Mosul Dam, despite our serious warnings. So just as your missiles continue to strike our people, our knife will continue to strike the necks of your people." The next scene shows the same executioner holding the orange jumpsuit of another prisoner and saying, "We take this opportunity to warn those governments that enter this evil alliance of America against the Islamic State to back off and leave our people alone." On 13 September 2014, ISIL released a similar video purportedly showing the beheading of David Cawthorne Haines, a British aid worker whom they had been holding hostage.

In a switch from its former practices, ISIL's media arm imposed a social media blackout on 27 September 2014, fearing that tweets and posts would give away military positions. ISIL has also attempted to present a more "rational argument" in its series of "press release/discussions" performed by hostage/captive John Cantlie and posted on YouTube. In its most recent "Cantlie presentation", various current and former US officials were quoted, such as US President Barack Obama and former CIA station chief Michael Scheuer.

Finances

In 2014, the RAND Corporation carried out a study of 200 documents—personal letters, expense reports and membership rosters—that had been captured from Al-Qaeda in Iraq and the Islamic State of Iraq. It found that from 2005 until 2010, outside donations amounted to only 5% of the group’s operating budgets, with the rest being raised within Iraq. In the time-period studied, cells were required to send up to 20% of the income generated from kidnapping, extortion rackets and other activities to the next level of the group's leadership. Higher-ranking commanders would then redistribute the funds to provincial or local cells that were in difficulties or needed money to conduct attacks. The records show that the Islamic State of Iraq was dependent on members from Mosul for cash, which the leadership used to provide additional funds to struggling militants in Diyala, Salahuddin and Baghdad.

In mid-2014, Iraqi intelligence extracted information from an ISIL operative which revealed that the organization had assets worth US$2 billion, making it the richest jihadist group in the world. About three quarters of this sum is said to be represented by assets seized after the group captured Mosul in June 2014; this includes possibly up to US$429 million looted from Mosul's central bank, along with additional millions and a large quantity of gold bullion stolen from a number of other banks in Mosul. However, doubt was later cast on whether ISIL was able to retrieve anywhere near that sum from the central bank, and even on whether the bank robberies had actually occurred.

The group routinely practises extortion, by demanding money from truck drivers and threatening to blow up businesses, for example. Robbing banks and gold shops has been another source of income.

Pictures show damage to the Gbiebe oil refinery in Syria following air strikes by US and coalition forces.

ISIL is widely reported as receiving funding from private donors in the Gulf states, and the governments of Iraq and Iran have repeatedly accused Saudi Arabia and Qatar of financing and supporting the group. Ahead of the conference of the US-led anti-ISIL coalition held in Paris in September 2014, France's foreign minister acknowledged that a number of countries at the table had “very probably” financed ISIL's advances.

Although Iran and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki have accused Saudi Arabia and Qatar of funding the group, there is reportedly no evidence that this is the case. However, US Senator John McCain has praised Saudi Arabia's Bandar bin Sultan for supporting forces fighting Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Syria—"Thank God for the Saudis and Prince Bandar", he said to CNN—and according to The Atlantic, ISIL may have been a major part of Bandar’s covert-ops strategy in Syria.

In October 2014, The Daily Telegraph reported that new documents released by the US Treasury disclosed that 49-year-old Qatari Central Bank employee Khalifa Muhammad Turki al-Subaiy—known for his role in funding Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the mastermind behind the 9/11 attacks, and for bankrolling an al-Qaeda offshoot which plotted to blow up airliners using toothpaste tube bombs—was once again raising money for ISIL. The Qatari authorities had jailed al-Subaiy for terrorist offences in 2008, but freed him after only six months. Furthermore, a new report to be published in November by a US security think tank is understood to have identified 20 Qataris as senior terrorist financiers and facilitators; ten of these Qataris are already designated as terrorists on official US and UN blacklists.

