The Islamic State came into being on the ruins of the Saddam Hussein regime. In a way its rise was facilitated by an error of judgment of the US which withdrew from Iraq. The ISI claims to restore the old glory of Islam when the Abbasi Caliphate ruled. This has tremendous appeal for Sunni Muslims. We must remember the ISI is a Sunni outfit. However, the ISI despite cloaking its activities under a religious smokescreen is, in reality, a terrorist philosophy. It believes in the subjugation of women and thousands are made sex slaves.
Women as sex slaves
The ISI quickly overran large swathes of territory in Iraq. It established the most primitive form of governance. It based its laws on an extreme interpretation of the Sharia. It made women only as objects of pleasure and made non-Muslim women who were captured like the Yezdi's as slaves. Most of these women were repeatedly raped and hundreds died as well. Despite news of the atrocities of the ISI on women filtering out to the West and Muslim world, the supply of recruits to join the ISI continued. One reason for this was the justification by the ISI that they were following Islamic principles which lay down that captured women can be kept as slaves. In a similar vein, the ISI leader Al-Baghdadicaptured an American aid worker and repeatedly raped and impregnated her.
She was killed in an American air attack that was targeting Baghdadi. The Yezidi women who are non-Muslims, in particular, recieved harsh treatment. Shia and Christian women were also not spared and made slaves. Even the Sunni women were given no rights and were confined for sex to their homes
Reaction of Muslim world
The tales of the atrocities of the ISI on women are doing the rounds of the world news.
Unfortunately no single Muslim government or organization has condemned the ISI actions. This silence is intriguing and does not bode well for the future. In fact, the actions of the ISi are copied by other similar outfits like Boko Haram in Nigeria which captured almost 500 Christian girls which have as yet not been recovered, though many months have elapsed. The only way the atrocities of the ISI can be stopped is by destroying them in their strongholds. This is an easy task but the world and the USA under Obama are gulty of looking the other way.
