Militants return to the desert
IS retreats but territorial defeat will not mark end to group
BEIRUT: Islamic State militants, routed from one urban stronghold after another in Syria, have recently been moving deeper into Syria’s remote desert, where experts say they are regrouping and preparing their next incarnation.
The militants’ self-proclaimed “caliphate” with its contiguous stretch of land – linking major cities such as Syria’s Raqqa and Iraq’s Mosul – may have been vanquished, but many agree this territorial defeat will not mark the end of IS.
Beyond the urban and inhabited areas lies the vast Syrian Desert, also known as Badiyat al-Sham, famous for its caves and rugged mountains.
It encompasses about 500,000 sq km across parts of south-eastern Syria, north-eastern Jordan, northern Saudi Arabia and western Iraq.
The desolate landscape is a perfect hideout and a second home for many IS militants from the days before the birth of their caliphate.
Experts estimate that hundreds of thousands of troops would be needed to mount search operations – and even more to put the desert under permanent control.
Once they melt into the desert, without an army of tens of thousands of supporters from dozens of countries, IS militants will resort to scattered hit-and-run attacks and suicide bombings.
“They love fighting battles in the desert and they will go back to the old ways,” said Omar Abu Laila, a Europe-based opposition activist originally from Syria’s Eastern province of Deir el-Zour, which lies in the heart of Badiyat al-Sham.
IS leaders appear to have made contingency plans that involve precisely this – regrouping in the desert and launching attacks, much like IS’ predecessor, al-Qaeda in Iraq, did for more than a decade after the US-led 2003 invasion.
Some of those plans are already on display. In the eastern Syrian town of Mayadeen, a former IS stronghold, the militants pulled back and disappeared into the desert after only a few days of battle with Syrian government forces earlier this month.
Brett McGurk, the top US envoy for the anti-IS coalition, said the Sunni militant group is now down to the last 10% of the territory it once held in Iraq and Syria. The group still maintains some appeal for Sunnis, who complain of discrimination by Iraq’s Syiah-led government and by Syrian President Bashar Assad’s minority Alawite sect.
IS will also look to buy time and benefit from political conflicts – such as clashes between Iraqi and Kurdish forces following the Kurdish independence referendum.