ISIL is believed to receive considerable funds from its operations in eastern Syria, where it has commandeered oilfields and engages in smuggling out raw materials and archaeological artifacts. It generates revenue from producing crude oil from captured oilfields and selling electric power from captured power plants in northern Syria. Some of this electricity is reportedly sold back to the Syrian government. It has also been selling smuggled Syrian oil in Turkey.

Since 2012, ISIL has produced annual reports giving numerical information on its operations, somewhat in the style of corporate reports, seemingly in a bid to encourage potential donors.

Analysis

After significant setbacks for the group during the latter stages of the coalition forces' presence in Iraq, by late 2012 it was thought to have renewed its strength and to have more than doubled the number of its members to about 2,500, and since its formation in April 2013, ISIL grew rapidly in strength and influence in Iraq and Syria. Analysts have underlined the deliberate inflammation of sectarian conflict between Iraqi Shias and Sunnis during the Iraq War by various Sunni and Shia players as the root cause of ISIL's rise. The post-invasion policies of the international coalition forces have also been cited as a factor, with Fanar Haddad, a research fellow at the National University of Singapore's Middle East Institute, blaming the coalition forces during the Iraq War for "enshrining identity politics as the key marker of Iraqi politics".

By 2014, ISIL was increasingly being viewed as a militia rather than as a terrorist group. As major Iraqi cities fell to ISIL in June 2014, Jessica Lewis, a former US army intelligence officer at the Institute for the Study of War, described ISIL as "not a terrorism problem anymore", but rather "an army on the move in Iraq and Syria, and they are taking terrain. They have shadow governments in and around Baghdad, and they have an aspirational goal to govern. I don't know whether they want to control Baghdad, or if they want to destroy the functions of the Iraqi state, but either way the outcome will be disastrous for Iraq." Lewis has called ISIL "an advanced military leadership". She said, "They have incredible command and control and they have a sophisticated reporting mechanism from the field that can relay tactics and directives up and down the line. They are well-financed, and they have big sources of manpower, not just the foreign fighters, but also prisoner escapees."

According to the Institute for the Study of War, ISIL's 2013 annual report reveals a metrics-driven military command, which is "a strong indication of a unified, coherent leadership structure that commands from the top down". Middle East Forum's Aymenn Jawad Al-Tamimi said, "They are highly skilled in urban guerrilla warfare while the new Iraqi Army simply lacks tactical competence." Seasoned observers point to systemic corruption within the Iraq Army, seeing it as little more than a system of patronage, and have attributed to this its spectacular collapse as ISIL and its allies took over large swaths of Iraq in June 2014.

While officials fear that ISIL may either inspire attacks in the United States by sympathizers or by those returning after joining ISIL, US intelligence agencies find there is no immediate threat or specific plots. US Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel sees an "imminent threat to every interest we have", but former top counterterrorism adviser Daniel Benjamin has derided such alarmist talk as a "farce" that panics the public.

Some news commentators—the international newspaper columnist Gwynne Dyer, for example—and samples of public opinion, such as surveys by NPR, have advocated a strong but measured response to ISIL's recent provocative acts.

Conspiracy theories in the Arab world

Conspiracy theorists in the Arab world have advanced rumors that the US is secretly behind the existence and emboldening of ISIL, as part of an attempt to further destabilize the Middle East. After such rumors became widespread, the US embassy in Lebanon issued an official statement denying the allegations, calling them a complete fabrication. Others are convinced that ISIL leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi is an Israeli Mossad agent and actor called Simon Elliot. The rumors claim that NSA documents leaked by Edward Snowden reveal this connection. Snowden's lawyer has called the story "a hoax".

Military and arms

Main article: Military of ISIL

In June 2014, ISIL had at least 4,000 fighters in Iraq, and the CIA estimated in September 2014 that it had 20,000–31,500 fighters in Iraq and Syria.

