The practice of inventing labels to designate tribal insurgencies

[kritikvernunft]

First we had the label of "Taliban" to designate particular tribal, Pashtun insurgencies in Afghanistan. The "Taliban" would be illegitimate, because "there was something wrong with them", more specifically, they apparently did not like the western occupation. I personally have no opinion as to whether they should like the western occupation or not, but why was it needed to invent that kind of labels and incessantly demonize them?

Fast forward to Iraq where the tribal insurgents of Sunni, Arab tribes where designated with the label "Al Qaeda". All these people were "no good" because that label was evil. Again, they apparently did not like the western occupation. So, that was the reason why they were "evil", and why a new label has to be invented.

Nowadays we have the labels "IS" or "ISIS" or even "ISIL" to designate particular tribal, Arab insurgencies in Syria and parts of Iraq. In fact, the very same tribal insurgencies in Iraq that were called "Al-Qaeda" are now being called "ISIS".

In Syria, these tribal insurgents seem to object to Bashar's government. In Iraq, they apparently do not like the government in Bagdad. Is any of that a reason to create labels for them and incessantly demonize these people? My own point of view is that it is the God-given right of these tribal areas to dislike whoever claims to be their government and attempt to get rid of them. What would be wrong with that? Why would it be needed to demonize these people?

They seem to sympathize with each other, but beyond that, these tribes seem to be staunchly independent. I think it is a big mistake to lump them together and designate them with one demonized label. Therefore, I object to the use of labels such as "Taliban", "Al Qaeda", "IS", "ISIS" and so on. I will rather refer to them as "tribal insurgents in Iraq opposed to central rule from Baghdad".

I think it is about time to stop blackmouthing these people, because these tribal insurgents have every right to resist a foreign-imposed central government.

 

[Little_Lion]

It's my understanding that ISIL does not like the Taliban or Al Qaeda, according to their own publications. I admit that I have not seen these publications myself, but read such in an article that was not from Western media. If I could remember where I read it I would link it up.

Other than that, I am going to stay out of (though I will observe) the discussion simply because I do not consider myself educated enough on the subject to take a meaningful part.

 

[Abz2000]

kritikvernunft has mentioned quite a few points that i've often found myself observing and wondering about, sometimes with a very indignant feeling, even the word "fundamentalist" was manipulated and used as a tool to demonize when the evil ones thought they had gathered enough capital against the term which they had been busy loading with fears, apprehensions and disgust - up until many people said: wait-a-minit, sometimes fundamentalist can be good and packed with integrity in contrast with baseless and false.
i also recall after being arrested in bangladesh the first time (then released without charge) and conversing with other people about their opinions on the political situation, one shopkeeper told me to be careful about my beard which was quite short at the time, because they accuse good people of being shibir and take them away, i asked him if shibbir was bad or even illegal and he looked a bit confused.
i once showed an employee at my uncle's industry office whom i regularly converse with a picture of a mujahid (i think it was khattaab), the only thing that appeared to make him different in comparison to other soldiers was the beard and shahadah labels on his shoulders, and asked him what he saw, he matter of factly said: "a terrorist", i asked him if he would have said the same of a man without a beard and a national flag - any national flag on his shoulders, he said "no" in a very contemplative way. I asked him if he could see what had been done to him via media manipulation of the mind and he readily accepted the fact that certain strong and speedy subconscious negative and positive psychological associations had been added to his memory since bush's war began.

A similar type of propaganda was used after the second world war was staged and the world was on it's knees as the rothschilds carried out the zionist state stage, anyone who objected was easily labelled "anti-semite" or "nazi".

Quite orwellian actually.

Also notice the term "innocent civilians" which are often used as a tool to subconsciously make fighters "guilty" (antonym), and therefore valid targets.

But anyways, i don't give damn, ultimately when people have had enough of the lies and manipulations, they come out and say: we are all hamas/alqaeda/isis/shibir like those mask wearers in V for vendetta.

