The Caliphate does not represent the sole historical attempt of an armed organization to construct its own shell-state. Decades ago, the PLO successfully formed a shell-state after gaining independence from its sponsors and effectively privatizing the business of terrorism. Ironically, the achievement came as a surprise to the Israelis, just as the West was shocked when in the summer of 2014 it discovered IS’s independent wealth. Against the absurd claims of counter-terrorism experts that they could not have foreseen the rise of the Islamic State in the firmament of jihadist groups—if not through its military conquests, then via its successful financial endeavors—the history of the PLO’s financial independence bears recalling.
In December 1987, the Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank launched the Intifada. This spontaneous uprising triggered a distinct shift in Israeli policy. The government no longer tolerated “unofficial” inflows of money into the Occupied Territories and ordered the police to block the smuggling of money across all transit points. In the following year, over $20 million in cash was confiscated. Yet this did little to curb the PLO’s economic support in the Occupied Territories. Money earned through legitimate, often sophisticated, routes was plentiful.34
What the Israelis soon discovered was that Arafat had transformed a loose confederation of armed groups, financed by various sponsors, into a complex self-funded economic organization. It acted as a de facto state in the territories it controlled, thanks to various legitimate and illegitimate activities, ranging from export of textiles to drug smuggling.35 The PLO generated annual revenue in excess of the gross national product of a number of Arab countries.
With these revenues, Arafat effectively ran Gaza and the West Bank free of the control of his former sponsors. However, with money but without political recognition, the Occupied Territories could not be defined as a proper state, but only as shell-state, a state that possesses national infrastructure but lacks the self-determination that is the core of nationhood. In the standard nation-building model, the economy and the infrastructure of the modern state are built after the process of self-determination has produced political integration. In the shell-state model established by the PLO, and now adopted by the Islamic State, economy and infrastructure building precede political recognition. Self-determination then, remains an elusive, contingent fact. But not, as we shall see, in the intentions of IS.
The Modern Version of the War-by-Proxy
During the Cold War, shell-states often emerged out of proxy wars. That is, states sponsored non-state actors to wage their wars-by-proxy, and some of these armed organizations followed the lead of the PLO to achieve economic independence and built state infrastructures of their own. Since 2011, a similar transformation has been at work inside the war-torn regions of Syria and Iraq. Just as during the Cold War Arafat used donations from Arab sponsors as seed capital to build the independent wealth of the PLO in the Occupied Territories, so too Abu Bakr al Baghdadi financially exploited Arab state sponsors seeking a regime change in Syria to carve out his group’s economic stronghold. What differs today is the wide range of state sponsors available to proxy groups and the misalignment of sponsors’ interests.
In Syria, it has been relatively easy for any jihadist group to choose among an array of financial backers—in a sense, to shop around for sponsors. During the Cold War, instead, proxies had only two choices, i.e., one of the two superpowers. The advent of a multipolar world crowded the field of sponsors and in the process transformed the war-by-proxy into a sort of betting ground. When in 2010 al Baghdadi went in search of sponsors, the Kuwaitis, Qataris, and Saudis lined up, in the process indirectly providing IS access to Western military equipment—a luxury that Arafat never enjoyed.36
What has not changed is the increased difficulty proxies pose to finding peaceful solutions to conflicts. This is particularly true of the modern proxy war, in particular, due to the absurd and paradoxical conflicts of interest among sponsors. In Syria, Iran has backed the regime of Bashar al-Assad, mostly through its Lebanese branch, Hezbollah, while the Saudis, the Kuwaitis, and the Qataris have bankrolled a plethora of Sunni insurgent groups, including the former ISIS, to undermine Iranian power in the region. Hezbollah in turn has been arming and funding Hamas in the Palestinian conflict, though Hamas is predominantly Sunni, and historically has been bankrolled by Saudi Arabia.37 In the summer of 2014, Hamas used both Iranian drones (claiming they were built in Gaza) and Syrian-made long-range missiles (likely supplied by the Islamic State) to attack Israel.
To complicate the picture, Russia is arming the Assad regime in Syria while Washington arms the anti-Assad Syrian rebels with, ironically, weapons that IS confiscates after each victory. In April 2014, Time magazine reported, “Syrian fighters are now using U.S.-made anti-tank weapons against Assad’s forces. Experts say it is unlikely those weapons could have wound up in Syria without US approval.”38 Then, on September 10, 2014, President Obama announced in a nationwide address that the US would bomb the Islamic State in Syria, to which Damascus, backed by Moscow, replied that without its approval and permission such action would be an aggression. In the modern war-by-proxy, alliances are never clear and can change overnight.
