Mosul
maelstrom: ISIS and the turning point of American adventurism in
Middle East
RT,
30
June, 2014
The
American wars, including the ‘War on Terror’, were cat-and-mouse
games that did not produce a final confrontation with Takfiri groups,
but rather multiple confrontations, which have deferred or delayed
both the domestic goals of these groups and their destructive power
abroad, while ratcheting up their number and the resentment they
carry against the West and its regional allies.
What
happened in Mosul, after what happened in Syria, threatens the
pluralistic essence of Iraq and the Levant, and promises us another
decade of unrest and terror in the region and abroad, if not
addressed cooperatively on the international level, and in a
responsible manner.
There
is a story in the Babylonian Talmud, retold by Somerset Maugham in
1933, which my father liked to tell me when I was a child, about a
merchant in Baghdad who sent his servant to the market to
buyprovisions.
Back from the market, the servant told his master that a woman in the
crowd, who seemed to be Death, gestured threateningly at him. He
asked his master to lend him a horse to flee to Samarra. The merchant
lent his horse and went down to the marketplace where he saw the
woman. He asked her why she had made a threatening gesture at his
servant. ‘That
was not a threatening gesture,’ the
woman said,‘I
was only surprised to see your servant in Baghdad, for I had an
appointment with him tonight in Samarra.’
By
all accounts, the appointment that was given by ISIS (Islamic State
in Iraq and greater Syria) in Mosul to Iraq, the region and the
world, seems to have taken everybody by surprise, but it was bound to
happen.
No
surprise
For
decades now, the US and its regional allies, Saudi Arabia and other
Gulf countries, has been playing cat and mouse with Islamist
extremists trying to harness their destructive power, without
yielding to this power, and for years, it has succeeded, exception
made of 9/11. The post-9/11 War on Terror was supposed to be the end
of this game with terror, but it wasn’t.
The
same game is being played again, this time in the Fertile Crescent
region of the Middle East, thanks to two events: the 2003
American-led invasion of Iraq and the 2011 toppling of regimes in
Tunisia, Egypt and Libya, along with the three-year-old failed
attempt at regime change in Syria – which came to be called
the ‘Arab Spring’.
These
two sets of events have introduced power vacuum, weakened the central
authority of these states and their security apparatuses, attracting
many Islamist extremist groups. However, what’s different this time
in the new appointment with these groups is their proliferation and
power of mobilization based on humiliation, and religious and class
resentment in the face of power shift and power loss. This complex
reality is acknowledged in the West only as the one-dimensional
religious sectarianism viewed through the history of religious wars
in the West.
The
appointment given by extremist groups in Mosul to Iraq, the region
and the world, will not only be more deadly than 9/11, and will not
only topple regimes, but it will signal the death of pluralistic
societies in the Middle East and the Levant, inaugurating a new era
of barbarism and a new phase of persecution of religious minorities,
whoever they are, wherever they are.
This
may seem benign to Westerners because, contrary to the threat felt
from these extremists with 9/11, the end of religious pluralism in
the Levant is, after all, far from their shores. But it will be a
mistake to think that, in an interconnected, multicultural,
multiracial world, the end of religious pluralism in the Levant will
have no impact in the West.
The
West will not be able to escape the fallout of the appointment given
to the Middle East and the Levant by Islamist extremist groups in a
city known for its millenary old
pluralism.
Obama may hesitate, the public in West may be wary of wars, the war
in Iraq may be conveniently portrayed as a Sunni-Shia war, but if no
firm action is taken against these groups – not the cat-and-mouse
game we have seen so far – there will be an appointment for the
West with these groups again.
War
on Terror: An appointment always deferred
ISIS
originated in Iraq in the wake of the American-led invasion based on
the lie that Iraq had a‘relationship’ with
Al-Qaeda. Its new name was acquired only recently after assuming a
new role fighting for regime change in Syria. ISIS terror operations
in Iraq were led by a Jordanian named Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who waged
a savage sectarian campaign against Iraqis in the name of Al-Qaeda,
but ended up on bad terms with the terror group as his actions turned
Iraqi Sunnis against Al-Qaeda. Zarqawi was defeated and killed in
2006. The group fighting with Zarqawi suffered many setbacks before
merging with other small insurgent groups – including former
officers from the disbanded Iraqi army of Saddam Hussein –
continuing terror operations in an Iraq that had never ceased to
bleed since the American-led invasion.
