The announcement of victory over the Islamic State group in Syria marks the end of the extremists’ self-styled caliphate, a proto-state in which they held millions hostage to their dark and brutal vision.
BEIRUT — The announcement of victory over the Islamic State group in Syria marks the end of the extremists’ self-styled caliphate, a proto-state in which they held millions hostage to their dark and brutal vision.
But IS, which traces its roots back to the bloody emergence of al-Qaida in Iraq after the 2003 U. S.-led invasion, has survived past defeats and is already waging a low-level insurgency in areas it was driven from months or even years ago.
The grueling 4 ½-year campaign to drive IS from the territories it once held has left entire towns and neighborhoods in ruins, in both war-torn Syria and Iraq. If the long-standing grievances of Sunni Muslims in both countries continue to fester, the extremists could rise again.
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WHAT HAS ENDED EXACTLY?
What is over is the Islamic State group’s physical “caliphate,” after the Syrian Democratic Forces, a Kurdish-led group supported by the United States, declared on Saturday the capture of the last tiny patch of territory controlled by the militants, in the eastern Syrian village of Baghouz.
That domain once stretched over large parts of Syria and Iraq, which the group conquered in a blitz in the summer of 2014, capturing towns and cities, including Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest.
The fighters bulldozed berms along the border and proclaimed a contiguous caliphate stretching across a third of both countries. At its height, the territory was the size of Britain, stretching from near the northern Syrian town of Aleppo to the outskirts of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, and home to 8 million people.
The extremists governed under a harsh and violent interpretation of Islam. They massacred those who resisted their rule and beheaded hostages, including Western journalists and foreign aid workers, in gruesome videos circulated online. Alleged adulterers were stoned to death, those believed to be gay were thrown from the tops of buildings, and children were made to watch the atrocities as part of their brainwashing. The group captured thousands of women from Iraq’s Yazidi minority, forcing them into sexual slavery.
IS also carried out the more mundane actions of a state — collecting taxes, printing school textbooks, minting its own currency and restoring public infrastructure. It was an experiment in statehood that not even al-Qaida ever tried on a significant scale.
