UKC

I thought I would start a thread where UKCers could post links to things that they found particularly helpful in understanding ISIS, whether serious or satirical.

To get the ball rolling, these things are excellent

Alastair Crooke
- 'You Can't Understand ISIS If You Don't Know the History of Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia' http://tinyurl.com/isissaudi
- 'Middle East Time Bomb: The Real Aim of ISIS Is to Replace the Saud Family as the New Emirs of Arabia' http://tinyurl.com/metimebomb

Robert Evans '7 Things I Learned Reading Every Issue Of ISIS's Magazine' http://tinyurl.com/isismag7

In reply to ericinbristol:

http://m.imgur.com/gallery/o32cLtz

In reply to ericinbristol:

This is quite useful :

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Why-I-Am-Not-Muslim/dp/1591020115

An anonymous or rather pseudonymous author, for obvious reasons.

For such inflamatory material, the writing is actually quite turgid and rather laboured - he clearly needed a good editor. But the basic points are sound, such as :

1) Mohamed, or someone very like him, almost certainly DID exist, i.e. we are talking about a real historical figure - a brutal, rapacious but very successful warlord in fact
2) Although quite clever and personally charming when he wanted to be, he was not in any normal sense an intellectual or scholar, probably illiterate, with very little in -depth understanding of any theology
3) Much of the Koran is highly derivative, i.e. it is pinched from a variety of sources, predominantly the Hebrew bible but also Babylonian creation stories, Zoroastrianism etc. But the borrowings frequently misunderstand or or are inaccurate versions of the originals
4) He was probably personally sincere in his view that he was receiving divine revelations, various diseases have been postulated as the cause of these delusions
5) Despite his general sincerity about his voices, he could also twist them to attack his personal enemies or for his own very material or rampant sexual desires
6) He had little understanding of ancient philosophical dilemmas, such as the clash between free will and fixed fate

The last is quite important, as it is the basis of everything being the will of Allah, including whether anyone accepts the "revelation" of Islamic truth or not. So "Allah" could reveal himself to everyone if he wanted, but chooses only to do so to his selected ones. Those who he does not do so, he tortures (described in very graphic, physical terms), in hell for eternity, though of course it is in no way their fault, since Allah choose not to reveal the truth to them. So the non-believing human beings are basically automata, being punished in vile ways, forever, for something that they had no agency about whatever, basically a whim of Allah.

If Mohamed had been more of a religious scholar, he would have been aware of the ancient philosophical problem of free will conflicting with divine intention and justice. But he wasn't, so his universe is a crude, mafia-boss style rule - do what I say, utterly uncritically, and you will get (very material and specific rewards in paradise, girls, wine, water, etc). Don't do what you are told and you will be tortured (again in a very specific physical form), forever. But actually you have no choice or agency in how you behave anyway.

In Bernard Shaw's play Major Barbara (a major in the Salvation Army), Barbara famously says :

"Let God's work be done for its own sake, I have got rid of the bribe of heaven".

There is no such concept in Islam, indeed, it is unthinkable in it.

In reply to ericinbristol:

Climate change driving the recent Middle East drought:

http://www.pnas.org/content/112/11/3241.abstract

and its role in triggering civil war in Syria:

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2013/12/understanding-syri...

CB

For those who have a long url and want to shorten it, go to http://tinyurl.com/ then paste the long url into the box and create a custom url if you want

In reply to ericinbristol:

There's no need to read somebody else's analysis of the magazine: it's freely available online; so see, and read, for yourself.

In reply to ericinbristol:

A peek into ISIS foot soldiers http://awdnews.com/top-news/what-i-discovered-from-interviewing-imprisoned-...

In reply to Mr Lopez:

Ah yes, I read that - very good

In reply to Rob Parsons:
Analysis is also valuable.

Also, I think that these days one needs to consider very carefully whether or not to access such things directly. In all probability traffic to ISIS publications will be closely monitored.

In reply to ericinbristol:

Wikipedia has some info on the original song from which they took their name.

http://tinyurl.com/o78cy8t

In reply to ericinbristol:

Yes, sure. And the person in this case makes reasonable points. Pity he thinks he has to do it all in a rock'n'roll style, mind, e.g. '... we don't really understand who and what the f*ck they are ...' etc. etc.

