Islamic State: How does it work - and how does in indoctrinate
the civilized
into its own brand of barbarity?
Columnist Georges Malbrunot
offers details.
Laying Bare the Workings of the Islamic State (Le
Figaro, France)
"Several
prisoners have told of having been sodomized shortly after their arrival. … Through humiliations like these, Daesh
seeks to regress these fighters to the condition of animals to prepare them for
committing the worst atrocities. And as these sessions have been filmed, the
man thus abused will be disowned by his family, if ever he leaves the ranks of the
Islamic State. … A committee, headed by Abdallah
Ahmad al-Meshedani, conducts a screening of foreigners
who arrive. Behind the usual salaams
[salutations], one question preoccupies committee leaders: who is competent,
and in what area? If a youth has no practical value, he is directed to a
suicide operation. On the other hand, if he possesses experience in IT, for
example, he will be used for that purpose, and if he isn't married, an Iraqi
wife will quickly be found to attach him to her tribe."
The Islamic State (IS) is structured on a combination of the
organization skilled of the former soldiers of Saddam Hussein and the religious fanaticism of
its leader, "Caliph" Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
He is surrounded by a council of war. "Ministers" and "governors"
administer the territories conquered in Iraq and Syria.
Horrifying initiation rites are inflicted on some newcomers
to the IS. "Several prisoners have told of having been sodomized shortly
after their arrival in Iraq or Syria," says a Kurdish leader whose
movement is holding some jihadists. "Through humiliations like these,"
he adds, "Daesh (the Arab acronym for the IS)
seeks to regress these fighters to the condition of animals to prepare them for
committing the worst atrocities. And as these sessions have been filmed, the
man thus abused will be disowned by his family, if ever he leaves the ranks of the
Islamic State."
"It is a genuine factory of barbarity," according
to Haytham
Manna,a member of the Syrian opposition who is getting ready to publish an
investigation into "The Daesh Caliphate" - the
fruit of three months observing the methods used by this medieval monster with murky
operating practices.
It is headed by Caliph Abu Bakr
al-Baghdadi, on whose head a price has been placed by the Americans to the tune
of $10 million. This former sharia law professor is
the religious enforcer of IS. Around him sits a genuine war cabinet of half a
dozen former officers from the army or secret services of Saddam Hussein, drunk
with vengeance since their demobilization by the Americans in the immediate
aftermath of the overthrow of the Baghdad dictator in 2003. This is an inner
circle of centurions, without much reference to religion, which, in the purest
Baath tradition, gives IS its organization, discipline
and taste for secrecy and cruelty.
"It is a group that has been in power," according
to Haytham Manna's analysis. "Some have gone to war
against Iran with Saddam Hussein, others have tortured Shiite and Kurdish
prisoners, but all were tortured after 2003 by Iraq's American occupiers."
If Baghdadi has his way, IS forces will
come from converts to jihadism brought out of hiding.
It seems that 200 officers of Saddam
Hussein's army have rallied to the organization. "In the eyes of Baghdadi,
these former Baathists have become good Muslims, having atoned for their
past and proven by their armed actions that they are valorous fighters," Manna
added.
An organization stricken
by paranoia
Close to the Caliph, one Abu Mouslim
al-Turkmani guides the new counter-espionage network
IS has put in place in the territories under its control in Iraq and Syria. This
is a priority for an organization that fears infiltration like the plague. [Click Here for jumbo organizational graphic] A
former officer of Saddam Hussein's External Security Service [the Mukhabarat], this man is in fact Fadel Ahmad Abdallah al-Hiyali, and it was over the course of his time in the Bouka Prison in southern Iraq, while being held by the
Americans in the mid-2000s, that he converted to jihadism.
For other senior officers within the framework of Daesh as well,
Bouka served as an incubator.
Abu Ahmad al-Alwani is head of the
military council. At his side is former colonel Abu Ayman al-Iraqi
who has returned to Iraq after being dispatched to Syria to set up IS North of
Aleppo and in Raqqa. He was recently wounded in the
leg. Two other members of this small inner circle with access to Baghdadi have
been killed in recent months: Haji Baker, who was
killed by Salafist rebels in Syria, and above all, Abu Rahman
al-Bilawi. It is the latter who secretly planned the
lighting conquest of Mosul on June 9, the groundwork for which was laid in an
incredible infiltration mission.
