Beating the Islamic State Won’t Fix Iraq .
By Dr. Elie Abouaoun
Published in the "Foreign Policy" on July 8th, 2015.
The country's extremist problem goes way beyond ISIS. And unless the state fixes its governance troubles, it will have to fight this war all over again
Last spring, it would have been difficult for the world to imagine
large chunks of Iraq falling
into the hands of the Islamic State.
But the group’s presence — through the fall of Mosul, its expansion into Syria’s civil war, and its claiming
responsibility for attacks
around the world
— has all but become
the singular representation of Muslim radicalism, even though it has only commanded the world’s attention for just over a year. The circumstances that incubate this kind of ideological radicalization, however, are much older than the Islamic
State — and
they will almost
surely outlast it.
Unless the Iraqi
government, with the help of the international community, is able to engage in legitimate state development and governance in
the
region, militant extremism
will continue to rush in and fill the resulting
social and political vacuums.
The U.S.-led military
campaign — despite
some successes — has struggled
to push the group back. To actually help
Iraq defeat the Islamic State,
however, the United
States needs to diversify its approach. Fighting the kind of radicalization epitomized by the Islamic
State means addressing the base problem: the lack of legitimate governance structures that provide citizens
with opportunities for prosperity. Iraq cannot achieve this level
of legitimacy without
help and investment in the country’s economic and social infrastructure. If the United
States wants Iraq to overcome
this challenge, it needs to help Iraqis
rebuild an inclusive governance model as well as educational and economic opportunities in a way that benefits
all constituents — or face the possibility of groups violently
fracturing off to tend to the needs that their government cannot.
Though the Islamic
State is the current enemy, the problem
Iraq is fighting has deep roots. The Middle East is no stranger
to ideologies that use Islam
as justification for political violence. Before the Islamic State, there was al Qaeda. It, in turn,
was preceded by the often
forgotten radical Islamist groups that splintered off from the Muslim Brotherhood some decades ago, such as the Takfir wal-hijra, loosely translated as “excommunication and exodus.” So-called takfiri organizations like these — in Arabic, the term literally means the act of excommunication — have proliferated throughout the region.
They have no official bond but share a common
tendency to cast anyone who doesn’t subscribe to a particular insular ideology as an infidel target.
The Islamic State
is just the latest — if not, most successful — incarnation of this phenomenon. And it is the ideology incubating these extremist groups that must truly be defeated in
Iraq
and the Arab
region.
A military strategy
alone can only achieve short-term goals on the ground — what the Iraqi state needs to make those gains stick
is national legitimacy.
***
Weak states like
Iraq function as petri dishes
for extremism. The Islamic State
has been able
to draw recruits from local and international civilian populations at least in part because
they are able portray themselves as upholders of righteousness when cast alongside
the corrupt, authoritarian governments. The states’ lack of legitimacy drives people into the arms of extremist
ideology.
The more extreme pressure
on civilians becomes,
the more they flock to groups like the Islamic
State.
Even so, the Islamic State
has proven itself
uniquely adept at recruiting. According to CNN, the CIA estimates that there are between 20,000 and 32,000 Islamic State fighters. And though U.S. intelligence officials estimated
in early June that the U.S.-led bombing
campaign alone has killed more than 10,000 Islamic State troops, experts
estimate that foreign
recruits have more than made up for those lost. In a May report, the United Nations
estimated that more than 25,000
foreigners had travelled to join militant Islamist groups worldwide. This ability to suck in civilian recruits
wasn’t nearly as apparent in, say, post- 2003 Iraq, when sectarian insurgents were at each other’s throats. Nor was it as rampant
when al Qaeda was at its operational zenith in the years leading
up to 9/11. The Islamic
State’s ability to acquire and control territory — an accomplishment that has to do with active or tacit support
from local populations — helped fuel this recruitment.
Still, the simple
reality is that
the situation in Iraq has
grown dire for
many civilians, and
the Islamic State has continually been able to exploit
the sectarian cracks
that have crept across the country. Sunni Muslims have been dealing with social and political marginalization since the 2003 invasion of Iraq, which paved the way for the Shiite majority
to acquire political control. In more recent years, indiscriminate violence
by Iraqi military
forces became a prime reason for local civilians to turn to the Islamic
State, according to
Iraq-based journalist Mohammed al-Dulaimy.
The military strategy against the terrorist group has included
the elevation of anti-Islamic State
militant groups in the area — a security-centered approach that has led to unhelpful cycles
of regional and local violence. Regional
conflicts have divided
into local conflicts, and more and more civilian
communities are being militarized. The collapse of the Iraqi Army last summer
in several key battles has led such militias, many with Iranian, Kurdish,
or Turkish backing,
to fill the security vacuum,
which introduced an extra dimension of sectarian complication.
