March, 2015 – The Atlanitic, from an article entitled “What Isis Really Wants“, by Graeme Wood

Some key points from The Atlantic and its feature article on “ISIS” this month:

• Other governments and leaders have misunderstood ISIS, and many really don’t even understand what they are about.
• This misunderstanding has resulted in foolish schemes to try to counter the group, which have largely failed to this point.
• As a result, they have grown in just a few years from a fringe group to one that dominates parts of Iraq, Syria, and now Libya.  They already rule an area larger than the size of the UK, and control a population of some 8 million people.
• “The reality is that the Islamic State is Islamic. Very Islamic. Yes, it has attracted psychopaths and adventure seekers, drawn largely from the disaffected populations of the Middle East and Europe. But the religion preached by its most ardent followers derives from coherent and even learned interpretations of Islam.
• “Virtually every major decision and law promulgated by the Islamic State adheres to what it calls, in its press and pronouncements, and on its billboards, license plates, stationery, and coins, “the Prophetic methodology,” which means following the prophecy and example of Muhammad, in punctilious detail. Muslims can reject the Islamic State; nearly all do. But pretending that it isn’t actually a religious, millenarian group, with theology that must be understood to be combated, has already led the United States to underestimate it and back foolish schemes to counter it.”
• In order to defeat this movement, we must become learned in their “intellectual genealogy” so that we can react in such a way that will not strengthen it, but instead “help it to self-immolate in its own excessive zeal.”

Read the full article, and gain a better understanding of what this group is, what they believe, and their plans for the future of the world:  http://www.theatlantic.com/features/archive/2015/02/what-isis-really-wants/384980/