The diplomatic terrain in which all these parties move is also shifting constantly, at times to absurd effect. In August 2014, militants from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) came to the aid of the Peshmerga against the Islamic State, which was advancing in the autonomous region in Northern Iraq. The US, meanwhile, provided air strikes to aid the Peshmerga. The curious result was de facto cooperation between the PKK and the US, though the PKK remains on the US’s official terrorist list. The Europeans also agreed to arm the Kurdish army, and so technically are also fighting with the PKK. And because Turkey is part of the grand coalition organized by Obama to defeat the Islamic State, the PKK and Ankara, historical enemies, are on the same side.39
At the end of the summer of 2014, the United States organized the grand coalition under the NATO umbrella to fight IS. This might give the impression that the Islamic State is uniting old and new enemies, and that the time of irrational alliances had come to an end. This is not the case. In mid-September 2014, for example, Iran and Syria, the two largest Shia states in the Middle East, were not invited to participate in the Paris Conference, apparently because Saudi Arabia and Qatar had vetoed their presence. The coalition and the conference did not flesh out any new strategy to address the problems of the region, and the gathering turned out to be yet another opportunity for a group photo of world leaders. Indeed, none of the NATO or Arab countries has officially agreed to send troops to fight the Islamic State. On the contrary, they will continue to participate in the conflict by proxy, while pursuing their own interests. Paradoxically, the grand coalition, instead of stopping this process, risks adding more rich countries to the long list of sponsors.
Even the Assad regime uses proxy groups to fight the rebels and the jihadists and to repress the local population. Hezbollah and Iranian fighters have been deployed in Syria instead of the corrupted Syrian army. “In March 2012 I lived in Southern Lebanon,” recounts Francesca Borri. “Every week the bodies of Hezbollah’s militants in Syria were carried back for their funerals.”40
Against this background, al Baghdadi may cleverly continue taking advantage of the political paradoxes of the modern war-by-proxy. Thus far, showing a remarkable understanding of his sponsors’ wishes and perspectives, he has exploited the proliferation of small jihadist and rebel groups to enlarge his own organization, through either mergers or military victories against rival Sunni groups. “In Aleppo and Syria often fighters move from one faction to another,” explains a former Syrian rebel who escaped via Turkey. “ISIS appealed to many because it was better organized, more efficient than the others. Its fighters seemed better trained. You must understand that most of the people who participate in this war have no idea how to fight—they are kids, from Syria and all over the world. The foreigners, in particular, are excited at the idea of going to war. But they don’t even know how to shoot a gun. Among all these groups, the Islamic State projects the most professional image, so people believe they will be trained. At the same time, it appears determined to gain control of selected key targets. If you want to fight you may as well join the best.”41
From 2011 to 2014, betting on an international nonintervention in Syria, al Baghdadi has carved out his main territorial stronghold in Syria, ironically using the money of the Arab sponsors and attacking and conquering rival rebels’ positions. Foreseeing a long-term conflict in Syria, he sought to gain control of vast sections of the market for arms in that country.
Clearly, the Islamic State’s successful exploitation of the modern war-by-proxy in the Middle East springs from the contradictions of this type of conflict in a multipolar, post–Cold War environment. This is unlikely to be changed by the formation of a grand coalition, as proven by the exclusion of Iran, major sponsor of the regime of Assad, and the lack of united strategy. Indeed, such contradictions explain the difficulties that, since 2011, the United States has encountered in rallying any type of alliance of forces in the region to address the regime change in Damascus and, more recently, the threat posed by the Caliphate. As we shall see in the last chapter, the grand coalition has not resolved the foreign policy contradictions that prevent any fruitful resolution of the problems of the Middle East.
What the West is ignoring, either because of ignorance or because of convenience, is the anarchy into which Northern Syria has been plunged by a war-by-proxy bankrolled though a plethora of sponsors. “Society has broken down. Those who could flee have left and those who have remained are too poor or to old to leave,” explains Francesca Borri, for a long time the sole Western journalist in Aleppo. “What we have in Northern Syria is no longer what we had before the beginning of civil war but something different, not at all representative of what the Syrian population was. Those who prey upon the population are criminal groups, responsible also for most of the kidnappings of Westerners, mostly journalists and aid workers.”42 This is a scenario similar to the one we find in regions of the world where the authority of the state, often an authoritarian one, has broken down, creating a political vacuum that sectarian armed organizations fill with violence. In this anarchic environment, society has ceased to exist, replaced by perennial, pre-modern warfare. “Inside and outside Aleppo, warlords are the supreme authority, and this is true also for the Islamic State,” explains Borri. “The ultimate loyalty of the fighters is to their commander, not the leadership of the organization.” However, unlike the other groups, the Caliphate provides a hierarchic military and administrative structure that, though rudimentary, reduces the danger that its battalions will degenerate into militias or criminal groups.
