CFR Daily News Brief 8/7 Islamic State Kidnaps Scores in Syria

August 7, 2015 Daily News Brief

TOP OF THE AGENDA Islamic State Kidnaps Scores in Syria A monitoring group said that militants of the self-proclaimed Islamic State have kidnapped (Guardian) at least 230 people, including dozens of Christians, from the central Syrian town of Qaryatain, a day after the group seized the strategic town. On Thursday, the Islamic State claimed (Al Jazeera) responsibility for a suicide bomb attack on a mosque in Saudi Arabia that killed at least fifteen people. Meanwhile, the UN Security Council will vote (NYT) on a resolution to hold accountable the users of chemical weapons in Syria by creating a panel to investigate perpetrators of chemical attacks.

ANALYSIS "The assertive Islamism of some of the most powerful rebel groups has ensured that a military solution to the four-year conflict—which has claimed nearly a quarter of a million lives—is all but impossible in an increasingly fractious and complex battlefield," writes Kareem Shaheen in the Guardian. "The intensity of the Syrian conflict; the proliferation of armed factions on all sides; the huge influx of weapons; the divisive involvement of multiple regional and international states; as well as the brutality of the fighting itself makes the war in Syria a ripe candidate for intractability. All jihadist groups in the country, including IS, have invested in Syria precisely for this reason. The longer the conflict continues, the more unmanageable it will become and the more jihadists will find themselves operating within an environment that secures their long-term future," writes Charles Lister in Terrorism Analysts. "As the self-proclaimed Islamic State, or ISIS, commits horrendous videotaped executions, it might seem to pose the greatest threat to Syrian civilians. In fact, that ignoble distinction belongs to the barrel bombs being dropped by the military of Syria's president, Bashar al-Assad. The Islamic State has distracted us from this deadly reality," writes Kenneth Roth in the New York Times.