Earlier
this year, AdnanSmaïnNajem - his real name - presented himself, clean-shaven and
under a false identity, as a rich businessman returning to the city after a successful stay in Saudi Arabia to marry a Mosul woman. It was the former Baathist officer (not
an Islamist) who went around incognito, little by little weaving a network of
contacts with Baathist officers from other rebel
groups who would go into action on June 9, but under orders from the Islamic State. Bilawi died during a police check a few days before the attack. Like the other senior IS officers, he wore a belt concealing
explosives - which he set off. Like so many other jihadis
before him, Bilawi absolutely did not want to be captured.
By way of a posthumous homage, Daesh named the taking
of Mosul "Operation Bilawi."
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Worldmeets.US
Outside this inner circle, other members occupy "minister"
and "governor" posts. Their names are protected by the organization,
after revelations of the identities of their predecessors appeared in the
British press in mid-July, the day after Iraqi authorities seized documents
from al-Bilawi's house.
A budget of $2 billion
If final decisions are centralized at the top, the
functioning of the Islamic State is not. Baghdadi and close relatives have established
numerous go-betweens in the various regions conquered, most often locals, in
order for them to be better accepted by the population and to avoid annihilation
of the movement in case the leadership is decapitated. There seem to be a
thousand mid-level cadres with a wealth of military and security experience to
administer these territories, where between five and eight million Syrians and
Iraqis live.
"The problem," suggests HaythamMannar, "is that IS has no real framework on which to
build their state. Only the Islamic tribunals function well. Everywhere else is
more or less a mess. To mask the weaknesses of its state, IS distributes money,
for example, to a storekeeper to rebuild his business. But this creates corruption
that IS continues to rail against in its propaganda."
For Washington, Daesh is the
richest of terrorist organizations. It has a budget of $2 billion, according to
estimates by the Defense Ministry in Paris. "With which to buy weapons and
allegiances" says a French military officer with alarm. A note from the Directorate
of Military Intelligence details the weapons possessed by IS and is concerned
about the contacts the terrorist organization has already establish on the Bulgarian
black market for arms
Financial
independence
With its financial resources, IS has purchased weapons from
other Syrian rebel groups. Today, Daesh no longer
depends exclusively on its private Saudi, Qatari and Kuwaiti donors, which from
now on will be in the crosshairs of their regimes. IS has virtually insured its
continued funding thanks to oil smuggling, the extortion of merchants, and the collection
of ransoms paid for the release of Western hostages, to say nothing of the
taxes collected from trucks passing through.
Recalling the time of Saddam Hussein, IS is trying to take on the
look of a godfather to Iraqis. Fighting its sources of supply risks depriving
the population of some of the financial and humanitarian assistance that IS dispenses
to the needy and which is so worrying to American officials. Like all Islamist groups, IS has
established a Majlis al-Shura, or council of representatives. But unlike the
Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt for example, IS' "majlis"
meets only rarely. It hadn't even been formed before the attack on Mosul. Its
members, which are supposed to provide Islamic religious
backing for their crimes, are mainly foreigners in whom the Daesh
leadership has only relative confidence: they are Saudi, Kuwaiti or Maghreb
imams.
Toward a 'pure' Sunni state
About 25,000 people have sworn their allegiance to IS, including
6,000 in the month of July. Each receives a monthly salary of between $300 to $2,000. A committee, headed by Abdallah Ahmad al-Meshedani,
conducts a screening of foreigners who arrive. Behind the usual salaams [salutations], one question
preoccupies committee leaders: who is competent, and in what area? If a youth
has no practical value, he is directed to a suicide operation. On the other
hand, if he possesses experience in IT, for example, he will be used for that
purpose, and if he isn't married, an Iraqi wife will quickly be found to attach
him to her tribe. With rare exceptions, however, Abu Omar al-Shishani for example - foreigners are regarded with
suspicion. Having recently challenged the dominance of Iraqis in IS, Abu Obeida
le Maghrébin was accused of being "an agent
of the West," and immediately executed.
The Islamic State has no permanent training camps. Its
fighters train in the desert, then after a few days they go elsewhere. When
they attack a village, they generally take entire families hostage to convince
the others not to oppose their conquest. They even expel hostile tribes in
order to settle in their place Islamist families from the Caucuses or
elsewhere, like the Mamelukes - freed slaves in the service of the Muslim caliphs
in the 17th century.
"For them, the ideal state is pure Sunni" observes
Haytham Manna. "Hence
their determination to continue their conquests more toward the Mediterranean than
Baghdad and southern Iraq, where the majority of the population is Shiite.
We confront a diabolical plan that combines national fascism with religious
obscurantism."