As in Nigeria or Sahel or Afghanistan, hostages are precious merchandise, and, as in Lebanon in the 1990s, these goods are resold several times over in a market rife with criminal and terror groups. The facility with which journalists are kidnapped confirms the sectarian, pre-modern nature of the conflict in Syria. “Most of the colleagues who have been kidnapped were traveling with drivers and bodyguards provided by one of the many rebel groups, and were kidnapped at roadblocks by rival rebel groups traveling in a highly fragmented zone,” explains Borri. “I was lucky because I used al Qaeda’s protection and traveled inside an area at the time controlled by ISIS. I also use a disguise. I pretended to be a Syrian refugee. I didn’t carry even a pen, and was covered up head to toe.”
Often the sponsors involved in this despicable trade use ransom payments to hide their sponsorship. This seems to be the case with the $20 million ransom that Qatar paid al Nusra to free forty-five UN soldiers from the Fiji islands who had been kidnapped in the Golan Heights.43
World public opinion is equally disinclined to approve any intervention similar to that carried out in Libya. The fiasco of Bush and Blair’s war in Iraq has proven that military intervention is not the best solution to bring peace to the Middle East. On the contrary, it may produce Frankensteins like the Islamic State.
The Islamic State shows a remarkable understanding of the frustration of Western public opinion when confronted with the situation in the Middle East. The videos of kidnapped British journalist John Cantlie44 aim at denouncing the double standards of Western governments in dealing with kidnapping. While every other government negotiates and pays, the US and British refuse to do so. Al Baghdadi and his followers seems to be well aware of the idiosyncrasies of the current world order, very different from those of the Cold War, and their way of reaping revenge on a militarily superior enemy is to expose them to world public opinion. They also know that the proxy war fought in Syria and Iraq will only boomerang against its sponsors, weakening these states in the process. At present, Western and Arab powers seem unaware of all of these developments.
Privatizing Terrorism
The best proof that the war-by-proxy is an obsolete instrument of nation-building is found in the successes of the Islamic State. Unlike other sponsored groups engaged in overthrowing the Assad regime in Damascus, al Baghdadi’s warriors have been able to carve out a territorial stronghold in Syria and now also in Iraq. As a former US Marine recounted in the New Yorker: “My visit coincided with the day ISIS seized the city of Azaz from the Free Syrian Army’s Northern Storm Brigade [. . .] Seeing this, it seemed irrefutable that ISIS, although characterized as a rebel group in the Syrian civil war, did not consider the toppling of the Assad régime to be its primary objective. If it had, it wouldn’t have wasted resources seizing Azaz, a city held by the rebels since March 2012. ISIS’s war wasn’t part of the revolution. It was a conquest all its own.”45
The key to IS’s success has been the speed with which it has privatized terrorism in comparison to other groups such as the PLO or the IRA. IS gained financial independence from its sponsors with remarkable celerity, as it was virtually unopposed when it made the economic transition. The truth is, IS’s sponsors have been powerless, as they can find no proxy strong enough to challenge the organization. The proliferation of sponsored groups has backfired, producing a plethora of small and weak armed organizations. Among such a fragmented jihadist and rebel front, it was easy for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria to fight its own war of conquest and seize, in less than a couple of years, strategic regions rich in resources, such as the oil fields of eastern Syria, often in the hands of smaller rebel groups, militias, and war-lords.
Further contributing to IS’s independence were al Baghdadi’s clever alliances with local Sunni tribes to exploit such resources. Working together, they arranged for the extraction and smuggling of oil, some of which was even sold back to the Syrian government. By so doing, al Baghdadi forestalled any opposition on the part of the local population, and projected the image of a more honest and equitable power than the Assad regime. Politically, the ability to cooperate with local leaders, to co-opt them into the Caliphate as partners, not as a conquered population but as citizens of a modern state, has allowed the Islamic State to grow exponentially among militants as well as to strengthen its political claim to recreate the Caliphate. Against this background, it would be a mistake to regard IS’s territorial strongholds only as military bases. They represent the necessary pillars of a modern Islamist state that seeks legitimacy through consensus at the local level in the very regions it has occupied through a war of conquest.
