The glory days of Islamic State sweeping all before them have come to an end and now they are losing captured territory in Syria and Iraq. The lure of being on the winning side drew many young men to join this jihad and high on that expectation was access to large numbers of captured women. They were promised the excitement of a conquering army, but prominent in many minds was the sexual slavery exercised by the invaders. Unlimited numbers of "wives " were available to them, to be dismissed and replaced when the novelty wore off !
Islamic State often speaks of attacking the "far enemy " - which is the term with which it refers to western countries. They urge Muslims to attack "Infidels " with the promise of Paradise for those who choose martyrdom, and this has resulted in lone wolf attacks in many parts of the world.
The thinking and psychology of the leaders of Islamic State is questionable following this weeks incident on the streets of Jakarta. Returnees from this Middle East jihad launched street attacks in an area of the city that contained embassies and was popular with foreigners, but the eight people who were killed were mainly Muslim Indonesian citizens or Muslim police officers. If anything, that is likely to turn ordinary men and women in Muslim Indonesia against Islamic State - which is showing itself as making war on anyone not prepared to embrace it's peculiar "Warhabist " version of Islam.
It seems that the focal point of the Jakarta attack was a Starbucks coffee house but the attackers were intercepted by police and tried to detonate their suicide vests to kill officers manning the police post to which they were taken. It didn't seem to register that such a coffee shop was run and staffed by Muslim Indonesians - and while it may have had some foreign customers - it's main trade was likely to be ordinary Muslim Indonesians from the surrounding array of office buildings.
Islamic State has been careful to try and present itself as a pure form of Islam trying to ignite a holy war against encroaching "Infidel " armies, and this form of extreme Islam originated in the tribes that once ruled the land that is now Saudi Arabia. Before vast oil reserves were discovered below it's sandy deserts the dominant Wahabi tribe who held these views allied with the Saudi royals to become a united country and this Wahabi doctrine has been the mainstay of the law that prevails. Saudi Arabia is a feudal state - with few freedoms, specially restrictive on it's women. The original Al Qaeda thinking came from a Saudi man of wealth - named Osama bin Laden.
Islamic State will always attract a hard core of religious fanatics who will do it's bidding but the vast hordes that matter are the ordinary men and women who make up the populations of educated Islamic countries like Indonesia and Turkey. The Wahabist doctrine forbids simple pleasures like listening to music and watching movies. It implements a harsh lifestyle - by force, and any infringement is punished by the lash - or the death penalty. Those who practice moderate Islam need to ask themselves if they could tolerate such a lifestyle.
There is a big difference between the propaganda Islamic State deploys on social media which depicts it as defending Islamic principles against a western invasion - and the actions of zealots under it's control making war on fellow Muslims whose sin is not instantly obeying the harsh creed if seeks to implement across the entire world.
Perhaps the grasp of psychology so often attributed to Islamic State leaders is not so great as we once imagined !
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