What's added to the analysis by the 'the f*ck'?

You subsequently added:


If you think in those terms, then, really, 'the terrorists have won' - to trot out that cliche.

In reply to Rob Parsons:

The swearing didn't help the analysis of course.

In reply to Rob Parsons:

Actually found that article quite informative. I don't think i could stomach trawling through the actual magazines...

In reply to Rob Parsons:

I don't follow your logic here. ISIS would like people to read their propaganda. The security services generally monitor those who do access such things. A student at Nottingham University downloaded an Al Qaeda document (publicly available on the internet - from a US government website!). He was arrested and held for seven days, subsequently harassed by the police and in the end the police paid up £20k. See http://tinyurl.com/sabirthe

So there is a real risk - from the security services not ISIS - to anyone accessing these things.

In reply to ericinbristol:


In the context of 'wanting to understand your enemy' - i.e. in exactly the context in which you started this thread - *I* want to read their propaganda.

I realise that the security services will be monitoring activity, but they're probably not as stupid as you might be implying: they more-or-less know who is, and who isn't, worth targetting. In any case: I'll take the risk, but I have no problem if others see the risk differently.


Sounds like the police screwed up in that particular case, and have presumably learned their lesson. If not, I'll be £20K up on the deal - so the drinks are on me when I get out.

In reply to ericinbristol:
There is also a struggle between Al Queda and Daesh (ISIS)

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/isis-vs-al-qaeda-jihadism%E2%80%99s-glo...

If the UN does succeed in crushing Daesh, that still leaves Al Queda to deal with.....

In reply to Rob Parsons:

What I mean is that I didn't get the logic of how this will be the terrorists having won.

You say that the security services are probably not as stupid as I was implying but the example I gave shows exactly that they are capable of being that stupid. So I was suggesting that those considering accessing the material need to be aware of the risk of this happening to them. Whether or not someone wants to take that risk is a different matter - it's a personal call either way.

In reply to Trangia:

Thanks, good piece, I hadn't seen that.

In reply to ericinbristol:


I just meant that, if we've been so collectively panicked by the current situation that we're afraid to even read relevant material for fear of a knock on the door, then we've already lost an important part of the Western, liberal, secular values which we are trying to defend.

In reply to ericinbristol:

I don't think he was "subsequently harassed by the police" - other than by the fact it was recorded that he had been arrested for a terrorist related offence.
It appears in this case there was a cock-up, however the two clear "get-outs" he appeared to have were the subject of his studies (terror-related) and the source of his download (us govt. website)

In reply to Rob Parsons:

Ah right, got you and I agree. It is a very bad situation that this is even a consideration and is a victory for authoritarianism.

In reply to off-duty:
That requires you to disbelieve his claim that he was subject to numerous stop and searches subsequently.

And e.g. 'Documents from the professional standards unit of West Midlands police reveal that officers fabricated key elements of the case against former University of Nottingham student, Rizwaan Sabir.' http://www.theguardian.com/uk/2012/jul/14/police-evidence-muslim-student-ri...
so not just a cock up

In reply to ericinbristol:


I'm not entirely certain who to believe, given that unfounded stop searches are a compensation "banker" for claims against the police.
This is what the cops said :

“The matter was settled without admission of liability save that the force admitted that one brief search of Mr Sabir and his vehicle carried out in February 2010 was the result of a mistaken belief on the part of the officers involved. This was admitted in November 2010 and the Force apologises for this search.




The sequence of events isn't clear, but obviously "someone" has informed the cops about the download. Then, at some point, either pre or post arrest they have had a meeting with his supervisor to discuss his studies and his possession of the document. That is where it is claimed that the account of the meeting is fabricated. Given any case would require an actual statement from his supervisor - and that statement would be " key evidence" , notes from a meeting would be intelligence, if anything, the headline claim of the article seems a bit inflammatory.
All very odd.

