Pakistan and the ISlamic State: ISI, ISIS, and the IS
Did you hear? After a 90 year interlude, the world finally got back its caliphate.
As of June 2014, there is once again an Islamic State in the Middle East. Matter of fact, it was formed by a group now going by “Islamic State,” or simply IS. Before changing their name to something that most Americans will pronounce as “Iz,” they were previously known as ISIS, the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (or Sham). ISIS itself grew out of a coalition between the Islamic State of Iraq, or ISI, and the Syrian rebels. The original ISI, in this case, should not to be confused with the other, Pakistani ISI, or the terror masters who run the Inter-Services Intelligence agency.
Well, maybe the two ISIs, the Iraqi and Pakistani, should be conflated a bit. The Pakistani ISI, incidentally, does count among its business partners one Dawood Ibrahim, a notorious Mumbai gangster and al Qaeda associate, currently residing in Pakistan. Not only is Dawood in business with the Taliban and their burgeoning opium fields, but he is also behind some of the most notorious terror attacks in Indian history, which killed hundreds. Under protection of the ISI, not unlike Osama bin Laden was, last year it was reported that Don Ibrahim pledged 30% of his revenue to fund terror.
With these images of Islam, terror, and India’s underworld floating around in your head, you may be asking, what exactly is a caliphate anyway? To quote Barack Obama’s Democrat predecessor, William Jefferson Clinton, “It depends on what the meaning of the word ‘IS’ is.”
Caliphate is the name given to the political institution of the Muslim ummah, or community, which governed by Sharia (i.e., Koranic) law and ruled by a Caliph, or successor to the Prophet Mohammed. You can look up the details, but it has something to do with Islamic supremacy, subjugating the infidel to theocratic 7th century rule and a jizya tax for not saying the Shahada, slaughtering declared enemies of the Prophet like halal certified camels, and stoning to death women who protest resembling Batman in public.
The terminology is confusing, but do not despair fellow kufar. There is a convenient translational dictionary, adapted and updated for the Age of Obama (available here). Inshallah it will permit you to make the most of this Islamic revival.
Or is it a Carteliphate?
All that Islamo stuff aside, the brand new, shiny, genocidal Islamic State also presents a golden opportunity for the smuggling the drugs and other goodies not considered haram (that means “forbidden”) by Sharia standards. As long as the denizens of the Caliphate don’t peddle in fermented grains or bacon, there are plenty of ways to have fun in this practical Middle Eastern nightclub. Drugs are coming in by the plane and truck load.
Documents leaked this week show the backing of IS by a certain Middle Eastern kingdom in the Persian Gulf: natural gas rich Qatar. Qatar is known for many things other than drug smuggling, like banning tank tops, slaves, bribing FIFA, pampering the freed Taliban prisoners, being the driving force behind the Arab Spring, and determining America’s foreign policy . But let’s just, for the moment, focus on the drug smuggling.
To begin, Qatar is in a strategic business partnership with the National Logistics Cell, a division of the ISI (see above) responsible for operating trucks. See, Qatar has had a construction boom over the last decade or so, and they need trucks to bring in the materials. Problem is, NLC trucks are notorious for carrying Taliban heroin. (FYI: They’re also NATO subcontractors, really.)
Furthermore, Doha International, Qatar’s airport, has become a transiting hub for South American cocaine. Boko Haram, started with seed money from Qatar and famous for selling Christian girls into sex slavery, is also in the drug smuggling business across North Africa. Like the Doha International loads, Boko Haram is moving South American product, as well. Finally, the coincidences between Islamist terror groups and Mexican cartels are almost certainly not coincidental. From beheadings to crucifixions, to human and narcotics trafficking, is it any surprise that Qatar purchased ocean front real estate in Mexico, in a place known for narcotics activity?
Now throw in Dawood Ibrahim, one of the most wanted men in the world, and his al Qaeda-allied criminal organization D-Company. If the Carteliphate starts to resemble the Free and Sovereign State of Sinaloa, now you know why.
