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By Zachary Laub, Council on Foreign Relations–

Introduction

The self-proclaimed Islamic State is a militant Sunni movement that has conquered territory in western Iraq, eastern Syria, and Libya, from which it has tried to establish the caliphate, claiming exclusive political and theological authority over the world’s Muslims. Its state-building project, however, has been characterized more by extreme violence than institution building. Widely publicized battlefield successes in 2014 attracted thousands of foreign recruits, while insurgent groups and terrorists acting in its name carried out attacks ranging from the United States to South Asia.

The group’s momentum in Iraq and Syria withered in 2016 as local forces, backed by a U.S.-led coalition, ousted Islamic State fighters from much of the territory they controlled. But major cities, including Mosul and Raqqa, remain in ISIS hands. In both Iraq and Syria there are few signs of the political progress that, analysts say, would likely be needed to sustain military gains. Meanwhile, across the region, and as far away as Europe and the United States, followers of the Islamic State have often eluded counterterrorism agencies, raising the possibility that the group will continue to motivate attacks even if it’s pushed out of Iraq and Syria.
What are the Islamic State’s origins?

The group traces its lineage to the aftermath of the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, when the Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi aligned his militant group, Jama’at al-Tawhid w’al-Jihad, with al-Qaeda, making it al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI)

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