"Murder Of All Kinds"

"Is it not high time for you to dirty your feet with the dirt of jihad in the cause of Allah?"
"Is it not time for you to feel the whiz of bullets over your heads?"
"With this declaration, Allah permitting, the name Islamic State of Iraq, as well as the name Al-Nusrah Front, will disappear from our use, and become part of our blessed jihadi history."
"The clouds are about to clear from the skies, so the bright sun of Islam can shine, a sun that bears warmth, security, safety, dignity and good living for every Muslim man and woman, and for every boy and girl, and for all of those [that] have a right in the house ... of the Muslims."
Ibrahim Awwad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri al-Samarrai, aka Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi

"We're not going to allow ourselves to be dragged back into a situation in which, while we're there we're keeping a lid on things, and after enormous sacrifices by us, after we're not there, people start acting in ways that are not conducive to the long-term stability and prosperity of the country."
"We do have a stake in making sure that these jihadists are not getting a permanent foothold in either Iraq or Syria, for that matter."
U.S. President Barack Obama

"[Not since bin Laden] has such a leader been held in such reverence among Sunni fighters, scored such stunning and shocking victories, and threatened so much of the established order."
Al Jazeera

"Under our ruling the people are safe and secure. [Those who wage] war against Allah [shall be killed]. Whoever changes his religion, kill him. Strike him with the sword, whoever he is."
Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham (ISIS)

Fighters from the Al-Qaeda-linked Islamic State of Iraq & al-Sham (ISIS) march in Raqqa, Syria. AP Photo/militant website

Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, leader of ISIS, a secretive man who inspires radical Islamism, speaks softly to those among whom his terrorists move, to assure them that as righteously pious Muslims they will be safe and secure under his rule. That is to say, the rule of fundamentalist Sunni Islam. Muslims who practise the Islamic sect of Shia Islam are consigned to another fate, as heretics. Thus far, ISIS claims to have executed 1,700 Shiite military personnel.

Which may go a long way to explaining why a mere one thousand ISIS terrorists were able easily to rout 30,000 Iraqi police and soldiers from Mosul. Bewildered Mosul refugees arriving to take safe haven under Kurdish protection, spoke of the Islamists appearing suddenly as though from nowhere, and soldiers scrambling to rid themselves of their uniforms, mingling with the crowd wearing civilian clothing, abandoning their military hardware.

Enabling that scanty crew of Islamists to loot armouries, occupy government buildings, and take possession of hundreds of millions of dollars from the Mosul central bank. United Nations human rights chief Navi Pillay has stated her office received reports of summary executions, reprisal killing, rape, kidnapping; "murder of all kinds". As an example, 17 civilians on a street in Mosul were rounded up and killed. It is examples such as this that chill the very marrow of the vulnerable.

The Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham posted a 61-minute video online, graphically showing an ISIS group knocking on the door of a police major in Iraq in the black dead of night. When the door is opened, they blindfold and cuff the policeman, then slice off his head with a knife in his own bedroom. "Through their use of media, the propagation of their message, and their explicit and gory operations, they create a real intimidatory factor", according to Mathew Henman, head of IHS Jane's Terrorism and Insurgency Centre, London.



But there is a response to the Sunni terror battalions. Iraq's Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, the revered Shiite cleric has exhorted all Iraqis to defend their country from the terrorists. It is their civic duty to confront the threat, worshippers at Friday prayers were told. ISIS jihadis driving machine-gun-mounted pickups claimed two newly conquered towns late on Thursday, 124 kilometres northeast of Baghdad and 95 kilometres north of the capital.  Again, Iraqi soldiers abandoned posts there, giving no resistance.

Volunteers, who have joined the fight against predominantly Sunni militants, carry weapons during a parade in the streets in Baghdad's Sadr city. Photograph: Reuters

In Baghdad, however, security officials insist that government troops, backed by the Kurdish peshmerga forces counterattacked hours later, forcing the terrorists to withdraw. The numbers are telling; the population of Iraq is comprised of 34% Sunni, 63% Shiite. Half the number of Sunnis as the Shia population. Under Saddam Hussein it was the minority Sunnis that ruled and oppressed the Shiites. Under the current Shia-majority-led government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, the Sunnis are held in contempt and marginalized.

Under American democratic tutelage and instruction, the first government that was temporarily installed was a unity administration, with Iraqi Sunni, Shiite and Kurd representation. While the Kurds assembled an independent governing infrastructure in Iraqi Kurdistan with their own military and managed to become an idyllic oasis in an otherwise-sea-of-Iraqi-instability, the majority Shia sought to edge out the Sunnis, and did just that, with al-Maliki accusing the Sunni President of terrorism signing a warrant for his arrest.

The Sunni tribes, locked out of the military after Saddam Hussein's downfall, created their own militias with the encouragement of the U.S. who helped train and arm them, and used them to fight al-Qaeda Islamists that flooded into Iraq through the deliberately porous Syrian border. The Northern Awakening militias were supposed to be melded into the regular Iraqi military with the departure of the American troops, but this never happened. The result was the complete alienation of Iraqi Sunnis from the larger majority, and their radicalization.

Though Iraqi Sunnis hold no particular brief for the brutal methodology of the al-Qaeda-linked jihadists, their grievance against the Shia government is great enough to make them indifferent to the presence of the ISIS terrorists in the hope they will unsettle the Shia-led government to take Iraq into a Sunni-led Sharia empire. ISIS is fighting a battle to establish itself as the primary Islamist power in both Syria and Iraq with aspirations to spread its strength into Lebanon, Jordan and anywhere else it can establish itself through fear and violence.

Their leader, 43-year-old cleric Baghdadi has a $10-million price on his head, the most wanted international terrorist since the death of Osama bin Laden; considered to be more viciously dangerous than his predecessors. He has a doctorate from the Islamic University of Baghdad. He had led a local militia unit until his capture by U.S. forces, when he was held briefly as a war prisoner. By 2005 he was considered a senior Al-Qaeda in Iraq leader intent on imposing extremist Islam on Iraq to begin with and then extending his rule.

When the civil war erupted in Syria he sent a delegate to set up an Al-Qaeda affiliate, the Al-Nusrah Front. In 2013 he transformed the group into the Islamic State in Iraq and Al-Sham (the ancient name for the greater Syria region). He is seen by many as presenting the future of jihad, with thousands of battle-hardened armed men under his command. Iran, alarmed at the threat to Shiites presented by the Sunni terrorist network, has sent Iranian troops to aid Baghdad. The United States will, in some guise, become involved in pushing back ISIS.

"The Iraqi armed forces will eliminate these terrorists", said Abdulrahman Hamid Al-Hussaini, ambassador to Canada, claiming government forces were closing in on Baghdadi to capture or kill him. In the meanwhile, ISIS is working hard to endear itself to the people of Mosul and beyond. Women who are judges, lawyers and doctors have been informed they must stay at home, wearing burqas. Shrines which offend its religious doctrine will be destroyed. Thieves' limbs will be amputated.