Dozens of successor groups forming in wake of ISIS defeat, experts warn

The collapse of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria is giving rise to a host of successor groups, which are quickly regrouping, recruiting members and launching increasingly sophisticated attacks against government forces, according to experts. A military victory in the war against ISIS was officially declared by the Iraqi government in December of last year. In recent weeks, United States President Donald Trump has repeated his government’s claim that American forces are “knocking the hell out of ISIS”. The Sunni militant group, which rose to prominence in 2014 after conquering much of Syria and northwestern Iraq, is clearly on the retreat, having lost every major urban center that it used to control. However, the collapse of the organization has led to the emergence of numerous insurgent groups that are quickly forming in Iraq and Syria.

Many of these highly agile groups are operating in the sparsely inhabited and remote southern district of Iraq’s Kurdish region, which includes the Hamrin Mountains. Others are found in Iraq’s arid regions west of the Euphrates. All are engaged in recruitment, propaganda and —increasingly— attacks against government forces and rival Shiite militias. Writing on Sunday, BuzzFeed’s Turkey-based Middle East correspondent Borzou Daragahi profiled one such group, the so-called White Flags. The group was formed in late 2017 through the union of two ISIS commanders, Khaled al-Moradi, an Iraqi Turkman, and Hiwa Chor, a former member of Ansar al-Islam, a predominantly Kurdish jihadist group that was active in northern Iraq after 2003. Daragahi notes that the White Flags have managed to carry out strikes in Baghdad and Kirkuk, and have repeatedly ambushed Iraqi government forces and members of Shiite militias. Senior White Flag members have been involved with ISIS for years and have “a wide range of experience [and] a high level of training”, says Daragahi. They are one of several post-ISIS armed groups that are recruiting members from Iraq’s disaffected Sunni Arab minority, while promising to protect them from the ire of the almost exclusively Shiite Iraqi government.

In a separate but related development, two analysts with Britain’s Government Communications Headquarters —the country’s primary communications interception agency— have warned that ISIS remains a “significant threat” to the West. The two analysts spoke on Britain’s Sky News television, using only their first names, Ben and Sunny. They recognized that ISIS has lost much of its territory in recent months, but cautioned that it continues to be “a very advanced adversary”, primarily due to its technological dexterity. Operational planners of ISIS have “pushed the bar and raised the bar” in terms of the “technology they have used and the ways in which they have used it”, said one of the analysts, adding that British intelligence agencies have to keep adapting their techniques to remain “one step ahead” of ISIS operatives. IntelNews regulars will recall that last year this blog advised Western counter-terrorism officials to “actively and immediately prepare” for attacks by ISIS militants using chemical weapons.

► Author: Joseph Fitsanakis | Date: 3 April 2018 | Permalink