One thing to bear in mind also is the fact that on a less shallow level, certain traits and characteristics are used by highly paid crooked psychologists and analysts to categorize different types of people, file them, and anticipate movement.
one group or individual may be more reactionary and anti-american, focusing on retaliation whilst not neglecting establishment of Islam, another group might be more Islam establishment focused and couldn't care less about travelling to america to whack them, others may be nationalist, then there's the other type who hate fighters and hate plastic toothbrushes, put nafl over fardh and say tawba tawba and slap their cheeks when they hear a mobile phone ringtone or car alarm etc etc.....and all these labels are used to refer to them in order to avoid using long descriptions,

Then there are other aspects where the labelling confuses the situation and blinds them to the bigger picture, the proverbial blind men describing the elephant they saw at the zoo is an easier way to understand it.

And Allah knows best.


إِنَّ رَبَّكَ يَعْلَمُ أَنَّكَ تَقُومُ أَدْنَى مِن ثُلُثَيِ اللَّيْلِ وَنِصْفَهُ وَثُلُثَهُ وَطَائِفَةٌ مِّنَ الَّذِينَ مَعَكَ وَاللَّهُ يُقَدِّرُ اللَّيْلَ وَالنَّهَارَ عَلِمَ أَن لَّن تُحْصُوهُ فَتَابَ عَلَيْكُمْ فَاقْرَؤُوا مَا تَيَسَّرَ مِنَ الْقُرْآنِ عَلِمَ أَن سَيَكُونُ مِنكُم مَّرْضَى وَآخَرُونَ يَضْرِبُونَ فِي الْأَرْضِ يَبْتَغُونَ مِن فَضْلِ اللَّهِ وَآخَرُونَ يُقَاتِلُونَ فِي سَبِيلِ اللَّهِ فَاقْرَؤُوا مَا تَيَسَّرَ مِنْهُ وَأَقِيمُوا الصَّلَاةَ وَآتُوا الزَّكَاةَ وَأَقْرِضُوا اللَّهَ قَرْضًا حَسَنًا وَمَا تُقَدِّمُوا لِأَنفُسِكُم مِّنْ خَيْرٍ تَجِدُوهُ عِندَ اللَّهِ هُوَ خَيْرًا وَأَعْظَمَ أَجْرًا وَاسْتَغْفِرُوا اللَّهَ إِنَّ اللَّهَ غَفُورٌ رَّحِيمٌ {20*


Your Lord knows that you and a group of those who are with you get up for prayer sometimes for less than two-thirds of the night, sometimes half and sometimes one-third of it. God determines the duration of the night and day. He knew that it would be hard for you to keep an exact account of the timing of the night prayers, so He turned to you with forgiveness. Thus, recite from the Quran as much as possible. He knew that some of you would be sick, others would travel in the land to seek God's favors, and still others would fight for the cause of God. Thus, recite from the Quran as much as possible, be steadfast in prayer, pay the zakat , and give virtuous loans to God. Whatever good deeds you save for the next life, you will certainly find them with God. This is the best investment, and for this you will find the greatest reward. Ask forgiveness from God. God is All-forgiving and All-merciful.

Quran 73:20

 

[kritikvernunft]

one shopkeeper told me to be careful about my beard which was quite short at the time, because they accuse good people of being shibir and take them away, i asked him if shibbir was bad or even illegal and he looked a bit confused.

Nowadays, I also grow my beard long, mostly because I see it as an anti-establishment symbol. I tend to adopt pretty much everything that is anti-establishment. Sometimes, once or twice a year, I shave anyway, because it confuses the hell out of people. But then again, 75% of the year, I tend to bearded.

I only do that on the condition that there are no ancient parchments containing old warnings against doing exactly that. If there are serious, old scriptures warning against something, there are reasons to believe that these things could be accursed and Satanic.

I asked him if he could see what had been done to him via media manipulation of the mind and he readily accepted the fact that certain strong and speedy subconscious negative and positive psychological associations had been added to his memory since bush's war began.

