Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

also called ISIL: Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant

• part of a global Jihad movement that originated in Afghanistan
• emerges out of the destabilization of the Iraqi state in 2003 and increasing sectarianism. 
• Scores major military successes in the face of American trained Iraqi military failures.

Lands controlled by ISIS

BBC, December 2016

Aims

• focuses on the 'near enemy'
• establish a caliphate, replace authoritarian regimes and destroy colonial borders
• ultimately building a community of true 'believers' globally who adhere to Sunni Islam.

Ibrahim ibn Awwad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri al-Samarrai

(Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi)