Podcast: The true horrors of life under Islamic State
By Matthew Gault The Great Debate
Participants: Jason Fields, Matthew Gault, Kevin Sullivan
Many in the West think of the Islamic State as a loose collection of fighters — rabble who kill, loot and burn. But the truth is more complex, though no less terrifying. Islamic State actually governs the territory it takes and it’s not terrible at it. The group levies taxes, teaches children and organizes garbage pickup.
Some living under Islamic State’s rule feel the Caliphate is less corrupt than the governments it replaced. The Islamist group’s propaganda videos depict both the violence of the jihad as well as the wonderful “paradise” of the caliphate. Children ride Ferris wheels and eat cotton candy.
In this episode of War College, Kevin Sullivan, a senior correspondent at The Washington Post walks us through his five-part series, Life in the Islamic State. Sullivan and his team spent months interviewing men, women and children in and around the territory ISIS calls the caliphate.
For some, particularly a small number of Sunni men, life in the state is happy. But the lives of women and children can be both brutal and cheap. Sullivan tell us how some women find themselves, “part of an institutionalized, near-assembly-line system to provide fighters with wives, sex and children.”
Sullivan breaks down the horrors of life in the Islamic State, where the tax-man carries a whip, schools brainwash children and women are little better than property.
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Further reading:
Al Qaeda is taking advantage of Islamic State’s bad reputation
Islamic State is not even close to defeat
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