Islamist militants have declared an Islamic “caliphate” in an area straddling Iraq and Syria, trumpeting the declaration in several videos. “This is not the first border we will break, we will break other borders,” a jihadist from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (Isis) warned in the video called End of Sykes-Picot, a reference to the agreement between France and Britain that divided up the Ottoman empire territories after the first world war. Later the fighter pledges that jihadists will free Palestine. “We are not here to replace an Arab cahoot with a western cahoot. Rather our jihad is more lofty and higher. We are fighting to make the word of Allah the highest,” the spokesman said.

He is filmed showing abandoned Iraqi army badges and vehicles left by fleeing soldiers. “There is no army in the world that can withstand the soldiers of Islam,” he said. The video features about a dozen men in a cell said to be captured troops and border police. A building, said to be a police station, is shown being blown up, as well as US-made Humvees captured from the border police. “Look how much America spends to fight Islam, and it ends up just being in our pockets,” the spokesman taunted. Isis, a breakaway group from al-Qaida, is notable for its hardline anti-Shia sectarianism, declaring Shia Muslims and other rivals as heretics that deserve death.

Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, an ISIS is spokesman, defined the Islamic state’s territory as running from northern Syria to the Iraqi province of Diyala north-east of Baghdad, a vast stretch of land straddling the border that is already largely under ISIS control. He also said that with the establishment of the caliphate, the group was changing its name to the Islamic State, dropping the mention of Iraq and the Syria. 

 —Prashant Tewari, Editor-in-Chief

Islamist militants have declared an Islamic “caliphate” in an area straddling Iraq and Syria, trumpeting the declaration in several videos. “This is not the first border we will break, we will break other borders,” a jihadist from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (Isis) warned in the video called End of Sykes-Picot, a reference to the agreement between France and Britain that divided up the Ottoman empire territories after the first world war. Later the fighter pledges that jihadists will free Palestine. “We are not here to replace an Arab cahoot with a western cahoot. Rather our jihad is more lofty and higher. We are fighting to make the word of Allah the highest,” the spokesman said.

He is filmed showing abandoned Iraqi army badges and vehicles left by fleeing soldiers. “There is no army in the world that can withstand the soldiers of Islam,” he said. The video features about a dozen men in a cell said to be captured troops and border police. A building, said to be a police station, is shown being blown up, as well as US-made Humvees captured from the border police. “Look how much America spends to fight Islam, and it ends up just being in our pockets,” the spokesman taunted. Isis, a breakaway group from al-Qaida, is notable for its hardline anti-Shia sectarianism, declaring Shia Muslims and other rivals as heretics that deserve death.

Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, an ISIS is spokesman, defined the Islamic state’s territory as running from northern Syria to the Iraqi province of Diyala north-east of Baghdad, a vast stretch of land straddling the border that is already largely under ISIS control. He also said that with the establishment of the caliphate, the group was changing its name to the Islamic State, dropping the mention of Iraq and the Syria. 

 —Prashant Tewari, Editor-in-Chief