The most common weapons used against US and other coalition forces during the Iraq insurgency were those taken from Saddam Hussein's weapon stockpiles around the country, these included AKM variant assault rifles, PK machine guns and RPG-7s. ISIL has been able to strengthen its military capability by capturing large quantities and varieties of weaponry during the Syrian Civil War and Post-US Iraqi insurgency. These weapons seizures have improved the group's capacity to carry out successful subsequent operations and obtain more equipment. Weaponry that ISIL has reportedly captured and employed include SA-7 and Stinger surface-to-air missiles, M79 Osa, HJ-8 and AT-4 Spigot anti-tank weapons, Type 59 field guns and M198 howitzers, Humvees, T-54/55, T-72, and M1 Abrams main battle tanks, M1117 armoured cars, truck-mounted DShK guns, ZU-23-2 anti-aircraft guns, BM-21 Grad multiple rocket launchers and at least one Scud missile.

When ISIL captured Mosul Airport in June 2014, it seized a number of UH-60 Blackhawk helicopters and cargo planes that were stationed there. According to Peter Beaumont of The Guardian, it seemed unlikely that ISIL would be able to deploy them. However, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported in October 2014 that former Iraqi pilots were training IS militants to fly captured Syrian jets. Witnesses reported that MiG-21 and MiG-23 jets were flying over al-Jarrah military airport, but the US Central Command said it was not aware of flights by ISIL-operated aircraft in Syria or elsewhere. Two of the jets were destroyed during landing by Syrian Air Force aircraft on October 21. ISIL shot down an Iraqi helicopter in October 2014 and claim to have shot down "several other" helicopters in 2014. Observes fear that they have "advanced surface-to-air missile systems" such as the Chinese-made FN-6, which are thought to have been provided to Syrian rebels by Qatar and/or Saudi Arabia and purchased or captured by ISIL.

ISIL captured nuclear materials from Mosul University in July 2014. In a letter to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Iraq's UN Ambassador Mohamed Ali Alhakim said that the materials had been kept at the university and "can be used in manufacturing weapons of mass destruction". Nuclear experts regarded the threat as insignificant. International Atomic Energy Agency spokeswoman Gill Tudor said that the seized materials were "low grade and would not present a significant safety, security or nuclear proliferation risk".

Support

Turkey

Turkey has been accused of supporting or colluding with ISIL, especially by Syrian Kurds. According to journalist Patrick Cockburn, there is "strong evidence for a degree of collaboration" between the Turkish intelligence services and ISIL, although the "exact nature of the relationship ... remains cloudy". David L. Phillips of Columbia University's Institute for the Study of Human Rights, who compiled a list of allegations and claims accusing Turkey of assisting ISIL, writes that these allegations "range from military cooperation and weapons transfers to logistical support, financial assistance, and the provision of medical services". Several ISIL fighters and commanders have disclosed Turkey's support of ISIL.

Turkey has been further criticized for allowing individuals from outside the region to enter its territory and join ISIL in Syria. With many Islamist fighters passing through Turkey to fight in Syria, Turkey has been accused of becoming a transit country for such fighters and has been labeled the "Gateway to Jihad". Turkish border patrol officers are reported to have deliberately overlooked those entering Syria upon the payment of a small bribe. A report by Sky News exposed documents showing that passports of foreign Islamists wanting to join ISIL by crossing into Syria had been stamped by the Turkish government. An ISIL commander stated that "most of the fighters who joined us in the beginning of the war came via Turkey, and so did our equipment and supplies", adding that ISIL fighters received treatment in Turkish hospitals.

