Hiding somewhere in Islamic State of Iraq and Syria [ISIS]-controlled territory, 46-year-old Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi spoke to his crumbling caliphate, urging what’s left of his terrorists to burn their enemies, targeting “media centers of the infidels.” After the death of Osama bin Laden at the hands of the U.S. Navy Seal Team-6 May 1, 2011, no terrorist spews propaganda better than al-Baghdadi. “You soldiers of the caliphate, heroes of Islam and carriers of banners: Light a fire against your enemies.” Not since Bin Laden, has any terrorist delivered the pseudo-religious propaganda with such ease. Rumored to have died in a Russian air strike June 16, al-Baghdadi’s new audio message dismisses those rumors, letting the world know that he’s still directs what’s left of his terror group. Whether al-Baghdadi’s alive-or-dead is anyone’s guess, despite the recent audiotape.
Losing Mosul, Iraq July 18 al-Baghdadi knows that his days occupying Raqqa and Deir el-Zour, Syria are numbered, with the Syrian army, Russia, Iran and U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces closing in. Speaking to his dwindling caliphate, al-Baghdadi knows that he’s about to lose any credibility, watching his Islamic fighters wiped out or flee or driven into hiding. Keeping the message alive is al-Baghdadi’s last gasp to preserve what’s left of his battered terror group. Recruiting was built on seizing Iraqi and Syria territory, offering recruits the fantasy of a caliphate to meet their every needs. Seizing young Yazidi women as sex slaves, appealed greatly to ISIS recruits told they’d have their pick of readily available sex slaves, something al-Baghdadi enjoys himself. Ousting ISIS from Raqqa and Deir el-Zour, the terror group still holds territory from the Euphrates River to the Iraqi border.
Ridding ISIS from Raqqa and Deir el-Zour scatters the terror group into hiding, much like al-Qaeda today. Al-Baghadi’s knows that recruitment for the dwindling terror group just got more difficult. For new terrorist recruits, where do they go now, to unspecified and changing hideouts? “You soldiers of Islam, supporters of the caliphate everywhere, step up your attacks and include the media centers of the infidels and the headquarters of their ideological war among your targets,” al-Baghdadi said in his radio message. When al-Baghdadi talks of “media centers” or “headquarters” he’s referring to every credentialed news organization or foreign capital on the planet, something so off-the-wall, so unrealistic, so desperate, it looks like a madman’s pleading to save his rapidly sinking ship. Once ousted from his territory in Syria and Iraq seized in 2014, ISIS no longer has a home base.
ISIS’s 2014 blitzkrieg, seizing some 30% of Iraqi and Syrian sovereign territory, gave the terror group unprecedented credibility, especially to jihadi recruits from all over the planet. “Don’t you dare allow the Crusaders and the apostates to enjoy a good and comfortable life at home while your brothers are enduring killings, shelling and destruction,” said al-Baghdadi, knowing he’s used hapless recruits as cannon fodder, watching from his hideout ISIS terrorists massacred by Syrian, Russian, Iranian and U.S.-backed forces. No one’s killed more fanatical Sunnis than al-Baghdadi, giving them a suicide mission. Al-Baghdadi offers new recruits only martyrdom, no longer holding enough territory to continue the sex slave operation that brought recruits in by the thousands. Showing that he’s a master propagandist, al-Baghadi has nothing to offer new recruits other than martyrdom.
Al-Baghdadi’s new radio appeal was so conspicuously desperate that it can’t be taken seriously by anyone, knowing that there’s no place to go other than to die on the front lines. Without promising virgins and sex slaves, ISIS no longer has the appeal to testosterone-driven post-adolescents looking for action masked by their phony Islamic practices. “The sons of Islam will willingly continue to sacrifice their blood and bodies for the sake of their creator,” said al-Baghdadi. Whether al-Baghdadi lives in a delusional world is anyone’s guess. His guile, his temerity and his fraudulent appeals to youth to commit suicide for his crumbling cause goes beyond the pale. Without a home-base, means of paying recruits with something other than the afterlife, al-Baghadi’s foolish message falls on deaf ears. While some recruits seek suicide for Allah, most prefer cash and sex slaves.
Watching ISIS eradicated by Syrian, Russian, Iranian and U.S.-backed forces has left al-Baghdadi preaching to a shrinking choir, no longer taken seriously by current or future recruits. When you have nothing to offer disenfranchised young men other than martyrdom, you’re terror group’s in trouble. “You Sunnis of Iraq, Syria, Yemen and everywhere , , , get our of your beds and shake off oppression . . . return to your faith and restore your glory and eminence,” said al-Baghdadi, pitting Sunnis and Shiites in Iraq and Syria. Calling the U.S. a shrinking superpower in relation to Russia, al-Baghdadi can only sit in his hole, making poetic appeals that no longer carry any weight. Robbed of his safe havens in Iraq and Syria, al-Baghdadi’s days are numbered before one of his followers rats him out to collect the reward on his head. “Victory against the enemies and the enemy of God comes next,” said al-Baghdadi.