Turkish Delights
It would be wrong to give all the credit for the new narco-Caliphate to a country whose greatest cultural achievement has been to construct a hedge fund, the Qatar Investment Authority, from natural gas exports and the hard work of Bedouin gangbangers. One of the other major powers behind al Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s rise to supreme Holy Leader of the Ummah is seat of the previous Caliphate, Turkey. Turkey is mentioned in the leaked document, linked above, as the power who could help provide logistics to certain ports.
Until 1924, Istanbul was the political center of the Islamic world. Never known for their great tolerance for other religions, toward the end of the Ottoman Empire things got especially bloody for Christians. From 1894-1896, Sultan-Caliph Abdul Hamid II ordered the massacre of an estimated 80,000-300,000 Armenians. But they were only getting started. During World War I, the Ottoman Empire killed upwards of 1.5 million Armenians, actually leading to the invention of the word “genocide” to describe the mass-murder of an entire race of people.
In this grand tradition of Islamist bloody murder against religious minorities, al-Baghdadi has shown himself a preconscious student. Iraqi Army soldiers, POWs, are routinely executed allegedly because they are Shia [as opposed to Sunni Muslims]. Hmm, this doesn’t bode well for relations between the little Caliphate and Shiite Iran, does it? Christians in Syria have suffered awfully from IS[IS], where they are persecuted for their beliefs, murdered, and even crucified in the style of their Savior. In Iraq, what few Christians remain are fleeing for their lives from the minions of the Caliphate, which, believe it or not, include a group called “The Army of Mohammed.” Most merciful? I think not.
Some people, it seems, refuse to get with the times, say the Shahada, and submit to the will of al-Baghdadi. They’d rather remain infidels than join the carnival of violence.
Obama’s Sham Child
The truth of the matter is, the man we have to thank most for this glorious new Caliphate is none other than Barack Hussein Obama, the 44th President of the United States of America. For it is Obama whom Qatar depends on to provide the military and diplomatic muscle in the region, which has made this all possible.
- Both Qatar and Obama removed Gaddafi, turning it into a terrorist state resembling an African Afghanistan.
- Both Qatar and Obama supported Muslim Brotherhood President Morsi in Egypt
- Both Qatar and Obama support the Syrian “rebels,” i.e. jihadis, where IS came from.
- Obama and the previous Emir of Qatar even met at West Point to formalize the Bowe Bergdahl swap for the Talib 5.
- Obama abandoned Iraq and refuses to provide air cover for the Iraqi Army against IS, once again at the direction of Qatar, for he does not want to risk offending Iraq’s Sunnis. (Try not to think about them slaughtering everyone else in sight.)
Lest you’ve forgotten, Mr. Obama, you might call him the Emir of Americas:
- Declared that the United States is not a Christian or Jewish nation while speaking in Turkey in 2009.
- Said Prophet of Islam should not be criticized while speaking at the United Nations in 2012.
- Traveled on one of his first trips as Emir of the Americas was to Cairo, the heart of Islamic learning, to address the Muslim World.
- Said one of his best friends among leaders is Recep Erdogan, the Islamist who has turned Turkey away from secular rule.
- Has a senior advisor at the Department of Homeland Security who tweets encouragement to the nascent Caliphate through his official U.S. government Twitter account and says the United States is an Islamic country.
The Black Hole
Black is the color of al Qaeda, IS, and other such groups. A map released by IS shows their aspirations for the borders of the Caliphate, which would stretch from the Horn of Africa to India, from Spain to Austria to Greece, from the Crimea to the Balkans. Already, much of this area is infested with al Qaeda groups, who use terror to dominate the local populations and then move in with profitable criminal activities.
A “black hole” state is one which serves as a haven for organized crime. Should IS establish a Caliphate even half or one-quarter the size of what they aspire to, it will be the largest black hole state in the entire world, by far. It would be tantamount to the barbarian hordes sacking Rome and ending civilization across three continents.
We may never reach that point. But if we do, let there be no doubt: Barack Obama, who has given the United States nothing but a wrecked economy and an evolving dictatorship, has given the world back its Caliphate.
Right Side News contributing writer William Michael