The big Middle Eastern news of the day, of course, was the death of Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the founder and wannabe caliph of al-Dawla al-Islamiyya fi al-Iraq wa al-Sham — “the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria” (ISIS), or “the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant” (ISIL), or as it’s known from its Arabic initials in both Europe and the Middle East, “Da‘esh.”
Incidentally, I heard somebody important pronounce the late thug’s adopted name today as something like Ah-BOO Ba-KAR al-Bad-GAD-dee. You would do better than that important person if you were to pronounce it more like AH-boo BAH-ker al-Bag-DAD-dy.
His real name, at birth, was Ibrahim Awad Ibrahim Ali al-Badri al-Samarrai. He took the title Abu Bakr, I suppose, to link himself with the first successor (the first caliph) to the Prophet Muhammad, a much more genial and admirable man who bore the same name. The al-Baghdadi, I suppose, was intended to link him with the powerful city — Baghdad — that the was the last capital of a more or less unified, single, imperial caliphate.
In the end, his pretenses came to little, although they caused a great deal of suffering and substantially damaged the image of Islam worldwide. In view of Saturday evening’s events, he has a somewhat lower chance of becoming the caliph of a powerful Islamic empire than Mr. Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke has of becoming president of the United States.
It’s difficult to feel very sad about the passing of the murderous ideologue and fanatic who founded and led one of the most depraved political movements in human history, and I’m not making the slightest effort to do so. Obviously, though, among many other things that I could have wished different, I wish that he had not managed to take three children (and, quite possibly, a pursuing dog) with him into the next world. But, otherwise, there’s a certainly steely and grim satisfaction to be taken in his violent exit from contemporary history.
Does his demise mean the end of the Islamic State? I hope so. Lots of people in the Middle East tend to go with powerful winners, and Da‘esh hasn’t done a lot of winning in recent months. The bloom is off the rose, and if it’s really true, as Mr. Trump boasted, that the apparently rather charismatic former “caliph” and terror chieftain died whimpering and crying in fear, and if there is really video footage to show that, his personal mystique will be gone. Recruiting to a seemingly sinking ship will be much more difficult.
That said, though, I fear that Da‘esh may not really be gone. The poisonous ideology that fed it still exists. And, widely dispersed as it may now be, it may have become in some ways more dangerous than it was when it was relatively easy to locate, besiege, and bomb. Underground cells are difficult to find. The true-believers who remain might easily form and join new organizations. And now there may be a desire for revenge.
Time will tell.
Posted from Orlando, Florida
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