Foreign fighters

See also: Foreign involvement in the Syrian Civil War

There are many foreign fighters in ISIL's ranks. In June 2014, The Economist reported that "ISIS may have up to 6,000 fighters in Iraq and 3,000–5,000 in Syria, including perhaps 3,000 foreigners; nearly a thousand are reported to hail from Chechnya and perhaps 500 or so more from France, Britain and elsewhere in Europe". Chechen leader Abu Omar al-Shishani, for example, was made commander of the northern sector of ISIL in Syria in 2013. According to The New York Times, in September 2014 there were more than 2,000 Europeans and 100 Americans among ISIL's foreign fighters. 2,400-3,000 Tunisians had joined ISIL as at October 2014. As of mid-September 2014, around 1,000 Turks have joined ISIS. An ISIL deserter alleged that foreign recruits were treated with less respect than Arabic-speaking Muslims by ISIL commanders and were placed in suicide units if they lacked otherwise useful skills.

Allies

• Abu Sayyaf (Philippines, Malaysia)
• Iraqi Ba'ath Party (former ruling party of Iraq)

• Boko Haram (Nigeria and surrounding countries)
• Bangsamoro Islamic Freedom Fighters (Philippines)
• Jemaah Islamiyah (Southeast Asia)
• Ansar al-Sharia (Libya)
• Ansar al-Sharia (Tunisia)
• Mujahideen Shura Council in the Environs of Jerusalem (Gaza Strip)
• Ansar Bait al-Maqdis (Egypt)

• Jund al-Khilafah (Algeria)
• Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan

Opposition

Opposition within Iraq, Lebanon and Syria

Iraq-based opponents

Iraqi Armed Forces

• Iraqi Army
• Iraqi Air Force
• Special Forces
• Iraqi Police

Iraqi Kurdistan

•   Peshmerga

Special Groups

Iraqi Turkmen Front

Lebanon-based opponents

Lebanese Armed Forces

• Lebanese Army
•   Internal Security Forces

Hezbollah

Syria-based opponents

Syrian Armed Forces

• Syrian Army
• Syrian Air Force
• National Defence Force
• Ba'ath Brigades

Syrian Opposition

• Free Syrian Army
• Syria Revolutionaries Front
• Islamic Front
• Army of Mujahedeen

Syrian Kurdistan

• People's Protection Units
• Syriac Military Council
• Sutoro
• Local guerrillas

Multinational coalition opposition

Military operations in or over Iraq and/or Syria (US-led)

NATO members:

• United States
• Belgium
• Canada
• Denmark
• France
• Germany
• Italy
• Netherlands
• Spain
• Turkey (limited/pending)
• United Kingdom

CCASG members:

• Bahrain
• Jordan (pending GCC member)
• Qatar
• Saudi Arabia
• UAE

Other:

• Australia
• Singapore (announced)

Supplying military equipment to opposition forces within Iraq, Syria or Lebanon (in cooperation with EU and/or NATO and partners)

• Albania
• Bosnia and Herzegovina
• Bulgaria
• Croatia
• Cyprus
• Czech Republic
• Estonia
• Finland
• Greece
• Hungary
• Poland

Other state opponents

Iran

Russia (arms supplier to Iraq)

Other non-state opponents

The Arab League issued a statement on ISIL in September 2014. Al-Qaeda is the parent organization of ISIL, but they separated in 2014. The leader of al-Nusra Front, Abu Mohammad al-Julani, has been critical of ISIL. Ansar al-Islam announced in a statement released on 18 September 2013 that ISIL had forced Ansar al-Islam to "respond to their aggression". The Kurdistan Workers Party has aided and fighters from the Kurdistan Democratic Party of Iran have fought against ISIL.

Note: The opponents list is restricted to: (a) States and non-State actors with military operations past, present or pending against ISIL in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon; (b) States directly supplying weapons to ground forces fighting ISIL; (c) transnational organizations coordinating or supporting such States.