Though traditionally shell-states run by armed groups have shunned the participation of local authorities, the Islamic State pioneered this strategy even before al Baghdadi was elected Caliph. While advancing toward Baghdad in the summer of 2014, IS launched an attack on the Baiji oil refinery, the largest in the country. At the same time, it targeted the Haditha Dam on the Euphrates River in northwestern Iraq, as well as sections of the 600,000-barrel-a-day pipeline to Turkey, which, as of this writing, has not operated since March 2014. As in Syria, the management of these resources was shared in Iraq with the local Sunni communities, tribes that had been discriminated against by the governing regime. This tactic not only prevented their opposition, but also gained their support and consensus.
In all his dealings with Iraqi Sunni tribes, al Baghdadi has applied remarkably modern diplomatic tactics to win their support. In Anbar, he avoided stirring up bad memories of al Qaeda’s attacks on the participants in the Sunni Awakening. “Al Baghdadi’s fighters have not harmed religious men, the Anbar tribes, including those who formed the Sahwa forces, or even the police force. When the tribes refused to raise ISIS banners in Fallujah, he ordered his fighters not to raise the banner or try to co-opt the fighters of armed groups, clans or religious men. . . . However, the banner did appear on certain occasions, such as when ISIS kidnapped and killed a number of Iraqi soldiers in the area of Albu Bali in north Fallujah in mid-January of this year. Al Baghdadi’s appeasement policies in Anbar have once again revealed a pragmatism that was lacking in al-Qaeda’s previous leaders.”46
Al Baghdadi’s willingness to foster these alliances with local Sunni tribes is part of his strategy to speed up the process of independence from his sponsors. Financial independence, however, is not born exclusively from a desire to break with foreign sponsors. Rather, the privatization of terrorism offers IS tools to enforce loyalty among its fighters. That is, al Baghdadi has sought financial independence as an inoculation against the corruption of his forces. Corruption has been the downfall of many armed organizations and of all Arab regimes, without exception. Sponsorship, accordingly, is well known to breed a culture of bribery.
One such lesson from history is Arafat’s downfall, a result of the PLO’s swelling coffers. By the time the PLO was managing an annual budget of $8 to $12 billion, its structure and leadership had been fully compromised. Bribes and corruption generated by a political culture of sponsorship represented a blight of which the group was never fully cured.47
Carving Out the First Islamist Shell-State in Syria
While privatizing terrorism, the Islamic State discovered that the shell-state model was a perfect vehicle to achieve the ambitious nation-building goal of recreating the Caliphate. A shell-state can be as small as a suburb or as large as a proper state. A shell-state is simple to construct and manage, because political integration is often absent. Its ideal ground is found in war-torn enclaves where all infrastructure has collapsed and political authority has disappeared. Rulers monopolize political power and need to seek democratic consensus. In assembling the shell-state, therefore, economics trumps politics. And a shell-state has the further benefit of being inexpensive to run, because its economic sphere is limited to the war economy and the privatization of terror. Non-military expenses are minimal and the population need only be provided with bare sustenance.
In the traditional shell-state model, war is the sole source of income. “War is our way of life,” declared a Northern Alliance fighter from the Shomali Plain in Afghanistan. Accordingly, fighters are highly paid in comparison with the rest of the population.48 In sharp contrast, the economy of the Caliphate does not exclusively depend upon the economy of the war of conquest, nor are its jihadists semi-mercenaries motivated by high salaries. Indeed, despite its need to assure their loyalty, the Islamic State pays its fighters less than what a blue-collar civilian earns in Syria or Iraq. Declassified documents show that, over a period for which the Department of Defense kept records, “the average Islamic State foot soldier earned a base salary of just $41 a month, far lower than blue-collar Iraq jobs such as a bricklayer making $150 a month. As counter-terrorism experts have long suspected, the members of a group like the Islamic State are so ideologically driven that economic incentives to stop the flow of fighters aren’t likely to have much impact.”49
If the Islamic State’s army is not primarily motivated by money, it is driven by a higher cause: the achievement of the modern Caliphate, an ideal Muslim state that transcends all, including personal wealth. Such political construction should be regarded as a sign of modernity in the Middle East, a region where nation-building has been for centuries the sport of foreign powers seeking their own interest with the help of corrupted local elites.