Led
now by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, who was liberated by the US in 2009
after five years of detention in camp Bucca in Iraq, ISIS found a new
opportunity in the Syrian ‘revolution’,
and territorial aims.
In
Syria, ISIS gained strength, followers, and greater coverage form the
traditional and the new media, being Western liberals or
conservatives from the Arab Gulf, willing to bet their sympathies on
any group challenging the rule of President Bashar Assad. In Syria,
ISIS also came to lay its hands on revenues from oil refineries and
seems to have achieved financial success by attracting private
donations and logistic support for a ‘cause’ dear to West, Gulf
leaders, Saudi affiliated Sunni groups in Lebanon, and Turkey.
ISIS
terror operations in Syria and Iraq shifted in intensity, during late
2013, early 2014, to Iraq, due to the advances of the Syrian Arab
army. It is then logical that ISIS, an organization with a structured
leadership and a long-term
vision,
turned to Iraq to break the deadlock in which it found itself in
Syria. Iraq was ripe for an ISIS breakthrough, with a weak central
government, a weak leader, a political climate poisoned by
sectarianism, and a known operational field, thanks to its own
dormant cells helped by former officers from Saddam’s disbanded
army.
Syria
did not make ISIS, as some allege, it was rather the US invasion of
Iraq that made ISIS, and the Syrian ‘revolution’ gave it a
sympathetic platform.
The
ISIS war chest is estimated at somewhere between $400 million and $2
billion now; most gained during the Mosul takeover with the looting
of the central bank, although sources in the US say these figures
are exaggerated.
ISIS has been already known for its mafia style, racketeering and
imposing local taxes on the population, with harsh punishments for
those who refuse
to pay (see
also ISIS inc).
Mosul’s
proximity to Kurdish territory, which evades Baghdad’s control and
sells its oil on the black market, or to countries willing to defy
Baghdad, will make business easy for ISIS. In the wake of Mosul’s
takeover, many speculated about a Kurdish-ISIS conspiracy, but this
is only logical since Kurds and ISIS, despite differing views, both
plan to sell Iraq’s oil, unencumbered by a central authority.
Without
the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, ISIS would not have existed in
Iraq and resurrected in Syria, and without Gulf Arab countries’ and
West’s push for regime change in Syria, ISIS would not be claiming
its throne in Mosul.
But “Sitting
a throne is a thousand times harder than winning one.” ISIS
territorial ambitions are fantasies. Not one pious Sunni Muslim, let
alone any Muslim, outside the fanatics who are fighting with ISIS,
wishes to live by their rules.
Since
the early 1990s, Al-Qaeda and other Takfiri groups, militarily
strengthened by the anti-Soviet War in Afghanistan, trained and
radicalized with Saudi-Gulf money & American complicity, have
been serving the interventionist unilateral foreign policy of the
United States and its allies acting as facilitators of armed
intervention in countries they view as theirs to subdue to their
brand of Islam.
From
Afghanistan to Nigeria and in-between, these groups have either
reacted to US interventions or pro-actively preceded US penetration
in new territory by causing a deep enough crisis resulting in US
intervention. A recent example is the US late penetration of
sub-Saharan Africa, achieved through these two modes of action and
reaction resulting in the presence of these groups where there is
American presence, being on the military or security levels. The
cat-and-mouse game the US plays with these groups follows two main
objectives, which have not changed for decades: Israel’s security
and the West’s own energy security. ISIS is no exception.
Feeding
the politics of resentment
The
religious extremism of Takiri groups is a project born out of
resentment; it is not a resistance movement, neither a revolutionary
one. It is bound to fail. The politics of resentment often ignores
reality, is moved by a set of negative collective emotions pertaining
to loss of power, experience of humiliation, and desire for
vengeance. Its project for the future is often to withdraw, return to
a previous state. It thrives on anxiety and disenchantment with the
world.
In
the case of ISIS and other Takfiri groups, these factors pervade the
religious, spiritual and political lives of individuals from
different nationalities. This is what makes these groups dangerous to
any society they live in.