Kurdish groups and the Iranian-backed Shiite militias who are fighting
against the Islamic
State are now responsible for a good portion
of sectarian violence
in both Syria and Iraq. Shiite militias
entering traditionally Sunni areas
of Iraq, for instance, has resulted in further unrest,
despite their supposed anti- Islamic State mandate.
Western support for supposedly moderate
militias fighting against
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s forces has exacerbated sectarian rifts, as these militias
have engaged in reprisal attacks against Sunnis.
The Yazidis of Iraq (mainly
in the Mount Sinjar area)
started to take revenge after being pillaged
by the Islamic State
last summer and violence against
Assyrian Christians in northeast Syria
and the Coptic Christians in Libya has prompted Christian fanatics to travel
from overseas to “protect” their
religious brethren. The Iraqi Christians of Assyrian descent,
who have also suffered under the rise of the Islamic State, have even taken to crowdfunding to bolster their retaliatory efforts.
In many cases,
civilians are being armed and trained
to fight. For instance, pro-Kurdish forces are training Yazidis and other groups
in Iraq against the Islamic State,
while pro-Shiite factions are training Shabaks,
another ethnic and cultural minority in Iraq, and other Shiite
Iraqis to do the same.
This regional dynamic
can facilitate a future where different sectarian or ethnic militias
will resort to violence to achieve political
goals with the support of larger regional powers like
Iran, Turkey, or Saudi Arabia.
This is a recipe for more instability.
If the world hopes to dial down this kind of local and regional
sectarian-based violence, there needs to be a strategy — by both international and regional powers
— working alongside
the current security-centric plan. This cooling effect
is impossible at the present
pace of local militarization, often carried out along political and sectarian lines.
***
Counterbalancing
the forces that seem to be destabilizing and reorienting the Middle East demands a comprehensive strategy that bolsters institutions of education and social security, which can improve
the economic inequality and lack of upward mobility
in much of the region.
This, however, needs to be done in a way that is suitably
tailored to the characteristics of each country.
So far, the proposed approach
of cross-sectarian nation states
adheres too much to secular
Western social standards, which are often impractical and unpalatable for the region’s
populations. Moreover, the West has a credibility problem that it has to overcome.
To begin with,
policymakers in the West would
do well to reconsider their alliances with certain authoritarian states
like Saudi Arabia
and Turkey, which
have strategic agendas
that don’t always
align with the United States. Not only does this foster cynicism among civilians, it also directly
facilitates regional instability and violence by way of a highly
perceivable double standard.
Iraqis also balk at what they see as a double standard
regarding how the world seems
to legitimize sectarian militias
in Syria that are anti-Assad but label
similar groups in Iraq as “terrorists.” The
alleged GCC-based funding of anti-Assad militias in Syria is a good example of this mismanagement, as a substantial portion of its funding went to extremist groups,
which helped exacerbate the Islamic State
problem next door.
Secondly, consistent militarization of localities and civilians will result in heightened radicalization. The United States and other countries should start cutting
off the flow of weapons
into places like Iraq, Syria, Lebanon, Yemen, and Libya, though the genie is out of the bottle by now.
The offspring of Iraqi insurgents in post-2003 Iraq will come of age and possibly
continue the same fighting that their fathers
engaged in unless
the region’s governments start taking their
citizenry more seriously by transitioning into truly representative democracies and implementing measures that benefit everyone, regardless of sect or ethnicity. None of this can be done through
forceful foreign imposition, which makes ethno-sectarian divisions
even more dangerous
and perhaps more capable of sparking radicalization. The question of how Islam might play a role in state-building must also be addressed.
Managing sectarianism means the facilitation of moderation. This can be done by providing a platform for mainstream Muslim
scholars to project
their voices in public discourse. One example is Mauritania’s Abdullah bin Bayyah, who has long advocated the resolution of sectarian differences within the global Muslim community.
Western nations must
reconsider their priorities in a way that helps
restore regional legitimacy to states and protects
people during conflict
while enhancing their quality of life in peacetime. This means pouring more resources into areas like educational and economic development, all done in a way that bolsters inclusive and peaceful coexistence in a diverse
society. Investment in inclusive governance and development will go a long way in terms of building a government’s legitimacy, which has long been a
problem for the Middle
East. New leaders
must also embody
this new legitimacy by voicing a willingness from the state to address issues
like human rights
and economic inequality. Without these strategies to complement a military
plan, it will be impossible to prevent further
violence from animating
the region for a long time to come. A Middle East with even more sectarian violence
than exists today is the kind of nightmare scenario
that the world should do everything to prevent.
No comments:
Post a Comment