Although al Baghdadi’s war of conquest in the Middle East is reminiscent of pre-modern conflicts, the discipline and ideals of the Caliphate represent a step toward a proper state different from the shell-state of the Taliban in Afghanistan or the FARC in Colombia, whose aims are primarily to prey, financially and otherwise, upon the local population. The Islamic State’s warriors also represent a step forward vis-à-vis the jihadists of al Zarqawi, all potential suicide bombers, eager to become martyrs and spend eternity with seventy-two virgins. Though al Baghdadi’s men are willing to die for the Caliphate, their dream, by contrast, is positive and contemporary: they want to experience the Caliphate on this earth, not only in the afterlife. Like Israel for Zionist Jews, the recreation of a strong Islamic state in the land of the forefathers represents deliverance in this life to some Muslims. This is a powerful, positive message for a population that is ready to hear it.
Seeking Consensus Inside the Shell-State
Rather paradoxically, the support of the population inside the state-shell is as important to al Baghdadi as is the commitment of his warriors. As proven by the Iranian Revolution, divine right alone is not enough to secure the functioning of the state. Nor can the Caliphate become a gigantic prison, as Taliban-controlled Afghanistan was. Unlike the Taliban, who behaved as a superior caste and preyed upon the local Afghan population, al Baghdadi aims to found a modern state, complete with the consent of the governed, even if the definition of the citizenry itself is limited by sectarianism and does not include the active participation of women. Key to this consent is the provision of social programs.
As has been reported in the Atlantic, in Syria and Iraq “IS helps run bread factories and provides fruits and vegetables to many families, passing the goods out personally. In Raqqa, ISIS has established a food kitchen to feed the needy and an Office for Orphans to help pair them with families. IS militants have developed health and welfare programs in the enclaves under their control, using the organization’s own funds. The Taliban may be paranoid and skeptical about vaccination campaigns, but IS conducts polio vaccination campaigns to arrest the spread of the disease.” Social programs,50 then, are the other side of the coin of the Islamic State’s barbarous sectarian dictatorship.51
It is important to point out that those who carry out social work are different from the fighters. “The distinction between civilians and fighter militants is fundamental. They are two different things,” explains Michael Przedlacki.52 If it is deemed necessary, fighters will prey upon the local population while civilian militants protect it. Inside the Caliphate, the distinction between these two types of militants is arranged to maximize the efficiency of the shell-state.
Moreover, the provision of social programs represents the fruit of IS’s economic strategy. That is hardly by mistake. Even before IS fighters had literally bulldozed sections of the border between Iraq and Syria to announce the birth of the Caliphate, revenues were plentiful. For example, for over a year the group has been running a profitable smuggling business along the Turkish and Syrian borders,53 even taking a cut of the humanitarian aid coming into Syria. Thanks to the clever plan of action carried out during its three-year privatization of terrorism, today the Islamic State does not need to prey upon the local population like other groups. As the Atlantic reported, when IS seized $425 million from Mosul’s central bank, the monies were earmarked to underwrite not only military aid but also “the group’s campaign to win hearts and minds.”54 Such events demonstrate an integration of the finances of the armed group, the Islamic State, and of its shell-state, the Caliphate.
The merging of IS funds with the shell-state’s finances and business partnerships with local tribes also proves the organization’s commitment to nation-building and demonstrates its application of some of the basic administrative principles of the modern nation state. Finally, the rechanneling of wealth inside the shell-state not only makes the Caliphate stronger militarily, but also solidifies consensus among the population.
The governorate of al Raqqa in Syria, where the headquarters of the Caliphate is located, offers several examples of public works bankrolled through the profits generated by the privatization of terrorism, such as the completion of a new souk, or public market, welcomed by the local population. The Islamic State also “runs an electricity office that monitors electricity-use levels, installs power lines, and hosts workshops on how to repair old ones. The militants fix potholes, bus residents between the territories they control, rehabilitate blighted medians to make roads more aesthetically pleasing, and operate a post office and zakat (almsgiving) office, which the group claims has helped farmers with their harvests. Most importantly for Syrians and Iraqis downriver, IS has continued operating the Tishrin Dam (renaming it al Faruq) on the Euphrates River. Through all of these offices and departments, IS is able to offer a semblance of stability in unstable and marginalized areas, even if many locals do not like its ideological program.”55 The pursuit of this type of stability through the rule of an armed organization is not atypical in regions that have suffered protracted conflicts. For example, in 1998, the Colombian government demilitarized an area the size of Switzerland encompassing the municipalities of San Vicente del Caguan, La Macarena, Vista Hermosa, Mesetas, and Uribe. The area, which became known as Despeje, was given to FARC, the Marxist armed organization, as a gesture of goodwill in bringing the country’s civil war to a peaceful conclusion. In this region FARC carried out social and public works. It built and paved new roads and improved the town’s communal areas, utilizing forced labor. It provided people with security, a luxury they had long lacked.56 However, none of the shell-states constructed by armed organizations has successfully completed the transition into a real state.