Well, in my case, it works the other way around. The more that the establishment, the powers-that-be, and the media demonize you, the more you gain in credibility in my eyes, again, unless you are doing something that old parchments warn against. Otherwise, it is a great plus. It is a stamp of approval. In fact, I became interested in Islam only after the media began to demonize it. Otherwise, I would probably never have taken notice. I wasn't born in it. It wasn't part of my environment either. I still don't know Muslims "in the real world". It is mostly an internet thing for me, because where else would I find English-speaking Muslims in this god-forsaken pagan country?

one group or individual may be more reactionary and anti-american ...

Anti-americanism would unite them against you. So, that is not a good strategy. If you don't like them, you should rather seek to divide them. It is not even that hard to do that, because in fact, they don't particularly need anybody to divide them for them. They are actually already very divided as it stands. If Donald Trump becomes president, I will be on the floor laughing, because I have never seen anybody as divisive as that man. Who is going to stop them from fighting amongst each other? The United States will become an impossible and unsustainable endeavour, if Donald Trump wins the elections.

As an inveterate anti-statist, I will always side with the tribes against something like the Iraqi national state. The tribes are naturally unruly, and that is why I like them. I will never like people who kiss arse with the official elite in Baghdad. So, those are my true sympathies. I do not really like the Kurdish plans over there either, because they clearly just want to create another national-state monster. So, the idea of Islamic "National State" is not really what I would sympathize with. If the idea is to levy centralized taxes, create central armies and central police forces, and just continue the existing official thefting, I am against all of that. I was rather hoping that they would reinstate something like a Sultan along with a bunch of unruly slave girls, and give us a good laugh.

Islam is both the goal and the instrument to attain that goal.

I have noticed that Islam is a quite usable tool against obnoxious, centralized, national states. It will automatically create a lot of havoc with the existing national-state elite, while at the same time it is immune as a religion against most accusations that its enemies would otherwise try to levy against it. Not one government right in their mind would openly dare to attack Islam directly. You can clearly see that Obama does not dare to do that either. They are being forced to respect it in ways. The billion+ head count of Islam is just too incontrovertible. Obama will always pay lip service to "how much we appreciate the peaceful religion of Islam". Ha ha ha. Obama is a very skillful hypocrite. Of course, Donald Trump will not manage to do that. Trump will just say what he thinks, and what Obama did not dare to say. But then again, Donald Trump will also discover why exactly Obama has always been saying this; and what the alternative would be, if he hadn't done that. In certain ways, it would be a good thing to put a stop to the hypocrisy, which was actually funny, but also contradictory under Obama. Letting Donald Trump just say and do what he thinks, is in fact a more attractive option. In my impression, we will soon see interesting times!

 

[Abz2000]

I've learned that it's better to focus more on being pro justice and truth than to focus more on being antithesis of everything, being pro truth and justice ensures you have firm grounding on sound principles, self respect and courage, whereas focusing on antithesis too much ensures that you often shoot urself in the foot just for the sake of opposition, and that you find yourself washed away from the shore in a confusing a tumultous manner and get kicked around like a football as the corrupt manipulaters see fit, hence the republican vs democrat fallacy:

Remember that a description of the term "satan " is adversary, describing how he undoes himself through his inherent rebelliousness.

As demonstrated earlier, labelling can be harmfull if done unjustly and out of sheer opposition, however can be useful if done justly and in order to understand and avoid rambling in conversation, it was also used in war during the prophet pbuh's time, though they were careful to define differentiating points in their intentions whilst seeking to be true to themselves, to others and to God.

When at the talks of hudaybiyyah, one of the illusionists of Quraish tried to define him as a rebel who had gathered rabble around him in order to fight and cause harm to kith and kin (maybe trying to make an illusory mirror for themselves), he pbuh shattered that false mirror, refused to fall into that false definition before Allah), discussed things with Abu Bakr (ra) and clarified to Allah their intention of making 'Umrah and that they would be ready to fight anyone who would stand in their way.
we can notice here an awareness on both sides of a presence bigger than themselves in Whose presence they needed to plot, calculate and establish their points in order to be successful - hence we observe a constant checking of intention.
(Also happened befor the battle of Badr where the Prophet pbuh was making definitions in his prayers, and so was Abu Jahl).

