Daesh Releases New ‘Guerrilla Manual’

Date: 24 May 2019 - 21:59

News ID: ۶۶۳۱۷

CAIRO (Dispatches) – After losing territory, Daesh terrorists are turning to "guerrilla war” - and the group’s newspaper is telling them exactly how to do it.
In recent weeks, Daesh’s al-Naba online newspaper has encouraged followers to adopt guerrilla tactics and published detailed instructions on how to carry out hit-and-run operations.
The group is using such tactics in places where it aims to expand beyond Iraq and Syria. While Daesh has tried this approach before, the guidelines make clear the group is adopting it as standard operating procedure.
At the height of its power Daesh ruled over millions in large parts of Syria and Iraq.
But in March it lost its last significant piece of territory, the Syrian village of Baghouz, and the group has been forced to return to its roots: a style of fighting that avoids direct confrontation.
In a rare video published by Daesh’s Al Furqan network in April, the group’s ringleader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi encouraged terrorists to fight on and weaken the enemy by attrition, stressing that waging war is more important than winning.
It was more downbeat than his only other video appearance from the pulpit of the Grand al-Nuri Mosque in Mosul in 2014, when he was dressed all in black and sporting a fancy watch.
In the new video, he sat cross-legged on a mattress as he spoke to three aides. A Kalashnikov rifle rested against the wall behind him — the same type of weapon that appeared in videos of Al Qaeda founder Osama bin Laden and Baghdadi’s predecessor Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who both adopted the guerrilla warfare tactic.
Hassan Abu Hanieh, a Jordanian expert on terrorism, said Daesh has used guerrilla tactics to temporarily seize towns in order to attract media coverage but also as part of a new strategic approach.
"This kind of war has turned into a strategy for the group,” he said. "At this stage they are using it as a war of attrition, like Baghdadi said in his latest speech.”