In reply to off-duty:

There is more than one possible given here, including the given that unfounded stop searches have been a major problem (unless you are actually denying that?) so it is already clear from the given you have chosen who you are inclined to believe. Also the implication that Rizwaan Sabir was in it for the money, that's a pretty rough call considering the circumstances

EDIT: off-duty: I am in danger of hijacking my own thread, which was about useful things to read about ISIS, so feel free to post what you want and I won't respond if that's okay.

In reply to ericinbristol:

Just to make it clear, I haven't decided who I believe. I am just offering a more sceptical take on news reports, hopefully with a bit of insight into police procedure.
It could equally be argued that you have made up your mind as to exactly what has occurred.

I don't intend to imply that he was just in it for the money - just that stop searches are among the most heavily scrutinized and recorded processes in the cops. "Numerous" unlawful/unfair stop searches would be easy to demonstrate, hence "banker" for any claim against police.

I think some of the terrorism legislation relating to possession of publications may be of dubious value - I'd like to think it isn't misused, it is good to hear of examples like this where it might have been.

In reply to Simon4:

I've struggled to read the Koran in the past, without any success. It's about the biggest pile of gobbledegook I've ever encountered, and what is vaguely coherent is often contradictory. I then bought a book in the Oxford series - A Very Short Introduction: The Koran, by Michael Cook. And that didn't help much. It was almost as if this scholar was himself having trouble making much sense of it.

In reply to Gordon Stainforth:
There are some very curious features in the Koran, not least that it is arranged in order of chapter lengths, for no very clear reason. It also contains (in the original Arabic), various grammatical, spelling and continuity errors, as well as obvious contradictions. It does of course depend WHICH Koran you are referring to, originally there were several but most of them were suppressed in the early Caliphate.

Partly the contradictions are due to the Mecca verses and the Medina verses. In Mecca, Mohamed was not all-powerful and still had to be relatively conciliatory, so the verses are fairly benign and un-aggressive. His power grew on the move to Medina and his vengeful and totalitarian self took over, as did his apparent personal greed for women and possessions.

There is a bizarre explanation for some of the apparent contradictions, the doctrine of Abrogation. This says that some verses replace other verses, as being better "I have never taken away anything that I have given you, without giving you something better to replace it". This is of course absurd in the context of a book that supposedly represents the perfect, invariant, word of God, an exact replica of a golden copy kept in the 7th heaven (having 7 levels of heaven, to match the 7 levels of hell, was taken from the Babylonian religious beliefs). How can an eternal, all-knowing, all-seeing God have errors that need replacing? The perfect, eternal, immutable word of God - Version 2???

This is made a lot worse by the fact that it is almost entirely the relatively peaceful, conciliatory, verses that are abrogated by the violent warlike ones.

Of course all religions have similar logical absurdities, but as in so many other things, Islam is by far the worst of the major world faiths. As I mentioned above, although they all have considerable problems with addressing the question of free will and divine agency, none of them are so tilted toward predestination and fixed fate as much as Islam, to the point where there is no real free will at all. Which raises the obvious question, why the bitterness and violence toward "the enemies of God"? They have no choice about being enemies of God, nor should God need any human aid.

In reply to Gordon Stainforth:
A discussion of abrogation :

http://www.meforum.org/1754/peace-or-jihad-abrogation-in-islam

As I say, it is fundamentally nonsensical, a Jesuitical trick, playing with words and timelines to justify straightforward contradictions in what is proclaimed to be in an infallible, divinely authored, book. The bible of course contains contradictions but it is never claimed to be the infallible word of God, but is rather acknowledged, even by believers, as a selection and compilation. So as usual, while Christianity and Judaism are not free from the problem, they are far less exposed to it than Islam.

Similarly while the bible, particularly the Pentateuch, contains accounts of massacres, these are reports of historical events (albeit very nasty ones), not general instructions for all time. So if you are an Amalekite or whatever, this is not good news, but the bible does NOT instruct Jews to go out and slaughter Glaswegians. The Koran certainly DOES instruct the murder or forced conversion of "pagans" or "apostates", now and forever.

Incidentally, some of the scholars quoted in this piece clearly show the transition of Mohamed from just being a messenger (i.e. no more than a seventh century telex machine), to a semi-divine authority in himself, referring to "Mohamed's instructions". But supposedly he was doing no more than relaying God's instructions, and could not have any of his own.