Was Ibrahim pbuh a rebel or was he a seeker and conformer with truth who was attempting to bring foolish rebels into line, be they kings or parents? A careful studgy would show that he used the strong innate rebellious nature within himself as a youth (which all people have to a certain extent) to reject falsehoods one by one even if it meant trying them and then to settle on conforming with what he was convinced and later certain of being the truth and just way, from an "unruly" kid who broke the idols, got his elders in knots with a few crafty and smile rousing lies, a dabble worshipper of stars the sun the moon, to one who was ready to sacrifice anything in order to confiirm with the will of God.
some believe it was a presentation from hinself and that he was just playing parts for demonstration, some believe it was all a presentation from God though he was for real, others say it was whatever it was and that God knows best, just like our struggle with comprehending destiny and freewill.

Anyways, when we say Laa ilaaha illa Allah Muhammad ar rasool Allah.
We negate falsehood in confirming truth with a nay and a yay, so it's a case of presenting facts as they are rather than just saying, "yous lot are all liars" or "this is a truth", whilst leaving room for lies to make the same claim so as to be on an equal footing.

 

[kritikvernunft]

I've learned that it's better to focus more on being pro justice and truth than to focus more on being antithesis of everything...

Politics is rarely about what you like. It is usually about what you dislike.

being pro truth and justice ...

Everybody thinks that he is pro truth and justice. That is exactly the problem.
It all depends on how you define the truth, as well as justice.

whereas focusing on antithesis too much ...

Up till now, the strategy of the antithesis has worked out fantastically well for me. Of the top of my hat:

• I did not like Windows. So, I ended up doing Linux only.
• I did not like being an employee. So, I ended up being an external consultant, and now a co-founder.
• I did not like banks. So, I ended up doing pretty much bitcoin only.
• I did not like national states. So, I ended up doing projects on the tor network only.
• I did not like living in the west. So, I ended up living in a much cheaper country where you are surprisingly free in comparison (no tax returns to fill out).

Every dislike got eventually turned into "like", and always ended up making me more money. ;-)
Seriously, my incessant dislikes and nay-saying are an excellent business model.
Hence, I will almost always seek to the the opposite of what everybody else is doing. I can't help it. It simply has worked way too well to change now.

Seriously, the fact that everybody around me said that they were not religious, and that they were convinced in their atheist ways, is a very important factor contributing to why I am religious now, and why I staunchly believe in our beloved Master, the Illustrious Allah! ;-)

In fact, the reason why I am posting in an Islamic forum, is also the same.
Everybody around me said that they did not like Islam nor the Muslims.
So, what religion do you think that I would pick?
Yes, obviously! ;-)

 

[Abz2000]

^ ur an amazing person, i look forward to your participation and in taking note of your different way of seeing things - it should help in understanding mindsets,
just a quick note, imagine everybody made their own laws because they thought they were just, wouldn't you have to run and hide from the rapists and robbers and murderers? Would you let your lil sis out in society? What if she came a cross a big dude who thinks it's just and right to kill people of a different biological race to themselves, or maybe another madman son of a madman who kill a million people between themselves and then say: but we need the oil?
isn't it wiser to find a just and authoritative source of common dispute settlement, you already know the u.n turned into a fraud, along with the security council bartering between themselves about who should unjustly take what or persecute whom while the others turn a blind eye in order to compromise and pounce upon the chance of a bargain, the nation states have become like the bedouin tribes of pre-Islamic arabia, and the only one left standing is God.
i tried to isolate myself totally but find it's quite bothersome for each individual to make their own furniture, make their own cement, cloth, foods etc and much easier when we work together as a community, but to work as a community we need a common frame of reference in dispute since otherwise we'd end up tearing each others heads off until the big fat man was left standing or the clever little one, quite an unpleasant outcome no?
please think over it for at least five minutes, that's all i ask.

