Great chart for understanding relations between countries and Isis in the ME (all hate Isis)

[flamingdem]

ONCE again, and more wearily than ever, America is saddling up to lead an armed posse into the badlands of Mesopotamia. In 1991 the elder George Bush gathered a coalition to chase the invading forces of Saddam Hussein’s Iraq from Kuwait. In 2003, ostensibly but misguidedly as part of his global war on terror, the younger Mr Bush invaded Iraq, rid the country of Saddam but then got bloodily stuck; it took a vast commitment of American troops and fresh thinking to bring the violence under control. Now Barack Obama, having extricated American forces in 2011, has announced a new campaign to “degrade and ultimately destroy” the jihadists who burst out of Syria and reached the gates of Baghdad.

Today’s foes are an especially vile cast of Sunni zealots, killers and misfits calling themselves Islamic State (IS). An offshoot of al-Qaeda, IS has exceeded its progenitor in terms of both political ambition and brutality. Across swathes of Syria and Iraq it has founded a “caliphate”, the long-defunct Islamic institution that the late leader of al-Qaeda, Osama bin Laden, only dreamed about in messianic discourses.

[KurtNYC]

1. Thanks for this.

A Rubics cube of mistrust and conflict.

[flamingdem]

2. Check out the Syrian Kurds and Iraqi Kurds

and their different alliances.

Nothing can be taken for granted in the ME!

[Takket]

3. what an absolute mess. I'm glad I don't have to figure this out

Why are Iraqi Sunni's not shown on this chart? Or are they just lumped in with the IS?

[flamingdem]

4. You're right. The tribes are not included and they are a fairly clear block

with many of them supporting Isis, at least temporarily.

I guess that would mess up the chart!