Alan Castle

Isis / Isil Terror Alan Castle

The Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), or the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS or DAISH/DAESH in Arabic), is a militant group that has called itself the Islamic State. A terrorist group, as designated by Security Council under Resolution 2170, it has become synonymous with extreme violence directed against civilians and captured fighters. The Islamic State, known as ISIS, exploded into the public eye in 2014 with startling speed and shocking brutality. It has captured the imagination of the global jihadist movement, attracting recruits in unprecedented numbers and wreaking bloody destruction with a sadistic glee that has alienated even the hardcore terrorists of its parent organization, al Qaeda. Now let's make two things clear: ISIL is not "Islamic." No religion condones the killing of innocents. And the vast majority of ISIL's victims have been Muslim. And ISIL is certainly not a state. It was formerly al Qaeda's affiliate in Iraq, and has taken advantage of sectarian strife and Syria's civil war to gain territory on both sides of the Iraq-Syrian border. You can't understand ISIS if you don't know the history of Wahhabism in Saudi Arabia.... For their guiding principles, the leaders of the Islamic State...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.