Edit:
i just wanted to add that in my personal opinion, bitcoin - as in the digital imaginary currency that is backed by hard disk ones and zeros - is another ploy touted as a rebel's currency,when in fact it is not rebellious at all to the usurious banking system but something they were finding difficult to get the critics on board the imaginary ship, the digital currency has been on the userers' agenda for quite a few decades and they have been attempting to limit use of paper (as they had fraudulently through financial blackmail removed gold, silver and other rare metal coinage from the hands of the masses) and had issues with many critics of the scheme, they couldn't lend imaginary volumes of gold and silver without risking being lynched until they took control of governments and forced through the fractional reserve lending ratio acts, and after then inflating faithless paper promissory notes (some still bearing the promise to repay in weight sterling etc) they decided that that too made it difficult to control whole economies and destinies, so they resolved upon digital imaginary currency a while back.
it was forseen over 2000 years ago, let the one who has understanding put two and two together and maybe wonder what all that stuff on the barcode is about.

 

[kritikvernunft]

imagine everybody made their own laws because they thought they were just, wouldn't you have to run and hide from the rapists and robbers and murderers?

You would still have the real world, and its necessary and inevitable truths.
Rapists: One half of the act contributes to survival from generation to generation. It is the other half that is a problem. A rapist will abandon/dump his victim. That is detrimental to survival from generation to generation, because it seems to be, more often than not, a necessity that the man continuously supplies resources to the woman and their children for the breed to be successful. Therefore, the male who confiscates such female from her relatives would also have to keep her around, for the entire setup to remain workable. But then again, if the man defeats the female's relatives in battle, he can indeed claim her for himself. Who would prevent him from doing that anyway? The defeated lot?
robbers and murderers: men tend to cooperate when dealing with adversity. Therefore, the question is: Can robbers and murderers gang up more successfully than the ones who want to get rid of them? I doubt it. But then again, sometimes that happens too. Still, without a national state around, robbers and murderers, who are unsuccessful at ganging up, would get a much harsher treatment than they are getting now.

I strongly suspect that the laws of nature (and hence the Creator-God) would rather sooner than later reassert themselves. The idea that you would need a national state to enforce laws is widespread, but also seriously questionable. I avoid trading when the national state is likely to stick their noses into the deal, because in my experience they never bring justice but rather try to justify injustices. We have proven black on white that you do not need a national state to emit currency: Bitcoin. I think that a technologically sufficiently advanced society should be able to prove that you do not need national states to enforce justice either.

What if she came a cross a big dude who thinks it's just and right to kill people of a different biological race to themselves, or maybe another madman son of a madman who kill a million people between themselves and then say: but we need the oil?

It took them quite a few years in Iraq to discover how to get rid of the occupation, but eventually they discovered everything they needed to know. The IED (Improvised Explosive Device) was pretty much invented in Iraq. It renders armoured vehicles and tanks utterly ineffective. Somalia had already shown that helicopters are more of a liability than an asset. I somehow suspect that the war in Syria will at some point prove that fighter jets no longer work. We have all understood that you cannot take on tribal insurgents in urban warfare either. In fact, all these wars are gradually but surely disarming the madmen. Necessity is the mother of invention. If these wars go on like that, national armies will find themselves totally disarmed, because for everything they use, the insurgency will already have discovered or invented simple counter-veiling measures.

isn't it wiser to find a just and authoritative source of common dispute settlement ...

Yes, but without establishing a state monopoly on the job of judge. I never use the national states for disputes. For example, bitcoin transactions tend to be escrowed, with the marketplace itself being the judging and adjudicating authority. Therefore, for every transaction, it is indeed wise to clearly appoint the third party who is going to be the judge of it. Trade on the internet is borderless. Even the fiat money transactions would never appoint a state actor as a judge. It would rather be the credit-card company who would judge. Seriously, nobody wants the government as judge. They are known to do an utmost lousy job. They are costly, slow, inefficient, and worst of all, systematically unfair. A state-appointed court is never a tool to bring justice, but always a tool to justify injustices.

the nation states have become like the bedouin tribes of pre-Islamic arabia ...

