ISIS: What You Need to Know
On the eve of the president’s address to the nation, at the ACLJ we’re releasing a new e-book: Rise of ISIS: A Threat We Can’t Ignore. Based on a series of papers presented at Oxford’s Harris Manchester College earlier this summer — and on our long experience defending Israel’s interests before the U.N. and International Criminal Court (along with my first-hand experience in Iraq) — the book traces the rise of ISIS from the ashes of al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI), compares its jihadist aims with those of Hamas, and then explores how the international community is actively seeking to limit our inherent rights of self-defense.
The book is about ISIS, but it’s also about Hamas. And it makes a key point: The only difference between the plight of the Christians in Iraq versus Jews in Israel is the people of Israel are protected by the might of the IDF, while Iraq’s Christians were helpless when ISIS surged into Mosul and threatened Kurdistan.
There is nothing politically correct about this book. It gathers all available sources to take a realistic, grim look at the jihadist threat and refuses to make the popular distinctions between more- and less-respectable jihadists. ISIS and Hamas are separate groups, but they’re part of the same jihad.
But the book’s not without hope. We remind Americans that through courage and will, we’ve vanquished terrorists before. We can do it again. And, unlike the president to this point, we outline a strategy. Simply put, a great nation must not be “war-weary” when its jihadist enemies are brutal beyond comprehension, gaining wealth and power, and eager to kill as many of our citizens as they can. A great nation must fight.