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Know ISIS to Defeat ISIS

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The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) is best described as an aberration to a peace loving humanity. It cannot be emphasized enough! ISIS is not Islamic and it is not a state! An organization like ISIS is based on an illegitimate founding. Its architects and practitioners alike thrive on a culture of anti-intellectualism. Through polarized stratification, ISIS continues to alienate Islam from its great civilizing tradition. In order to overcome ISIS, it is imperative, first and foremost, for Muslims to understand and expose its debauchery. Such efforts will enable the re-dignification of Islam which will mark the rekindling of a renewed Islamic renaissance.

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Know ISIS to Defeat ISIS

An Editorial to the New York Times on the Insanity of Fringe Extremism

Omar Alansari-Kreger

The madness of the times is all too surreal. How can people bring themselves to commit acts of unspeakable atrocity? Wherever there is rage, there is desperation. The victims of oppression are some of the most marginalized people on the planet. They have no rights and are treated as a subhuman species by their oppressors. The Middle East has been a powder keg since the end of the First World War. The colonial powers of Europe designed the geo-political map of the Middle East for one specific purpose: divide and conquer. All the while, the United States has done little to reverse such a trend from history.

The legacy of “Operation Iraqi Freedom,” is a contradiction in terms. On the contrary! Critics of the campaign should rename it “Operation Iraqi Terror,” to illustrate the true reality of its legacy. It condemned the posterity of Iraq to a state of abysmal chaos. After the official withdrawal of the US military, how much freedom is enjoyed by the average Iraqi citizen? The United States orchestrated Saddam’s ouster at the expense of a nation’s preexisting peace and security that once existed before the war. History proves that order and stability are also byproducts of dictatorship. The legacy of the U.S. military occupation has created a vacuum of opportunistic anarchy where the most arbitrary wielder of power secures tactical field advantages on the battlefield. With oppression comes hate which has little to no control in the enraged mind. That is why crimes against humanity are forged in the dehumanizing images of atrocity.

Who is to blame for the rise of the illegitimate Islamic State? Does the emergence of ISIS signify the failure of democracy in the ethnocentrically and ideologically stratified nations of Iraq and Syria? The fact of the matter is that no volume of bombs, bullets, and ballistics will bring about the defeat of ISIS. The headmasters of the illegitimate Islamic State are waging an ideological war that begins first and foremost in the mind. A victim of oppression living on the brink of existence has nothing to lose. That is especially true when they have directly suffered under an array of human atrocities most pronounced through personal tragedies. Irrespective of ideology, the most dangerous person in the world is one who has nothing to lose. Nothing is no longer scared which is why any and everything is a potential target.

That describes one mere aspect of the ISIS dynamic. As modern news reports confirm, a great deal of ISIS recruits originate from Western backgrounds largely derived from marginalized upbringings. The success of ISIS is attributable to thrill seekers that thrive under obtuse clouds of ignorance. When the cause in question demands total self-sacrifice through weighted tokens of death, all restraints are removed. ISIS attracts fringe elements that have given up on humanity. To the radicalized mind, posterity is treated as an alien concept. This can be broken down into two different categories which include criminals and social dropouts. The non-religious turned fringe fanatic is an attestation of desperation made possible through an extreme

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epiphany of hate. The belief of all or nothing interprets reality through a vision of penetrating polarity. Any perspective that is opposed to its own is nothing but an enemy, period.

ISIS was formed in a state of abject obscurity. No one really knows where they came from and how they plan on attaining their objectives. The practitioners of fringe extremism are as hypocritical as they are fanatical. They seek world vindication at the expense of an otherwise dignified humanity. Similar to the actual practice of communism, fringe fanatics transcend into the same class enemy they openly despise. To overcome the illegitimate Islamic State, it is above all necessary to address their cause for what it really is; that is best described as an apocalyptic dystopia with no respect for the human condition. The richness of Islam is found in its great civilizing tradition detailing a period that lasted from the 6th century to the 20th. That is an attestation of what Islam is combined together with what it truly stands for. An organization like ISIS thrives under an aura of anti-intellectualism. When the forces of hate, bigotry, and absolute retribution overtake the mind, sanity is forgotten and abandoned to the whirlwind of time. ISIS is a Muslim problem first and foremost.

Once Muslims return to their roots it becomes possible to adopt a comprehensive appreciation of Islam. That details a much needed awakening that can encourage a great insurrection against ISIS in all of its known forms. Such forces could encourage the rekindling of Near Eastern Civilization through a renewed Islamic Renaissance for the Ages. When Muslims root out ISIS through the power of Islam, a “campaign of re-dignification” can restore the hope of civilization to the oppressed and vanquished.