By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 19 January 2022
Al-Naba 317, page 3
Islamic State Dismisses the West’s “False Victory” Against It
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Tag Archives: Abu Umar al-Baghdadi
Islamic State Profiles the Man Who Led the Last Stand of the Caliphate
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 20 September 2021
Al-Naba 304, page 10
The 304th edition of Al-Naba, the Islamic State’s (IS) weekly newsletter, published on 16 September, mostly consists of reports from the various wilayats (provinces) about military activities: at the Centre in Iraq and Syria, in Egypt, Nigeria, and even further south in Africa, in the Congo. Notably IS keeps quiet about Afghanistan in Al-Naba 304, perhaps related to the series of attacks by the Islamic State’s Khorasan Province (ISKP) over the weekend: ISKP is often silent before planned attacks. Al-Naba 304 devotes pages ten and eleven to a profile of a veteran Iraqi jihadist, Abu Umar al-Khlifawi, who led the jihadists for a time in the final pocket of the caliphate at Baghuz, Syria, despite previous injuries that nearly cost him his hand and blinded him in one eye, before he trekked on foot for a month back to Iraq and ended his life as the military emir of Fallujah. A summary of that profile is below.
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Islamic State Profiles the Godfather of its Media Department
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 8 May 2021
Wael al-Ta’i (Abu Muhammad al-Furqan), Al-Naba 285, p. 3
The 285th edition of Al-Naba, the weekly newsletter of the Islamic State (IS), released on 6 May, had a biography of Abu Muhammad al-Furqan, one of the most important IS leaders, the head of its Central Media Department and its operational ruler when he was killed in September 2016. Continue reading
Islamic State’s Program for ‘Liberating’ Palestine
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 2 February 2021
Jaysh al-Islam in Gaza joins the Islamic State in 2015 (image source)
Hamid al-Zawi (Abu Umar al-Baghdadi), the second leader of the Islamic State movement, known at the time as the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), made his ninth speech out of what would prove to be twenty-three, entitled “Al-Deen al-Naseeha” or “Religion is Advice” (الدين النصيحة), on 14 February 2008. The speech was something of a rarity in that it focused on Palestine. A transcript of the speech was put out by ISI and is reproduced below with edits for grammar and clarity. Continue reading
The Dissolution of Al-Qaeda in Iraq
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 17 January 2021
One of the few pictures in existence of Abd al-Munim al-Badawi (Abu Hamza al-Muhajir)
Abd al-Munim al-Badawi (Abu Hamza al-Muhajir) had become the leader of Al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia (AQM) after its founder, Ahmad al-Khalayleh, much better known as Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, had been killed in June 2006. AQM was the dominant faction within the Islamic State (IS) when it was announced in October 2006 as a merger of jihadist insurgents, and for that reason most analysts at the time considered IS a “front” for AQM. When IS’s emir, Hamid al-Zawi (Abu Umar al-Baghdadi), made his first speech in December 2006 affirming the statehood declaration, most read this as the foreign-led AQM putting an Iraqi face on their enterprise. In fact, as can now be seen, dynamics were essentially as presented by the jihadists.
Crucial was a speech Al-Badawi gave on 10 November 2006, his fifth of what would prove to be fifteen, released by Al-Furqan Media Foundation within IS’s “ministry of information”, entitled, “I’na al-Hukm I’la Allah” (إن الحكم إلا لله), something like “Judgment is Only for God” or “Judgment is God’s Only”, where he gave his bay’a (oath of allegiance) to Al-Zawi, put AQM’s troops under Al-Zawi’s command, and effectively dissolved Al-Qaeda’s presence in Iraq. A transcript of the speech is available here, and a summary of the speech is below. Continue reading
Former Head of Islamic State Executive Committee Speaks
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 23 May 2020
There is now, with various caveats, a general agreement that the Islamic State (IS) is on the upswing—in Iraq, particularly, but also in the Badiya, the desert regions of eastern Syria, and more recently in the south of Syria around Deraa. Still, there have been some recent notable gains against the terrorist group. Continue reading
Islamic State Spokesman Vows Revenge Against Enemies, Plays the Israel Card
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 21 February 2020
The Islamic State’s (IS) spokesman, Abu Hamza al-Qurayshi, gave his second speech on 27 January 2020. The speech was entitled, “Allah Destroyed Everything Over Them, and for the Kafireen is Something Comparable”, by IS’s official English translation. The title is drawn from the Qur’an, the Surah of Muhammad (47), verse 10. The verse can be rendered as, “God Destroyed Them Completely, and a Similar Fate Awaits the Disbelievers”. Below is a copy of the transcript of Abu Hamza’s speech, with some editions for transliteration and translation, and some interesting sections highlighted in bold. Continue reading
The First Speech of Islamic State Spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adnani
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 7 November 2019
Taha Falaha (Abu Muhammad al-Adnani) [right] appearing in an Islamic State video alongside Tarkhan Batirashvili (Abu Umar al-Shishani, 3 June 2017, displaying a scene from 2014 when IS demolished the borders between Iraq and Syria. Falaha was killed in August 2016. It is common for IS to hold back pictures and footage of its leaders for time-spans that can reach over a decade.
Islamic State Appoints New Caliph and Spokesman
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 31 October 2019
Earlier today, the Islamic State (IS) released a speech through Al-Furqan Media by its new spokesman, Abu Hamza al-Qurayshi. The statement was brief, just under eight minutes, and entitled, “Whosoever Fulfils That Which He Has Promised God, On Him Will He Bestow A Great Reward” (drawn from Qur’anic verse, 48:10). Abu Hamza confirmed that IS’s caliph, Ibrahim al-Badri (Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi), was dead, killed in the American raid in Idlib in the early hours of the morning [Syria time] on 27 October, and that his predecessor, Abu Hassan al-Muhajir, was also deceased, killed in an airstrike the day after Al-Baghdadi’s demise. The new IS leader was announced as Abu Ibrahim al-Hashemi al-Qurayshi. IS released a transcript of the speech, which is reproduced below with some editions for transliteration and interesting sections highlighted in bold. Continue reading
Islamic State Profiles the Leadership
By Kyle Orton (@KyleWOrton) on 6 April 2019
Islamic State flag in front of the main gate of Saddam Husayn’s palace in Tikrit, 5 April 2015 // AFP PHOTO / MOHAMMED SAWAF
A lengthy document—roughly sixty pages and 12,000 words—was published online on 21 February 2019 containing biographies of twenty-seven senior Islamic State (IS) officials, past and more recent. Those bios that are dated were written between October 2018 and the time of publication, with one exception that was written in the summer of 2018. The author claims to be an IS veteran. While longevity is difficult to prove, the fact that the author provides heretofore unseen images of some of the IS leaders suggests that at a minimum he is an IS operative. Continue reading