This more or less deification of Mohamed renders Islam as a supposedly monotheistic religion nonsense, assuming (for what possible reason? There is no more evidence for one than the other), that you accept the initially peculiar premise that monotheism is inherently better than polytheism. To most people in the West, in the 21st century, they are both equally ridiculous.

In reply to ericinbristol:


Sounds like a good get rich quick scheme

In reply to Simon4:


Thanks for your long and interesting posts. I'm in a social situation at the moment so can't reply at any length. Just a little comment on a relatively minor point you made, above. I think most secular people in the West now would regard polytheism as rather more rational than monotheism. In that a) the notion of gods that pagan peoples had were rather different from our more modern notion: it was then much more a matter of mysterious forces to be appeased. b) They were separate, often conflicting forces. At worst they had icons, but they were really images of forces that lay beyond the icons ... not unlike physical forces. Joseph Campbell, one of the greatest writers on world mythology, was very good on this.

In reply to ericinbristol:
It's not about religion in the end is about power, the power to control.
The West, mostly usa has power and tries to control the rest of the world for its own stability, other nations understandably disagree
It's not hard to understand why radical groups arise, it will happen in any state of oppression
A person imprisoned will rattle their chains and force their bars to escape whether they are innocent or not its just human nature

In reply to Philip:

I clicked that partly in the hope that I would be RickRolled!

In reply to ericinbristol:

I found this one interesting
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/...

In reply to Dan Arkle:

This is superb - a definite must-read. Also the short video accompanying it is very interesting: it seems that, to the extent that ISIS supporters have commented on this report, they more or less accept it as accurate. A crucial thing it demonstrates is that ISIS has a clear ideology that fuels it (completely consistent with the Crooke and Evans pieces). This is a long-standing strand in Islam that long precedes the existence of ISIS. I think there is good reason to also think that cycles of violence and oppression also fuel it, including Western bombing and occupation - both are necessary parts of the story in explaining why it has so much support.

In reply to Pesda potato:

Control and oppression are part of the picture. But it is clear from the evidence that religion is an indispensable, central part of understanding ISIS and explaining what it does. Its long historical roots that indicate that ISIS or more likely some variant of it has ebbed and flowed over generations - and that a lot will need to change for this variant of Islam to peter out.

Another really good piece in The Atlantic magazine on how ISIS territory has changed since the US bombing offensive launched in September 2014, including 6,700 air strikes across Iraq and Syria:

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/09/isis-territory-map...

Some movement but in essence a stalemate.

In reply to Gordon Stainforth:

Well the evidence for multiple Gods is exactly the same as the evidence for one, all-powerful, all-knowing God, i.e. none at all. Cue the famous Dawkins retort to those who accuse him of not believing in God "I just believe in one less God than you do".


Indeed, and those Gods were couched in rather human (or rather super-human), terms, as against the all-powerful, detached God of the monotheists, who cannot be drawn and in the case of the Hebrew God, must not even be named. They are considerably more sympathetic than Allah or Jehovah, also they seem themselves to be subject to some sort of external moral law. For the monotheists, something is just good or bad because God says it is, or his messengers and "prophets" have revealed to them (i.e. make entirely unverified claims about what God said to them), there is no external morality at all. So if God says raping captured women from your religious opponents and murdering all men above the age of puberty is good, it is, no discussion or personal choice allowed.

"Appeased" is an appropriate word for a whole series of reasons, but certainly reflects the situation of 7th century tribal desert dwellers - at the mercy of all sorts of forces of nature, normally malign, that they could not understand and certainly could not control or anticipate, but could be rapidly lethal to their entire tribes. They needed an explanation, and needed one fast, any explanation, no matter how bad its evidence base was better than none. Hence they came up with very bad explanations of the world like Islam and having once fervently proclaimed it, found themselves unable to ever relinquish it, despite the arrival of much better, more reliable, evidence-based and realistically tested, explanations of phenomena.

