Reconstituting local order in Pakistan: Emergent ISIS and locally constituted Shariah courts in Pakistan (Manzar Zaidi, Brookings)

Many believe that the present disorder in the international system is greatly amplified by the collapse of local order across a number of key states. In this paper, Manzar Zaidi investigates how in Pakistan, the state has partially failed to establish local order in its region because of poor governance, the lack of a coherent counterterrorism policy, and a disconnect between state organs. Additionally, unresolved questions around Islam’s relationship to the state and attendant implications for state legitimacy and power relations between state institutions and Islamist groups have complicated the scenario. This has allowed non-state actors like Jamaat-ud-Dawa (JuD), Tehreek Taliban Pakistan (TTP), and emerging Islamic State (also known as ISIS) elements to undermine domestic order and participate in dispensing justice through the establishment of their own shariah adjudication bodies. This occurs most often where the state’s institutions have failed to protect human rights and provide justice.

https://www.brookings.edu/research/reconstituting-local-order-in-pakistan-emergent-isis-and-locally-constituted-shariah-courts-in-pakistan/

South and Southeast Asia—The Islamic State’s New Front? (Joshua Kurlantzick, CFR)

Over the past year, as the Islamic State (ISIS) has suffered multiple losses in Syria and Iraq, the group has clearly been looking to widen its impact, taking the fight to countries outside of the Middle East. Increasingly, ISIS leaders have used social media to call on Islamic radicals to stage attacks in countries in the West like France and the United States, where the Orlando gunman, the San Bernardino gunmen, and the Nice attacker, among others, have publicly identified themselves with ISIS. In most of these cases, the attackers were lone wolves (or duos) who had not received any training or funding from ISIS, and often had not even traveled to Islamic State-controlled territory to train and fight. (To be sure, some recent attackers in Western nations had traveled to ISIS-controlled territory and fought with the group.)

http://blogs.cfr.org/asia/2016/10/04/south-and-southeast-asia-the-islamic-states-new-front/

Mosul, the next target (Paul Rogers, openDemocracy)

The complex military operation to seize Iraq's second city from ISIS's grip is a microcosm of the long war.

https://opendemocracy.net/paul-rogers/mosul-next-target

The Importance of Women in the Fight Against ISIS (The Clarion Project)

http://www.clarionproject.org/analysis/importance-women-fight-against-isis

Don’t celebrate ISIS setbacks too soon (William McCants, Brookings)

https://www.brookings.edu/2016/08/09/dont-celebrate-isis-setbacks-too-soon/

An ISIS Containment Doctrine (The National Interest)

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/isis-containment-doctrine-16588

Defeating ISIS solves nothing without a political solution (John C. Hulsman, Al Arabiya)

Conventional wisdom would have you believe that things are looking up in the battle against the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS). As of the end of May, the caliphate has lost 46 percent of its territory in Iraq and 16 percent in Syria, according to the Pentagon - a faster collapse than American officials had thought possible

https://english.alarabiya.net/en/views/news/middle-east/2016/06/02/Defeating-ISIS-solves-nothing-without-a-political-solution.html

London Versus ISIS (Dominique Moisi, Project-Syndicate)

“I feel so proud of my city,” my interlocutor says, referring to the election of the first Muslim, Sadiq Khan, as Mayor of London. She is Catholic, though she identifies first and foremost as British. But, like many other Londoners, she was inspired by Khan’s message of hope over fear

https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/sadiq-khan-london-muslim-bigotry-by-dominique-moisi-2016-05

Will ISIS and al-Qaida always be rivals? (Daniel L. Byman, Brookings)

More than 80, and possibly up to 120, people died Monday in ISIS attacks on regime-controlled territory near Russian bases in Syria. And new reports show that earlier in the month, ISIS took out Russian helicopters working out of a base in central Syria. But Russia and the Syrian regime are hardly ISIS’ only foes. ISIS is engaged in a deadly conflict with al-Qaida in Syria and elsewhere in the Muslim world. Al-Qaida itself sees the threat from the ascendant Islamic State as so serious—and its own position in its base in Pakistan so weak—that it is reportedly moving senior leaders to Syria and considering emulating the Islamic State by establishing its own emirate there

http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/markaz/posts/2016/05/27-isis-alqaida-rivals-byman

Understanding Iraq’s anti-ISIS efforts, political deadlock, and economy (Anna Newby, Brookings)

As the Middle East goes, much of the world’s attention is understandably focused on the chaos in Syria. But the United States is much more directly involved—in a variety of capacities—with Iraq next door. How is the military campaign against the Islamic State going in Iraq? What explains the political paralysis in Baghdad, as well as massive recent demonstrations? Is there hope for the economy? And on all of these fronts, is the Kurdish region doing any better?

