Islamic State’s Cruelty Was Not the Same as Military Might

Oct. 27 2017

With its penchant for telegenic barbarism, and its success at rapidly gaining territory and affiliates in 2014, Islamic State (IS) made itself seem terrifying. Yet its rapid collapse in recent months, and the fall of its de-facto capital of Raqqa, have made clear its weakness, as Victor Davis Hanson explains:

The zealotry of Islamic State in celebrating the unthinkable added to its cult of invincibility. Young would-be jihadists from the Western world flocked to the group’s Middle East compounds, eager to engage in viciousness as if it were the latest video game. Dejected Middle Eastern armies seemed to have no answer for the medieval violence of IS. . . .

[But] their past horrors had earned Islamic State jihadists only ill will. Tens of thousands of Iraqi and Syrian victims volunteered to fight IS with a ferocity that they had rarely exhibited in the past. The net result is now mass IS surrenders. Half-starved jihadists in rags and tears beg their captors for forgiveness—and plead not to be shown the same savagery that had so often fueled IS slaughtering. The fate of IS reminds us that throughout history those who posed as superhuman savages, without any limitations to their cruelty, were often bullies who could not stand up to the determined payback of their finally aroused and outraged victims. . . .

Civilization in peace becomes complacent. People understandably hope that growing terror on the horizon will burn out on its own. During calm periods, prosperous and more liberal nations certainly do not want to send their youth across the world to fight those who claim that they would enjoy nothing more than dying while trying to kill those who are more successful and better off.

But the true strength in arms is usually civilizational, not tribal. A modern state that lives by the rule of law and the consent of the governed, and is energized by free markets and a free people, can be a deadly force when finally provoked into rage. The same is true of innocent victims initially overwhelmed by tribal killers like those of the SS, al-Qaeda, or Islamic State. IS may have been able to invent ever more macabre ways of dismembering innocent victims, but it could not make a fighter plane or win the lasting allegiance and loyalty of the majority of Iraqis and Syrians.

Read more at National Review

More about: ISIS, Military history, Politics & Current Affairs, War on Terror

Expand Gaza into Sinai

Feb. 11 2025

Calling the proposal to depopulate Gaza completely (if temporarily) “unworkable,” Peter Berkowitz makes the case for a similar, but more feasible, plan:

The United States along with Saudi Arabia and the UAE should persuade Egypt by means of generous financial inducements to open the sparsely populated ten-to-fifteen miles of Sinai adjacent to Gaza to Palestinians seeking a fresh start and better life. Egypt would not absorb Gazans and make them citizens but rather move Gaza’s border . . . westward into Sinai. Fences would be erected along the new border. The Israel Defense Force would maintain border security on the Gaza-extension side, Egyptian forces on the other. Egypt might lease the land to the Palestinians for 75 years.

The Sinai option does not involve forced transfer of civilian populations, which the international laws of war bar. As the United States, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and other partners build temporary dwellings and then apartment buildings and towns, they would provide bus service to the Gaza-extension. Palestinian families that choose to make the short trip would receive a key to a new residence and, say, $10,000.

The Sinai option is flawed. . . . Then again, all conventional options for rehabilitating and governing Gaza are terrible.

Read more at RealClear Politics

More about: Donald Trump, Egypt, Gaza Strip, Sinai Peninsula