Islamic State

September 14, 2015
In 2014, when ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi announced establishment of the Caliphate, the news went viral, writes Palestinian journalist Atwan (After bin Laden) in this deeply researched, relentlessly discouraging account of the latest terrorist bogeyman. Al-Baghdadi, an Iraqi, helped found one of the militant groups that sprang up in Iraq following America's 2003 invasion. By 2010 he was chosen by the Shura Council to lead the pugnacious Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), and he expanded into Syria, allying with other insurgentsâmany supported by Western nationsâwho were fighting Bashar al-Assad. In 2013 Baghdadi merged the groups to form ISIS. Atwan provides a thorough overview of the group's structure, philosophy, and recruitment methodsâparticularly its digital media savvy. The sheer awfulness of ISIS left the group shorn of any support its previous incarnations might have enjoyed; Western and regional powers, including Iran, oppose ISIS with money and arms. However, the woeful Iraqi army is the only one confronting ISIS on the ground. The result has been steady military success, with ISIS now controlling large areas of Iraq and Syria. Few readers of this painful, lucid account will quarrel with Atwan's assertions that Western ignorance, hypocrisy, and self-interest contributed to the rise of ISIS, and that there is little sign of Western leaders growing any wiser.