At
its source, Takfiri ideology was born in Egypt where it thrived in a
context of endemic poverty and oppression as an alternative to the
emergence of a secular state as a process of decolonization. Takfiri
ideology not only distrusted colonial powers, but also the process of
decolonization as a march toward separation between the religious,
the spiritual, and the state.
From
Egypt, the Takfiri ideology spread to Saudi Arabia who tried, and
succeeded, in harnessing the discontent of these groups persecuted by
Egypt’s governments and used it against nascent Arab secular
regimes. But in Saudi Arabia, Takfiri ideology gained traction among
part of the elite who felt ostracized and alienated by the Saudi
monarchy. Before gaining prominence on the world stage, the first
attempts of these groups at implementing their political objectives
were made in Egypt and in Saudi Arabia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Mosque_Seizure.
Sayyed
Qutb allegedly made an attempt to assassinate President Gamal Abdel
Nasser and was sentenced to death. Later, Islamist extremists
succeeded in killing his successor, President Anwar Sadat.
Since
then, either they were manipulated to fight in many conflicts where
their resentment could find an operational terrain or they were
fought in a manner feeding resentment, through illegal invasions,
illegal detentions, and humiliations. America’s War on terror in
the wake of 9/11 did not address the root cause of Takfiri ideology,
it worked mainly on validating the way Takfiris view the world and
the West.
This
is what I call a War on Terror that is deferred. After each battle,
along with or against America, these groups have returned to fight
their governments at home, always better armed and better trained.
Groups who fought in the anti-Soviet war in Afghanistan initiated the
Algerian civil war.
The
tragedy of 9/11 can be seen as a reaction to Gulf countries’
willingness to surrender more sovereignty to American troops in the
form of permanent US bases, in exchange for more protection, after
the first Gulf War. The takeover of the Syrian ‘revolution’ by
ISIS, and its offshoot Al-Nusra Front, is the direct result of the
2003 American led invasion of Iraq, which unsettled the power
equation in the whole region. And the current (though supposedly
finished) Iraq War, with the takeover of Mosul and the direct threat
to the integrity of Iraq is, the direct result of the war Western and
Gulf countries are waging on the Syrian regime with the help of these
groups.
The
resentment of these groups, carefully cultivated over the years, is
now joined by the resentment of Iraq’s Sunni cadres after their
exile from a long held throne. Many have questioned the unnatural
alliance between ISIS and former Saddamists, but it is not to be seen
as unnatural if we consider that both ISIS and former Saddamists
share a strong resentment against Shia and other sects as a
motivation, for the exile of Sunnis from power.
Saddam’s
regime never achieved the kind of secularism and inclusion fostered
by the Syrian Baath because it relied heavily on brutal sectarian
politics, and its former cadres are moved by strong sectarian
politics against other sects, mainly the Shia. It is madness to
accuse Nouri al-Maliki of sectarianism when the Sunni insurgency,
which never abated since power has been taken from them in Iraq, has
killed mainly Shias.
As
ISIS descends now on Mosul and other cities in Iraq, including
Samarra, a perfect storm is gathering. Its outcome is certain to
produce only atrocities and wars for years. And as ISIS descends on
Mosul, and Samarra, and Baghdad, there will be no escape this time
for the US and its regional allies, who have been playing cat and
mouse with these groups for over three decades now, but to look into
the eye of the storm and act responsibly, to own the monster they
have created.
Unfortunately,
this is not what the US administration has signaled since the
beginning of this crisis. Obama, who to his credit opposed the 2003
invasion of Iraq, finds himself with no clear policy on Iraq, and I’m
not sure, even with the best intentions, that he understands the
gravity of the situation. His two speeches until now indicate a mix
of caution and laissez-faire that has marked his approach to foreign
policy. But this is no time for nuances and carefully studied
caution.
The
absence of a coordinated campaign with other powers that have
influence in the region – namely Iran and Russia - against ISIS
makes the current situation even more alarming. If ISIS is to
consolidate its presence in Mosul and beyond, no country will escape
the chaos created by this storm.
Sonia
Mansour Robaey for RT
Sonia
Mansour Robaey is a neuroscientist who teaches Philosophy and Ethics.
She tweets on the Levant at @les_politiques and
on Ethics and Philosophy at @SoniaMRobaey
The
author thanks Ivor Crotty for editing this article and another one
for RT on Syria, which can be found here
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
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