Timeline (latest events)

Main article: Timeline of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant events

See also: Islamic State of Iraq § Timeline, Syrian Civil War § Course of events and Terrorist incidents in Iraq in 2014

An excerpt of recent events in the timeline is shown below:

• 26 October: during the Siege of Kobani, ISIL failed for the fourth time to capture the border gate with Turkey in the northern al-Jomrok neighborhood. The Iraqi army retook four villages in the Himreen mountains. Two bombs killed five people and wounded 15 in Baghdad.
• 27 October: ISIL car bombings killed 27 Iraqi soldiers and Shia militamen and wounded 60 in Jurf al-Sakhar, and killed 15 civilians and wounded 23 in Baghdad. The U.S. Air Force launched 11 more air strikes in Iraq and Syria. The Lebanese Army took the last positions held by ISIL militants in Tripoli, after 11 Lebanese soldiers, eight civilians and 22 militants were killed in three days of battle; 162 militants were captured. ISIL released another video with British hostage John Cantlie, in which he claimed that the city of Kobani was mostly under ISIL control, with only a few pockets of Kurdish resistance remaining. He also claimed that the Battle of Kobani was "largely over", and that ISIL forces were mostly mopping up in the city. The captions in the video, displaying the Turkish flags at the border, claimed that it was filmed by one of the four ISIL drones. However, the video has been deemed to be ISIL propaganda, especially since analysts claim that it was filmed about a week earlier. Additionally, 200 Iraqi Kurdish forces will soon arrive in Kobani as reinforcements, via the Syrian-Turkish border.
• 29 October: Australian ISIL leader and recruiter Mohammad Ali Baryalei was confirmed to have been killed. Fifty Free Syrian Army and 150 Kurdish Peshmerga reinforcements reached Kobani. The US launched 14 air strikes in Iraq and Syria between 28 and 29 October. Two-hundred and twenty members of the Albu Nimr tribe were executed by ISIL, 70 in Hit and 150 in Ramadi. ISIL forces captured three gas wells east of Palmyra in Homs province, and killed 30 Syrian Army soldiers in an attack on the Shaer gas field. A suicide bomber killed five policemen and wounded 18 civilians in Youssifiyah near Baghdad. ISIL released the last 25 of a group of 150 Kurdish children previously kidnapped from Kobani. The Iraqi Army retook six villages near Baiji.
• 30 October: ISIL captured the Shaer gas field near Homs, Syria. Norway announced that it would send 120 soldiers to Iraq to help train the Iraqi Army to fight ISIL.
• 31 October: The UN stated that overall 15,000 foreign fighters had joined ISIL in Iraq and Syria. While battle raged in Baiji between ISIL and the Iraqi Army and Shia militia, bombings killed 15 people and wounded 34 in and near Baghdad. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was proclaimed caliph of the "Islamic Caliphate of Derna" established by jihadists in Derna, Libya.
• The UN reported that at least 1,273 Iraqis—856 civilians and 417 members of the security forces—were killed "by violence" during October (379 civilians in Baghdad alone) and that 2,010 were wounded, not counting the casualties in Anbar province and other ISIL-held areas.