If you look at some of the more absurd elements of the mythology, such as the supposed midnight journey of Mohamed to heaven on a winged horse with a human face (again lifted, with distortions, from the Babylonian myths), you can clearly understand why the modern day adherents of this religion are inclined to murder people with AK 47s and blow up airliners. If it wasn't for the thought that someone might murder or threaten you, no-one would give this nonsense a seconds consideration, you would just laugh at it. So the only way to get it taken seriously or treated with a totally unmerited "respect" is to get all killy and to display an aggressive, expansionist victimhood.

In reply to ericinbristol:

The article on the Saud element of the Middle East is pretty interesting and does indicate that it is not just a Syrian issue of instability. I would argue that the Saud history of generous or "benevolent Dictatorship" {don't think western atall!] still holds a lot sway in Saudi Arabia though it is years since I was there and saw the profound loyalty the monarchy commanded from the general populace. However, if one does see Isis as essentially a power play rather than a religious movement it's strenghth does lie in undermining Saudi Arabia eventually. However we have now UN unity of purpose. We just need to ascertain and more importanlty REQUIRE the middle eastern counries that are relatively stable to have unity of purpose also in containing the Isis phenomemnon. The domino effect has always been the worst case sceneario for the middle east , eastern Europe and wider Europe.

Also very good: Graeme Wood on the response - from Western thinktanks to ISIS people - on his article I posted about above on what ISIS believes and its ideological roots:

http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/02/what-isis-really-w...

More useful summary here:
http://www.vox.com/2015/11/23/9779188/isis-syria-iraq-9-questions

In reply to Kean:

I liked that a lot. The 5 minute video of who is fighting who is relatively easy to follow.

It's easy to lose focus on the Iraqi side of the equation. A couple of good pieces:

http://www.reuters.com/investigates/special-report/iraq-abadi/

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2015/08/10/iraq-prime-minister-haider-a...

In reply to ericinbristol:

+1, good summary!
CB

In reply to ericinbristol:

Thought this was very good. Even-handed, not as self-assured in "knowing" all the answers as many articles are, but providing a very solid account of ISIS' potential trajectory. Seems to very strongly make the case against a massive military response in favour of containment.

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/...

In a followup article I thought the following quote summed up the position we are in quite well:

"[...]we might be in a situation analogous to seeing someone writhing around on the ground in front of us, showing every symptom of having appendicitis. But instead of being surgeons, armed with sterile scalpels, we are just laymen who once read a first aid manual and have no tools other than a rusty soup can. There’s no good option, even though we recognize the problem. The overwhelming probability is that the patient will die a terrible death, and we will have to watch."

In reply to David Martin:


I don't see why... a massive military response will render their prophesies b*llocks.

In reply to David Martin:

Yes, a good piece, as is the follow up - both mentioned up-thread

In reply to Mike Stretford:

A provided a link to a really good piece in The Atlantic magazine on how ISIS territory has changed since the US bombing offensive launched in September 2014, including 6,700 air strikes across Iraq and Syria:
http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2015/09/isis-territory-map...
Some movement but in essence a stalemate.

So the questions are just how massive it would need to be and who would do the fighting on the ground and what the casualties would be. If I recall correctly earlier estimates of 30,000 ISIS fighters have been revised upwards to something like 100,000. It is not looking at all feasible.

In reply to Mike Stretford:


If this article is anything to go by, it would do the opposite. The prophesies are that they themselves get annihilated and to be decimated on the battlefield gives ISIS Koranic credibility. So its unlikely to wipe out the ideology and if anything plays to the argument that Muslims in general are under attack. If just 1% of the worlds Muslims take offence, that's an army of 16 million we now have to deal with. Better to contain and allow internal collapse to discredit.

In reply to David Martin:

That's after they defeat the 'armies of Rome' at Dabiq.

'The Islamic State has attached great importance to the Syrian city of Dabiq, near Aleppo. It named its propaganda magazine after the town, and celebrated madly when (at great cost) it conquered Dabiq£s strategically unimportant plains. It is here, the Prophet reportedly said, that the armies of Rome will set up their camp. The armies of Islam will meet them, and Dabiq will be Rome£s Waterloo or its Antietam.'

If that doesn't happen, not the right time.

In reply to ericinbristol:




That's a bit dated, Kurds have taken more territory and demonstrated ISIS are quite vulnerable. If developed nations decided to miltary overwhelm ISIS they would. I'm not saying they should, but it is entirely feasible if that's what they wanted to do.

