What Is IS?

[Young Master Smeet]

This isn't about Islamic state.  Except it is.  On the radio yesterday, there was a half an hour breaking news story about the latest murdr by IS.  Commentators came on, declared them evil, we can't negotiate with them, they are incomprehensible.  I found myself wondering why human beings, with brains almost identical to mine, would become so unrelentingly beyond the pale?

he first thing is, that there is a prism of propaganda here.  We know this.  Britain and the US have a strategic interest in the region, so we hear about the crimes of IS in great detail.  There are comparable groups out in the world that have been operating for years.

Take Democratic Republic of Congo — millions died there in the 1990's (remember hearing about that?  Didn't think so). 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kivu_conflict

This is a slow burn conflict, trawl the web, you'll see a lot about it.  The groups involved are identical to IS in MO and character.  They are characterised by:

1) Possession of weapons

2) Operating in remote, relatively inaccessible regions.

3) Support from regional state actors

4) Access to natural resources with commercial value

5) Forced recruitement

6) Tribal affinities

But we can see similar groups:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mexican_Drug_War

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FARC

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Sudanese_Civil_War

These groups find themselves confronting populations they don't need: hence their almost feudal strategies fo terrorising the population.  Where capitalists need the active compliance and colalboration of their workforce, these groups just need to control the raw resources that supply them with money, and they use ideas of tribal affinity or religion as a line of communication for recuirtment, rather than as a motive or objective.  Staying in business becomes their chief motive.

[Young Master Smeet]

http://www.juancole.com/2014/11/refinery-shiite-militias.htmlJuan Cole says IS is known as Daesh in the region (much better handle, really):

Quote:

Daesh is estimated to make $30 million a month from petroleum sales. It isn’t actually that much in the larger scheme of things. Contrary to the somewhat breathless US reporting, Daesh is not the most wealthy terrorist group ever. At the height of the Iraq War a decade ago, Shiite militias probably siphoned off some $5 billion annually from the national oil production.

Cole's analysis is that Daesh is being routed, which means the euqllay unspeakable gangster Assad will regain Syria.

[ALB]

Young Master Smeet wrote:

 the euqllay unspeakable gangster Assad will regain Syria.

I don't agree that he is "equally unspeakable", a ganster no doubt but at least he's living in the 21st century not the 8th or 9th. I'd much rather live under his regime than under that of those Islamist barbarians. I'm sure any woman would agree.

[Young Master Smeet]

Not necessarilly:http://leftfootforward.org/2012/05/syria-assad-forces-use-rape-as-a-weapon/

[ALB]

That reads like propaganda from the time when the Assad regime was not objectively an ally of Western capitalism.

[Young Master Smeet]

Maybe I should add 'Organised rape' as a feature of these gangs.  It seems to be a persistent and, maybe, essential feature (perhaps connected with the tribal aspect of their makeup, or maybe connected with their recruitment and retention of young males):http://www.un.org/sexualviolenceinconflict/countries/syrian-arab-republic/Anyway, the above is a UN source from this year.  One of the most depressing things I've read in a while.

[ALB]

I suppose it depends on which 'atrocity stories' you choose to believe but the Islamic Statists don't bother to disguise theirs: they broadcast them to the world.

[Young Master Smeet]

http://theconversation.com/when-un-peacekeepers-commit-atrocities-someone-has-to-act-34317It seems even UN peacekeepers can be counted as gangsters and rapists.

Quote:

In early 2004, the  international media reported on the sexual exploitation and abuse of young Congolese women and girls by United Nations peacekeepers in the United Nations Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC). The public outcry that followed these reports led to an investigation by the United Nations Office of Oversight Services (OIOS). The investigation found serious problems of  sexual exploitation and sexual abuse in the Mission. The allegations were substantiated by a Human  Rights Watch report on sexual exploitation and abuse in Eastern Congo. In his annual report, pursuant to General Assembly Resolution 57/306, the Secretary-General reported a total of 121 allegations of sexual abuse and exploitation in 2004-more than double the 53 allegations reported in 2003. Forty-five per-cent of those allegations were reports involving sex with minors."

[hallblithe]

IS bad, UN good – think again;In 2007, it was reported that girls as young as 13 were having sex with U.N. peacekeepers in Haiti for as little as a dollar, Ezili Dant, president of the Haitian Lawyers Leadership Network (HLLN), said in a letter to the United Nations.     The continued sexual abuse of minors in Haiti – and also in other peacekeeping missions in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Cote d'Ivoire – has alarmed the United Nations.     Allegations of abuse have dogged U.N. peacekeeping missions since their inception over 50 years ago. 

[alanjjohnstone]

IS creates its own money systemhttp://www.cnn.com/2014/11/13/world/meast/isis-currency/index.html 

Quote:

Its aim is to stay away from the "tyrant's financial system," ISIS said in a statement. It said it would issue another statement to explain the new currency's exchange rate, and where it can be found.The currency will include seven coins: two gold, three silver and two copper.The move is "purely dedicated to God" and will remove Muslims from the "global economic system that is based on satanic usury," ISIS said.

[alanjjohnstone]

IS creates a health insurance system, widowers pensions and marriage allowances "The cost of the welfare system sometimes exceeded the expenditure for the purchase of weapons"http://www.spiegel.de/politik/ausland/islamischer-staat-is-hat-sozialsystem-errichtet-a-1003150.html  

[alanjjohnstone]

And another story reflecting the class dividehttp://www.dailystar.com.lb/News/Middle-East/2014/Nov-17/277865-food-prices-in-douma-spark-clashes-between-rebels-residents.ashx#axzz3JXDnHvt9 

Quote:

fighting broke out Friday and continued Saturday between residents and members of the Islam Army in the suburb of Douma…the clashes began when residents attacked the storage units of influential merchants who dominate the local food distribution business to protest high prices…The militia receives funding from some of these merchants, activists say, and is fighting residents to defend them. “People are angry with the Islam Army because they back the merchants"

 

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