As we shall see in the following chapter, the Islamic State believes that this goal could be achieved by including local authorities and populations in the political construction of the Caliphate.
Footnotes:
34 Donald Neff, “The First Intifada Erupts, Forcing Israel to Recognize Palestinians.” http://www.ampalestine.org/index.php/history/the-intifadas/364-the-first-intifada-erupts-forcing-israel-to-recognize-palestinians.
35 Loretta Napoleoni, Terror Incorporated (New York: Seven Stories Press, 2005).
36 Hannah Allam, “Records Show How Iraqi Extremists Withstood US Anti-terror Efforts,” http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/06/23/231223/records-show-how-iraqi-extremists.html.
37 Bernard Haykel, “The Enemy of My Enemy Is Still My Enemy,” http://www.nytimes.com/ref/opinion/26haykel.html.
38 Aryn Baker, “Syrian Rebels Appear to Have a new Type of US Made Anti-Tank Weapon,” http://time.com/57313/syrian-rebels-are-seen-with-u-s-made-weapons/.
39 Erika Solomon, Daniel Dombey, “PKK ‘terrorists’ Crucial to Fight Against ISIS,” http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4a6e5b90-2460-11e4-be8e-00144feabdc0
.html#axzz3ATSuW000.
40 Interview with Francesca Borri, September 15, 2014.
41 Interview with a former Syrian rebel, August 10, 2014.
42 Interview with Francesca Borri, September 15, 2014.
43 “Opposizione siriana, Qatar ha pagato riscatto di 20 milioni di dollari per rilascio caschi blu da al-Nusra,” La Repubblica, September 13, 2014 (in Italian).
44 “Il Fatto Quotidiano. Isis, nuovo video. L’ostaggio John Cantlie ai media: ‘Dite la verità su Stato Islamico,’” http://www.ilfattoquotidiano.it/2014/09/18/isis-nuovo-video-lostaggio-john-cantlie-ai-media-dite-la-verita-sullo-stato-islamico/1125414/ (in Italian).
45 Elliot Ackerman, “Watching ISIS Flourish Where We Once Fought,” http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/watching-isis-flourish-where-we-once-fought
46 “ISIS Leader al-Baghdadi Proves Formidable Enemy,” http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/02/iraq-isis-baghdadi-mystery.html.
47 Middle East Monitor, “Corruption in the Palestinian Authority,” https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/downloads/reports/20131214_CorruptioninthePalestinianAuthority.pdf.
48 Maggie O’Kane, “Where War is a Way of Life,” http://www.theguardian.com/world/2001/oct/15/afghanistan.terrorism9.
49 Hannah Allam, “Records Show How Iraqi Extremists Withstood US Anti-terror Efforts,” http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2014/06/23/231223/records-show-how-iraqi-extremists.html.
50 In fact, Moqtada al Sadr followed a similar blueprint in the Shiite suburbs of Baghdad in 2003, creating his own shell-state and social programs, and this approach proved very successful.
51 Aaron Zelin, “The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria Has a Consumer Protection Office,” http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/06/the-islamic-state-of-iraq-and-syria-has-a-consumer-protection-office/372769/.
52 Interview with Michael Przedlacki, September 16, 2014.
53 Fehim Taştekin, “Turkey’s Syria borders an open door for smugglers,” http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/04/turkey-syria-borders-smuggling-guns-conflict-kurds-pkk-isis.html.
54 Aaron Zelin, “The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria Has a Consumer Protection Office.” http://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2014/06/the-islamic-state-of-iraq-and-syria-has-a-consumer-protection-office/372769/.
55 Ibid.
56 Juan Foerom, “Rebel-Held Zone in Colombia Fears End of Truce.” http://www.nytimes.com/2000/12/16/world/rebel-held-zone-in-colombia-fears-end-of-truce.html.