History of violence and colonialism in Iraq and Syria

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Chapter 2 : Historical flashbacks, ideology and the lure of IS

Chapter two presents a brief background and flashback of the historical developments inside Iraq and Syria that have contributed to the tensions and escalating conflict in modern day Iraq and Syria. It considers the Realpolitik, the historical contexts and the stigmergic effect⁸⁷ that has spurred the development and the rise of IS and its lure for foreign fighters. In this regard, the research question for this chapter is, “What are the historical antecendents/ origins of the rise and development of IS and the growing support it receives from foreign fighters?” The recruitment of foreign fighters constitutes a substantive aspect of the conceptualisation of the rise and development of IS because of the fact that foreign fighters provide the necessary human capital needed to sustain the momentum and onslaught by IS against its enemies. Additionally, foreign fighters are considered a threat to the international community premised on the assumption that these fighters have the ‘potential’ to retaliate on the homeland once they return.

 Introduction

It is true that… [the revolution] includes various factions representing the diversity of the street…but mostly the initiators are young and not influenced by ideology. They have no dogmatic concept of freedom but rather a realistic view which implies that the totalitarianism of the regime is the only obstacle to freedom.
Mazen Km al-Maz
The rise of IS in the first hundred days of the summer of 2014 marked a change in the way in which the theatre of war had been scripted to narrate the history, map the present and deliver the future of Iraq and Syria. Despite being established since 2006, IS gained momentum in 2013 and 2014. During this time it managed to capture most of the majority Sunni populated areas inside Iraq and then declared itself the Caliphate. In Dabiq, Issue 1 of Ramadan 1435, IS writes, [t]he victories in Ninawa, al-Anbar, Salahuddin, al-Khayr, al-Barakah, and elsewhere, all aided the declaration made by the Islamic State on the first of Ramadan 1435H, in which the Khilafah was officially announced.
This declaration was significant as it signified the intentional cancellation of the artificial borders set by the Sykes-Picot Agreement since 1916 which had shaped the geopolitical landscape of the Middle-East. It was also significant because it now challenged the modern concept and meaning of a nation state and sovereignty. The debate on the state in the MENA is an integral aspect in analysing the violence of non-state actors because the state shapes the method and content of politics. The Sykes-Picot Agreement had remained as a symbol of the betrayal of Arab expectations and a determined effort to initiate an on-going conflict and instability in the region. IS’s declaration was thus an anti-imperial declaration. It was also an informed declaration, an awareness of the theatre of power in the killing fields of the Middle East. Ultimately, it was a declaration of contestation for the interpretation of the script and the right to not only retell the story on its terms, but the right to own the story.
IS had engaged in a full blown propaganda programme for eight years (since 2006), and its ambitions, political project and ideology are available on various platforms, communicating different messages to its Arab and Muslim audience on the one hand and to its enemies on the other. It’s messaging and propaganda has been strategically constructed to have the greatest impact on the audience it is speaking to, but the propensity to publish and update has decreased since the beginning of 2017. This has been due to the onslaught on IS strongholds by foreign military interventions and the fight to retake Mosul and other areas inside Iraq and Syria. IS is by no means a ‘shadow’ organisation and the fact that it had remained in obscurity till 2013/2014 raises pertinent questions. Suddenly, it seemed as if the curtains had lifted from the stage and IS emerged – from guest appearance to main actor. Even IS was cognisant of the nature and context of the space it occupied and the theatre effect that shaped the discourse of the region. IS makes reference to this contextualisation and narrative in issue 1 of Dabiq, stating that there was a “coordinated campaign to completely remove it (IS) from the Shami theatre…”⁹⁰
From 2013, the scrolls unravelled, revealing a plot based on the political history of the region; the Al-Sharq⁹¹ would be used as a theatre to show power. Significantly, a 100 years down the line, (from 1916 till the present) the same theatrical imagery of the political history of the Al-Sharq is being played. In an interview with Jeffrey Goldberg, President Obama explains the emergence of IS according to metaphors taken from the theatre,⁹² claiming that IS was an actor disturbing the balance that had been established in the “power-sharing arrangement among the gangsters.”⁹³ Citing Christopher Nolan’s 2008 film, The Dark Knight, Obama refers to IS as the Middle-East’s “Joker” who “soon turns this balance upside down,”⁹⁴ because of its capacity “to set the whole region on fire. That’s why we have to fight it.”⁹⁵ The use of the joker metaphor is striking and deeply telling. It continues the narrative of an age-old claim of evil Muslims vs. good westerners,⁹⁶ reinforcing the political mantra of westerners as saviours or what is commonly understood as the ‘good’ actors in the scene. What is also telling about Obama’s response is the manner in which the fiery scene and the actors are described in what is obviously an ambiguous and complicated geopolitical theatre of power which accommodated approximately 89 coups d’état in the MENA between 1950 and 2013.⁹⁷
Ironically, Obama’s manner of eschewing the role of the US as one of the “power-sharing gangsters” by referring to the US as the Knight reconciling between the gangsters, is of and by itself telling.⁹⁸ This is especially so for the occupied, invaded, tortured and degraded people of Iraq and Syria and the Ummah (the global Islamic community) in general. Furthermore, the gangster imagery is not lost on anti-war activists. On the home-front anti-war American intellectuals have written about American gangsterism, specifically in its foreign policy. The extent of US gangsterism in the military has been reported by various news outlets including the Chicago Sun-Times which revealed the existence of “increasing gang activity in the Army in the United States” and it was estimated that approximately “320 admitted gang members” have served in the US army in Iraq since 2002.⁹⁹ According to Justin Raimondo, it is unsurprising that “the cult of thuggery” would manifest in US foreign and military policy,” a foreign policy touted as being “‘unilateralist,’” but in actual fact reflects an organising principle of US foreign policy in the Bush II era which was ultimately about “might makes right.” Sedimented deep into this foreign policy and its principle of
“might makes right” was the “theory of pre-emption” which had been incorporated into the US military as an official doctrine.¹⁰⁰ To substantiate his claim, Raimondo states that, gangsterish foreign policy requires a mercilessly brutal gang of enforcers, and that, from all accounts, is what the U.S. military is turning into in Iraq. The latest evidence of this is what happened in Haditha, where U.S. Marines cut down at least 15 Iraqi civilians in cold blood. A young Iraqi girl testifies, ‘The Americans came into the room where my father was praying and shot him.¹⁰¹
This then, is the story of the joker, the gangsters and the Dark Knight in the Shami theatre. Scripted through a toxic approach from 1916 till now (2017), a 100 years and counting, from the time of the collapse of the Ottoman Sultanate and the conniving of the Sykes-Picot agreement the ultimate aim it can be argued was to divide, destroy and dismantle the region. The continuation of the gangster tradition and the gangster imagery is scripted on the walls of Baghdad as a result of the US invasion where [t]he Gangster Disciples, Latin Kings, and Vice Lords [who] were born decades ago in Chicago’s most violent neighborhoods, [n]ow, [have] their gang graffiti … showing up 6,400 miles away in one of the world’s most dangerous neighborhoods – Iraq.¹⁰²
The script would read the story of exploitation and control. Of colonial powers, (or gangsters?) who would function as devilfish in the water to exert power and dominate the people of the Al-Sharq through external leverage whilst controlling their resources. The plot would involve the creation of sectarian differences to foster hatred and conflict. After having masterfully generated the script in a toxic climate of divisions, a renegade actor surfaced to challenge the devilfish, the Knights and the gangsters by redirecting the theatrics. Yet this actor, the Joker of the Middle-East is playing by the same rules, using the same tactics of those who devised the plot, choreographed the action and directed the development of the Middle-Eastern theatre. It is an unwelcome understudy, it is IS.