November 2014

• 1 November: ISIL executed 50–67 more displaced members of the Albu Nimr tribe, in the village of Ras al-Maa. Thirty-five bodies of members of the same tribe were found in another mass grave. News spread that ISIL had started rounding up and killing former police and army officer in areas under its control (especially Mosul), in order to prevent possible uprisings. Among those killed were colonels Mohammed Hassan and Issa Osman. Suicide bombers and car bombings killed at least 24 people and wounded dozens in Baghdad area. 10 U.S. air strikes were launched in Syria and Iraq.
• 2 November: 50–75 more members of the Albu Nimr tribe were executed by ISIL in Ras al-Maa and Haditha and 17 kidnapped. Overall, 322 members of the Albu Nimr tribe had been killed by 2 November. Car bombings killed 44 Shiite pilgrims and wounded 75 in Baghdad.
• 3 November: ISIL claimed to have captured the Jahar gas field in the Homs province, Syria. 234 Yazidis kidnapped in August were released after ransoms had been paid. Canadian planes launched their first air strikes against ISIL near Fallujah. U.S. planes launched 14 airstrikes between November 2 and 3. In addition, ISIL executed 36 more members of the Albu Nimr tribe in Ras al-Maa.
• 4 November: 93 Syrian Kurds kidnapped in February were released by ISIL.
• 5 November: a leader of the Albu Nimr tribe stated that 540 members of the tribe had been killed by ISIL. 14 U.S. airstrikes were launched between 3 and 5 November in Iraq and Syria. Syrian Army and militia recaptured from ISIL the Jhar and Mahr gas fields near Homs.
• 7 November: car bombings in Baiji, which had been partly reconquered by Iraqi Army, killed 8 Iraqi servicemen and policemen, including general Faisal Malek, and wounded 15. U.S. decided to send 1,500 more troops to Iraq.
• 8 November: a U.S. air strike killed 50 ISIL militants near Mosul; rumors spread that Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi may have been killed or seriously wounded in the attack. 27 ISIL fighters were poisoned by Syrian rebels infiltrating as cooks in the Fath El-Shahel camp; however, 12 of them were killed. Six car bombings killed 40 people and wounded 90 in Baghdad and Ramadi.
• 9 November: The Syrian Air Force bombed the ISIL-held town of al-Bab in the Aleppo province, killing 21 and wounding over 100.
• 10 November: 70 more members of the Albu Nimr tribe were executed by ISIL near Hit. Ansar Beit al-Maqdis, the main Egyptian terrorist group operating in Sinai, pledged allegiance to ISIL. RAF drones launched first airstrikes in Iraq.
• 11 November: a car bombing killed 8 people and wounded 13 in Baiji, which had been largely recaptured by Iraqi Army; more car bombings killed 9 people and wounded 24 in and near Baghdad.

See also

• 2014 American rescue mission in Syria
• 2014 Australian terror raids
• 2014 ISIL beheading incidents
• 2014 Iranian-led intervention in Iraq
• 2014 military intervention against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
• American-led intervention in Syria
• Siege of Kobanî
• The Beatles, nickname for an ISIL terrorist cell that has beheaded a number of foreign hostages
• Islamist insurgency in Iran
• Iraqi insurgency (2011–present)
• List of armed groups in the Syrian Civil War
• List of wars and battles involving the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
• Management of Savagery, a book aimed to provide a strategy for al-Qaeda and other jihadists
• Northern Iraq offensive (June 2014)
• Northern Iraq offensive (August 2014)
• Oil wars
• Spillover of the Syrian Civil War
• Takfiri, a Muslim who accuses another Muslim of apostasy
• Timeline of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant events
• Turkish involvement in the 2014 military intervention against ISIL
• United Kingdom and ISIL

Bibliography

• Fishman, Brian (2008). "Using the Mistakes of al Qaeda's Franchises to Undermine Its Strategies". Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 618: 46–54. JSTOR 40375774. 
• Kahl, Colin H. (2008). "When to Leave Iraq: Walk Before Running". Foreign Affairs 87 (4): 151–154. JSTOR 20032727. 
• Phillips, Andrew (2009). "How al Qaeda lost Iraq". Australian Journal of International Affairs 63 (1): 64–84. doi:10.1080/10357710802649840. 
• Simon, Steven (2008). "The Price of the Surge: How U.S. Strategy Is Hastening Iraq's Demise". Foreign Affairs 87 (3): 57–72, 74–76. JSTOR 20032651. 

External links

• Iraq updates – Institute for the Study of War
• The New War in Iraq ISIL Overview – Midwest Diplomacy (September 2013)
• "This Is the Promise of Allah" – Declaration of the Islamic State (29 June 2014)
• Report on ISIS Governance in Syria – Institute for the Study of War
• Islamic State – Full-length documentary by VICE News (August 2014)
• The future of the radical groups
• From Chechnya To Syria – News & Analysis of Russian-speaking Foreign Fighters In Syria