In reply to Mr Lopez:
As a supplement to this, here's more Scott Atran in popular format:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scott-atran/violent-extremism-social-science_...

In reply to Kean:

That is indeed a good summary of a very complex and desperate situation, but with one significant error/piece of deception, in an otherwise realistic and honest piece. Certainly there is plenty of blame to share around, and most actors are due some of it, though some definitely more than others. Turkey is MUCH more culpable than described there.

The conspicuous error is in answer to 6, with the sub-question "does Islam promote violence?". The answer, as ISIS quite theologically correctly point out, is unambiguously "Yes". It was created by the sword and spread massively across North Africa, the Middle East and Southern Europe primarily by the sword and gloried in the fact. All religions are indeed as the author says, complex and have multiple strands. But in no other major world religion is violence and aggressive expansion with extensive forced conversion so prevalent and fundamental as in Islam.

It is fundamentally intolerant and deeply hostile to co-existence with other creeds or political systems, being totally supremacist.

In reply to Mike Stretford:

The US tried to defeat many of the self-same people (even their leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi was in US detention) and lost. They made major headway with the Sunni Arab split into AQI (Islamic State in Iraq) against the Awakening Movement that allied with the US, but there is now no meaningful prospect of such a return. So of course in abstract terms Western countries could annihilate everyone in the area or have a massive ground offensive with severe casualties including their own side. But in the real world that's not on.

In reply to ericinbristol:

They didn't lose militarily, as you say they had then in detention.


Many of the Kurdish forces are not professional soldiers but have made substantial gains againstISIS. A ground offensive against ISIS by developed countries would be successful, they are particularly vulnerable to this as they try to act like a state and conventional army.

I'm not saying this should happen, but the argument that ISIS should not be confronted because of the military difficulties doesn't hold water.

In reply to Kean:


There is one glaring oversimplification in there. The articles states:

"But to understand how all this happened, it helps to tell the story from the beginning."
Perhaps the place to begin this story is a quarter-century before ISIS formed, with the Soviet Union's 1979 invasion of Afghanistan, where Moscow sought to prop up the pro-Soviet regime that was under attack from rebels."

A 'quarter-century' ago isn't the beginning and doesn't really add much context to understanding where ISIS came from. This article does:

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/isis-in-a-borderless-wo...

In reply to ericinbristol:
Charles Lister is a readable expert in this area.

https://www.forewordreviews.com/ftw/issue/4416942

In reply to Mike Stretford:

The 'not losing militarily' line is a standard irrelevance - the Soviets didn't lose on the battlefield in the Afghanistan but they lost the war, the US didn't lose on the battlefield in Vietnam but they lost the war, etc. Insurgents aim for political victory not battlefield victory

As for the insurgents being in detention, you have that utterly wrong. They had a small minority in detention, and by having overwhelmingly innocent people in detention (by the US's own figures about 80-90% if I recall correctly), they recruited many times more for the insurgency. In the case of al-Baghdadi, again if I recall correctly he did not escape even though he could because he was (very effectively) recruiting detainees.


Only limited gains that would not reach anywhere into the heart of ISIS territory.


There is no reason to think this: the US tried and failed as recently as 2008 against precisely these people and there is zero prospect of them or any other developed country trying again.

> they are particularly vulnerable to this as they try to act like a state and conventional army.

They operate in a more complex way, and again they have been around for much longer and were not defeated in 2008.


It does - see above

In reply to off-duty:

Thanks, I will have a read. Lots of his stuff here http://www.brookings.edu/experts/listerc

In reply to ericinbristol:

Anybody who wants to understand a bunch of Islamo-Fascists hellbent on global domination ought to read 'Das Kapital'.

Isis is a business operation.

In reply to ericinbristol:
I think a reasonable place to try & get a basic understanding of there primary objectives , albeit from a western perspective could be .

http://www.understandingwar.org/

I would be tempted to go back a few years & offer up the Haqqani Network for some interesting & I think related reading .

http://www.counterextremism.com/sites/default/files/threat_pdf/report--extr...

I must add that I do not necessarily buy into all of the above information but do think it offers some interesting reading none the less .