Yes, good idea. I do not like the national states. The more they destroy each other, the better.

i tried to isolate myself totally but find it's quite bothersome for each individual to make their own furniture, make their own cement, cloth, foods etc and much easier when we work together as a community, but to work as a community we need a common frame of reference in dispute since otherwise we'd end up tearing each others heads off until the big fat man was left standing or the clever little one, quite an unpleasant outcome no?

We collaborate very intensely on the Tor network. There is no national state involved whatsoever. We would not want them there anyway. We trade for billions. So, where is the problem? Of course, national states will always try to prove that they are indispensable by shutting down alternatives. That is why they hate Tor, bitcoin, bittorrent, and all other decentralized peer-to-peer technologies. They always want to centralize things, because that is what allows them to steal funds, be unfair, restrict access, discriminate against the ones, and favour the others. But then again, who cares? We are technologically much more advanced than them. So, national states are mostly a non-issue for us.

bitcoin ... is another ploy touted as a rebel's currency,when in fact it is not rebellious at all to the usurious banking system ...

Well, ask the banks if they like bitcoin! ;-)
I don't think so! ;-)

We are happily busy defeating the riba/interest-infested banks AND the governments, and gradually expelling them out of the currency. It is very much a question of patience, but in the meanwhile, we also make very good money in the bitcoin/tor realms. You can reasonably say that I personally make a good living by working in a community that endeavours to utterly destroy the banks and ransack the governments that support them. Our original goal was not really to make money. The original goal was to get rid of the banks (read the original bitcoin paper). Making money is just one side effect from doing it successfully. So, yes, we aim to destroy the fiat banking system and to bring the national states to their knees. Therefore, yes, I spend the income gained with great pleasure, because I know that my sweat and efforts will have contributed to the destruction of things that I really do not like.

Of course, I am certainly always on the outlook for a way to make money by ransacking paganism too. I would obviously, immediately jump on such opportunity. There is just One God, and look, now I have made some money again, by bankrupting the pagans! ;-)

 

[G8R]

But a lot of these groups are based on tribes right? Isn't Daesh is made up of people from all over and not the same tribe?

 

[G8R]

I mean AREN'T made from the same tribe. Sorry.

 

[kritikvernunft]

But a lot of these groups are based on tribes right? Isn't Daesh is made up of people from all over and not the same tribe?

As far as I am concerned, and unless someone proves me wrong, Daesh is just a collection of Youtube videos. ;-)

 

[Abz2000]

^^ kvnft - by nation states i meant the Godless secular types who unlawfully try to push Godlessness upon people which opens the door to open immorality and injustice. Whereas God has in the Quran and through His final messenger set laws and made recommendations to all people and these laws are to be enforced by people who have accepted God as true and Prophet Muhammad pbuh as true within their communities, and therefore a coherent system of governance and judiciary are required to enforce these laws, there is no room for anarchy and confusion in such communities.
please note the above point as it appears that your bad experience with secular (kufr/infidel) anarchic states has caused a generalization and therefore a backlash against much that is authoritative despite Islam standing out as different from the crowd.

^ g8r - from what i know so far, of course they are composed of peoples from all over the planet, although i also cannot deny that there appears to be some manipulation or blackwater infiltration in many of the different factions present there which has caused a lot of chaos and turned the focus from working to develop an Islamic State and expending human and economic resources in that direction - to fighting off vultures and everyone suffering as a result of such sabotage, it would be good to wonder at this point why the heathen rage at the prospect of a successful Islamic state that is able to show the world it's model when they're (the heathen) are alarmingly prepared to accept and sit at the table with people who foolishly worship wood, stones, men, money, women, mud (motherland), etc, and criminally accept incest, buggery, murder for slaughtering and eating cow, burning thousands of people to death etc. as coalition and trade partners.
it's not baffling to one who attempts to put truth and falsehood at two ends of a spectrum.