http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/order-from-chaos/posts/2016/05/19-iraq-isis-politics-economy-newby

A decisive moment in the anti-ISIS campaign? (Theodore Karasik, Al Arabiya)

Is Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) about to teeter? Does the group need a shove or a push? What happens next?

https://english.alarabiya.net/en/views/news/middle-east/2016/05/19/A-decisive-moment-in-the-anti-ISIS-campaign-.html

The Online Fight Against ISIS (Colin P. Clarke, Isaac R. Porche III, Project-Syndicate)

Even as the United States and its allies carry out aerial bombardments in Iraq and Syria, their target, the Islamic State (ISIS), may be preparing to retaliate on another front. By taking the battle into cyberspace, ISIS would gain many of the advantages of asymmetric warfare – unless the US organizes itself to counter the group’s efforts.

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Colin P. Clarke is a political scientist at the RAND Corporation.

Isaac R. Porche III is a senior engineer at the RAND Corporation.

Is Calling ISIS ‘Genocidal’ Meaningful? (Naomi Kikoler, Zachary Laub, CFR)

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry declared in mid-March that the self-proclaimed Islamic State has committed genocide against Yazidis, Christians, and Shia Muslims, and crimes against humanity against others in territories it controls. The finding, which fulfilled a congressional mandate, does not appear to be a turning point in U.S. strategy to roll back the militant group, but does mark intensified efforts to document crimes for future prosecution, says the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum'sNaomi Kikoler. Insecurity and impunity in Iraq have encouraged the country's various ethnic and religious communities to form militias that could spur future cycles of violence, says Kikoler, whose fact-finding trip to northern Iraq in September 2015 documented genocide against the Yazidi minority.

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Naomi Kikoler, Deputy Director, Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum

The Comparative Metrics of ISIS and "Failed State Wars" in Syria and Iraq (Anthony H. Cordesman, CSIS)

The fighting against ISIS/ISIL/Daesh has become at least three different and interrelated conflicts: a fight against Daesh, a low-level sectarian and ethnic civil conflict in Iraq, and an intense civil war in Syria. It is also, however, part of a far broader regional and global conflict against terrorism and extremism; part of the competition between the United States and Russia; part of the competition between the majority of the Arab world and Iran; and part of an emerging struggle for Kurdish identity, and some form of “federalism” and/or independence that involves a range of separate Kurdish identities, Turkey, and the Arab world.

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Iraq Situation Report, Part I: The military campaign against ISIS (Kenneth M. Pollack, Brookings)

The U.S.-led coalition’s military campaign to “defeat” Da’esh (the Arabic acronym for ISIS) appears to be going better than is widely realized. The media has begun to pick up on this, but so far, the accounts do not seem to do it justice. The coalition has trained (or retrained) six Iraqi brigades, typically called the “Mosul Counterattack Brigades” or just the “Counterattack Brigades.” It was these formations that did most of the work at Ramadi and several are being shifted north to begin the Mosul operation. They are performing considerably better than other Iraqi brigades, a fact that is increasingly understood throughout the Iraqi government, boosting their prestige and the influence of the United States.

http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/markaz/posts/2016/03/28-military-campaign-against-isis-pollack

What the Brussels attacks tell us about the state of ISIS and Europe today (Daniel L. Byman, Brookings)

http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/markaz/posts/2016/03/24-bombings-in-brussels-byman

Could the Brussels attack backfire for ISIS? (Daniel L. Byman, Brookings)

The Islamic State’s bloody bombings in Brussels might appear to be yet another victory for a terrorist group that is already riding high. ISIS leaders are gloating about their success against their Western enemies, claiming that they hit Belgium because of its participation in the anti–Islamic State military coalition (though the ease of attacking in Belgium, given its dysfunctional security services and large jihadi presence, probably played a bigger role). But other terrorist groups—such as the Palestinians in the 1970s and the Algerians in the 1990s—have found that global attacks come with damaging long-term costs: The Islamic State may pay the same price.

http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/markaz/posts/2016/03/24-brussels-attack-backfire-for-isis-byman

Italy is the Key to Fighting ISIS in Libya (Matteo Garavoglia, Leore Ben-Chorin, The National Interest)

Rome plays a crucial role in the U.S.-led coalition.

http://nationalinterest.org/feature/italy-the-key-fighting-isis-libya-15560

ISIS and Genocide: A Narrow Approach to Mass Murder in Syria (Atlantic Council)

http://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/syriasource/29319-isis-and-genocide-a-narrow-approach-to-mass-murder-in-syria

Experts weigh in (part 5): Is ISIS good at governing? (Quinn Mecham, William McCants, Brookings)

http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/markaz/posts/2016/03/07-experts-weigh-in-isis-governance-mecham-mccants