"Lasting and Expanding"

Over the years, members of IS and its various predecessor organizations have frequently been heard proclaiming baqiya wa tatamadad, or "lasting and expanding." This slogan concisely sums up the fundamental modus operandi of the IS organization, the roots of which date back to at least 1999, when its notorious father figure, Ahmad Fadl al-Nazal al-Khalayleh (Abu Musab al-Zarqawi) was released from prison in Jordan. Since then, IS and its predecessor factions have by and large met this simple objective, despite military challenges by the U.S.-led invasions and occupations of Afghanistan and Iraq.

1999–2003: From Jordan to Afghanistan

Zarqawi was released from Jordan's al-Sawwaqa prison after serving five years of a fifteen-year sentence for weapons possession and membership in the Bayat al-Imam—a militant organization founded in 1992 by the infamous Jordanian jihadi ideologue Issam Muhammad Tahir al-Barqawi (Abu Muhammad al-Maqdisi). Shortly after his release, Zarqawi moved to Afghanistan, arriving in Kandahar Province with a letter of tazkiyya (a personal recommendation or reference) from then-London-based Abu Qatada al-Filistini, an alleged al-Qaeda operative. Upon making contact with al-Qaeda's leadership, Zarqawi acquired permission and a $200,000 loan to establish a training camp. He used this camp as a base for building his own newly formed jihadi group, Jund al-Sham. Within months, the group was renamed Jama'at al-Tawhid wa' al-Jihad (JTWJ).

Primarily consisting of Palestinians and Jordanians, JTWJ quickly attracted international attention for its December 1999 plot to attack Amman's Radisson Hotel and at least two other popular tourist sites. The foiling of this "Millennium Plot" by Jordan's General Intelligence Directorate forced JTWJ underground until the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks. Zarqawi's JTWJ then emerged to fight alongside al-Qaeda and Taliban forces, eventually fleeing to Iran in December 2001. There Zarqawi's followers were provided housing and given other assistance by elements linked to the Afghani militant group Hizb-e-Islami Gulbuddin. Shortly thereafter, Zarqawi's cadre relocated to northern Iraq with the help of locally based Ansar al-Islam.

2003–04: Initiating Iraq's Insurgency

By the time U.S. forces invaded Iraq in March 2003, Zarqawi had established a small JTWJ base in Biyara in the Kurdish province of Sulaymaniya—which was targeted in the opening rounds of the U.S.-led air campaign in March. This proved to be Zarqawi's initiation into a conflict that would come to define him and his fledgling militant organization.

JTWJ revealed its strategic intent in August 2003 with three significant attacks. The first took place on August 7, when the group detonated a car bomb outside Jordan's embassy in Baghdad, killing seventeen people. The second, on August 19, was a suicide car bombing outside the UN Assistance Mission in Iraq that killed twenty-two people, including the UN Special Representative in Iraq. Last, on August 29, the group targeted the Shi'ite Imam Ali Mosque in Najaf with another suicide car bomb, killing ninety-five people, including Ayatollah Muhammad Baqir al-Hakim, the spiritual leader of the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI).

Naturally, JTWJ targeted U.S.-led coalition forces, but other attacks focused on Zarqawi's traditional enemies of Jordan and the Shia, whom Zarqawi viewed as the chief threats is to Sunni power in Iraq and the wider region. This three-pronged targeting strategy represented the path to Zarqawi's ultimate objective: to undermine occupying forces while simultaneously sparking a sectarian conflict in Iraq. Zarqawi believed his organization could take advantage of the resulting chaos to cast itself as the defender of the Sunni community and to usher in the establishment of an Islamic state.

While partly influenced by the unique power politics of Iraq, the sectarian element of this objective was of particular personal importance to Zarqawi, as reflected in his writings. He consistently riddled his works with anti-Shia rhetoric, often mined from the words of historical Islamic ideologues. For example, he frequently quoted Ibn Taymiyya's well-known warning: "They are the enemy; beware of them; fight them, oh God, they lie." In fact, in his final public address before his death on June 7, 2006, Zarqawi exclaimed, "The Muslims will have no victory or superiority over the aggressive infidels such as the Jews and the Christians until there is a total annihilation of those under them, such as the apostate agents headed by the rafida "—a derogatory reference to Shia Muslims. Zarqawi demonstrated his personal commitment to targeting the Shia and sparking sectarian conflict early on by authorizing his second wife's father—a veteran of the group's Afghanistan days—to carry out the Imam Ali Mosque bombing.

2004–06: Iraq Consolidation, al-Qaeda Tensions

JTWJ ramped up its operations from 2004 through 2006, adopting the use of multiple suicide bombers in mass casualty attacks. To an increasing extent, Zarqawi himself was feared for the kidnapping and beheading of foreign hostages, beginning with American businessman Nicholas Berg in May 2004. Because of its prominence and extensive international recruitment networks, JTWJ became the center of a growing jihadi umbrella in Iraq, incorporating other similarly minded groups. In September 2004, after eight months of negotiations, Zarqawi pledged allegiance to al-Qaeda and Osama bin Laden. From that point onward, JTWJ was known as Tanzim Qa'idat al-Jihad fi Bilad al-Rafidayn, often simplified to al-Qaeda in Iraq (AQI).

However, Zarqawi's relationship with al-Qaeda was fraught with tension, particularly because of AQI's brutality and mass targeting of Shia civilians, a fundamental point of difference between Zarqawi and his masters in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Whereas Zarqawi thought society across the traditionally Islamic world had been corrupted and needed cleansing through terrifying violence, al-Qaeda had dedicated itself to combating "apostate" regimes and avoiding, where possible, tarnishing the image of the jihadi project. This was famously revealed in letters from al-Qaeda leaders Ayman al-Zawahiri and Jamal Ibrahim Ashtiwi al-Misrati (Atiya Abd al-Rahman al-Libi) to Zarqawi in 2005. Instead of pursuing fast results through dramatic and unforgiving brutality in the AQI manner, al-Qaeda, at least in the aftermath of the U.S. invasions, had called for a more patient strategy. At the same time, Zawahiri's 2005 letter did encourage AQI to prepare to establish an Islamic state in Iraq.

AQI's sustained prominence continued to attract the support—whether ideological or pragmatic—of other Iraq-based insurgent groups. On January 15, 2006, AQI announced its merger with five other groups (Jaysh al-Ta'ifa al-Mansura, Saraya 'Ansar al-Tawhid, Saraya al-Jihad al-Islami, Saraya...