History of violence and colonialism in Iraq and Syria

The legacy of the divide-and-rule strategy

When comparing the violence of the understudy, the Joker, to the violence of the main actors it is obvious that the use of violence by IS in Iraq and Syria is by no means a new occurrence. Violence has been the preferred means of engagement for European role players in the Middle East and in MMC. In 1923, British Foreign Secretary, Lord Curzon, a man who played an instrumental role in supporting and propping up Mustafa Kemal and in organising the Lausanne conference, stated in the House of Commons, “The situation now is that Turkey is dead and will never rise again, because we have destroyed (my emphasis) its moral strength, the Caliphate and Islam.”¹⁰³ The colonial and imperial strategy was and still is about sowing divisions in this region and maintaining the degraded status of the world’s Muslims in order to harness and secure the prolific resources of the Al-Sharq; resources which have been subject to the depredations of colonialism and imperialism. The nature of this domination and pillage is referenced by Juan Cole after the Manchester bombings of 2017. According to Cole.

DECLARATION
Acknowledgement
ACRONYMS 
Abstract 
Contents 
Chapter 1: Identification of the research theme .
1. 1 Research Problem
1.2 Research questions
1.3 Methodology
1.4 Motivation and rationale for the research
1.5 Theoretical framework
1.6 Structure/Outline
Chapter 2 : Historical flashbacks, ideology and the lure of IS
2.1 Introduction
2.2 History of violence and colonialism in Iraq and Syria
2.3 Historical flashback: Violent inseminations and stigmergy
2.4 Ideology and Influence
2. 5 Lure of IS for foreign fighters
2.6 Conclusion
Chapter 3: The violence of IS
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Templates of violence
3.3 What is violence?
3.4 Conclusion
Chapter 4: The Master’s Logic: A critical discourse analysis of the Paris attacks of November 2015
4.1 Introduction
4.2 Opening Scene: Cameron’s flashbacks and fantasies
4.3 Scene two: IS on the stage: between Islam and the West
4.4 Conclusion
Chapter 5: Conclusion: Findings and Recommendations 
5.1 Key findings
5.2 Areas for further research
5.3 Bibliography
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