 

[G8R]

As far as I am concerned, and unless someone proves me wrong, Daesh is just a collection of Youtube videos. ;-)

Would you call any organization of humans tribal if it was made up of people who you could reasonable describe as not from the same tribe?

 

[kritikvernunft]

I mean AREN'T made from the same tribe. Sorry.

Daesh, Isis, Isil, Idrasil, and before that, Al Qaeda, Al SomethingElse, are collections of Youtube videos that came in very handy, because they were supposed to be used to justify bombing tribal insurgencies. I wonder which video editing company produced them, and how much they were allowed to invoice for them? Whenever you see mayhem, always look at who exactly turns out to be the beneficiary, because he is almost always the one who organized it.

 

[G8R]

^ g8r - from what i know so far, of course they are composed of peoples from all over the planet

Right? So you can't call them "tribal" insurgencies.

 

[kritikvernunft]

Would you call any organization of humans tribal if it was made up of people who you could reasonable describe as not from the same tribe?

The numbers don't add up.

There are approx. 35 000 foreign fighters of a total of 50 000 fighters in Syria+Iraq, labeled as "ISIS", "ISIL", or "DAESH".
Around 8 million people live in the area said to be controlled by this label.
So, I am supposed to believe that 50 000 fighters are governing 8 million people against their will?
While that very same number of fighters are also said to be fighting against Bashir's army, the Kurds, the other insurgents in Syria, the Shia militia in Iraq, Hezbollah, Iraq's army, the Iranian Revolutionary guard, the Russians, and so on ...

Sorry, but it simply does not add up.

When the Iraqi government recently retook Fallujah from the "IS", I was wondering: Isn't that the same place where the Americans put down insurgencies twice (in 2006, ...)? Weren't these guys supposed to be "Al Qaeda"? It must obviously be the same people. It can only be locals. So, it is a local tribal insurgency against the central Baghdad government. How many foreign fighters were there in Fallujah? Possibly zero?

Of course, I did not say that none of these tribal insurgents sympathize with at least part of that notorious label-creating collection of Youtube videos. But then again, can you prove that "ISIS" is more than just a collection of videos?

 

[G8R]

OK, I think I got it now. You don't believe that there is a significant enough portion of foreign fighters/members. I mean it doesn't have to be zero foreign fighters for it still to be a tribal insurgency.

So that's where we disagree. Thanks.

 

[kritikvernunft]

OK, I think I got it now. You don't believe that there is a significant enough portion of foreign fighters/members.

Indeed, it must be mostly locals. These locals are not counted under the "ISIL" flag, for the one or the other strange reason, because that particular tally adds up to 50 000 or so.

I mean it doesn't have to be zero foreign fighters for it still to be a tribal insurgency.

The Sunni area in Iraq is known to be very tribal. That is said to be "ISIS" heartland. I do not believe for one second that these tribes are now governed by "ISIL" foreigners. It would not even be possible given their small head count.

By the way, Yemen is also staunchly tribal, also rife with insurgencies nowadays. The central government in Sanaa is/was even completely gone. The Shia Houti tribes were running the show, and maybe still are. The media do not call those tribal insurgencies "ISIL". They tend to mostly ignore them, actually. In my impression the situation in Syria and Iraq is actually the same; and even in Lybia too : These things are just tribal insurgencies against central government rule, that have conveniently been relabeled to "ISIS", "ISIL", "Al Qaeda" and things like that.

In fact, relabeling a tribal insurgency as "ISIS", is just a code word for saying: We are going to bomb these guys.
If the West is not very much against them, it will call them something else.

Seriously, re-labeling someone to "ISIS" is just a way to announce that they are now allowed to kill him. The justification can then be found in the Youtube videos that these western intelligence services have prepared for that purpose. That is all there is to it.