The Federalist: ISIS gift store sells beheading swords

Wednesday, July 29, 2015

ISIS gift store sells beheading swords

ISIS Capitalism in Action

(RT News) - Pictures of a gift shop in northern Iraq selling a whole range of souvenirs with Islamic State logo on them have emerged on social media, suggesting the extremist group has made yet another step to becoming a full-fledged state with relevant attributes and functions.

Following the recent publication of a tourist guide on its realm, the terrorist group Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) is providing the on the ground infrastructure that a potential sightseeing traveler would expect from a major city. Images appearing in Arabic social media on Sunday show a souvenir shop in Mosul filled with IS black flags, baseball caps and clothing featuring the group’s logo.

Side by side with them Kalashnikov assault rifles can be seen, as well as gun accessories and swords similar to those used in some of the notorious execution videos that IS frequently releases.

Mosul is the de-facto Iraqi capital of Islamic state. The lightning-strike seizure of the city in the summer 2014 provided the previously relatively unknown group with a few billion dollars of cash stored in local banks and a large arsenal of US-provided weapons, including tanks and helicopter gunships that the fleeing Iraqi army left behind.

IS declared itself a state shortly afterwards, a claim that was internationally rejected as ludicrous. In a year that past since then the entity that sprawls across a great part of Syria and Iraq has become relatively state-ish, producing a functioning bureaucracy to back its fighters in the field. It’s a brutal authority that expels or slaughters those it sees unfit, but it has found things to offer the subjugated population.

The militants for example maintain a form of social security, covering damages sustained from warfare – either from its own fighters requisitioning vehicles and other resources or suffered from airstrikes of the US-led coalition.

“One thing I’ve repeatedly heard from Syrian refugees is that ISIL moves very quick to restore basic services and provide compensations to civilians whose property has been damaged by the coalition airstrikes. There is a wide-spread perception in the contested areas of Syria that coalition airstrikes are doing more damage to civilians than they are to ISIL targets,” Mara Revkin, political science PhD student at Yale University, told RT.

IS has voiced plans of introducing its own currency. The group brings not only the back-to-basics version of Islam for its ideology, but also a large skill pool of former Baathist functionaries, who saw their livelihoods hurt under the US-backed Shiite government and are making a bid for a comeback as part of IS. Former Saddam officials provide the talent for Islamists’ military HQs and civilian administrations.

“This is a group that is absolutely committed to developing a state, expanding their state, so this is not merely symbolic. It’s both in developments and it is also a state that’s on a continuous war-time footing, fighting a war on multiple fronts, so I think it’s much better understood as an ongoing revolutionary organization,” Andrew March, associate professor of political science at Yale told RT.

Keeping the machine running costs, and IS group’s budget is estimated to get up to $100 million in revenue. A large portion of it comes from smuggling oil through Turkey or Iraq. Taking toll from passing caravans trafficking illegal goods is another one. A big chunk comes from squeezing wealthy people by kidnapping them and holding for ransom and other forms of raiding.

“Islamic State has built an empire, functioning as both a company and a state: selling oil and trafficking precious art while building a formidable army,” Middle East political analyst Catherine Shakdam told RT.

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Thomas Pinckney, Federalist

Commissioned as captain in the 1st South Carolina Regiment of the Continental Army. After seeing much action, he became an aide-de-camp to General Horatio Gates. He was captured by the British at the disastrous Battle of Camden in 1780. After recovering from his wounds, he was released in a prisoner exchange. In 1781 he fought under Lafayette in Virginia. Appointed by President George Washington to be the U.S. minister to Great Britain served as Envoy Extraordinary to Spain. The Federalist Party made him a candidate in the 1796 presidential election as the intended running-mate of John Adams. Served as Congressman and Governor of South Carolina. Served as a major general in the Army during the War of 1812.

Henry Lee III, Federalist

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David Cobb, Federalist

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Josiah Parker, Federalist

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