The Similarities Between Al-Qaeda And ISIS

Al-Qaeda and ISIS are both terrorist groups that operate in the Middle East that used to be united as one group but as time progressed, many discrepancies caused the two groups to move away from each other. Al-Qaeda has existed a long time and ISIS is a newer affiliate of the group, but a lot of circumstances on which they differ on caused them to break away. First of all, Al-Qaeda and ISIS differ in the resources they want to obtain which are used to help make revenue which helps them function. Another discrepancy between these two groups is that Al-Qaeda and ISIS have variety in the enemies in which they feel are their main priority to defeat. Finally, Al-Qaeda and ISIS both use different tactics to accomplish the goals they want.

Even though Al-Qaeda used to be united with ISIS, the two groups had conflicting ideologies on how they feel they should be run, leading to ISIS forming a separate group.
Al-Qaeda has had its presence in the Middle East for a long time and in the last decade, ISIS has become a prevalent affiliate of them, but they both went on their separate ways.

Al-Qaeda formed in the 1980s in Afghanistan for a different reason for why they exist today. The reason Al-Qaeda formed was because at the time, the Soviet military was invading Afghanistan and they wanted to help repel the invaders. The name Al-Qaeda is Arabic for the English words “the base”. The reason Al-Qaeda chose this name is because they are giving a shout out to the original training camp that was used to train the Afghans who were fighting the Soviet invaders. Hence, Al-Qaeda feels that the training camp was the foundation of how they came to be (“Al-Qaeda” 2). ISIS formed in 2003 because the United States decided to invade Iraq and they wanted to fight against the occupation. At the time, a man from Jordan named Abu Musaib al-Zarqawi decided to create the group affiliated with Al-Qaeda and to primarily help resist against the American invasion. In 2004, Osama bin Laden, who has been a long time leader of Al-Qaeda gave the group permission to use the name Al-Qaeda in Iraq (Dyer 6). Al-Qaeda in Iraq changed their name to Islamic State in Iraq in 2006 (8). It wasn’t until 2013 when Islamic State in Iraq combined with a terrorist group in Syria named Jabhat Al-Nusra when they combined to finally form ISIS. Early 2014 was when ISIS officially cut all ties to Al-Qaeda and currently

the groups are functioning completely by themselves (10). The map gives a recent
Figure 1
picture of where the groups are currently operating. Al-Qaeda has the current control over the territories in dark red with land scattered across the Middle East and North Africa. The core of Al-Qaeda is still located in Eastern Afghanistan. ISIS, on the other hand, controls the gray land in Syria and Iraq, which is much smaller but rapidly expanding. Overall, ISIS has been affiliated with Al-Qaeda for much of its existence, but they eventually drifted away from each other (see figure 1).
Al-Qaeda and ISIS both have different ways in which they feel they need to use to gain revenue. For example, Al-Qaeda feels that kidnapping tourists are one important way to gain money because they gain lots of money from ransoms. An important region of the world where this is taking place is in Northern Africa, especially in the country of Mali, where a group of Al-Qaeda members has a terrorist group out there called AQIM which stands for “Al-Qaeda Islamic Maghreb” (Callimachi 5). Alarmingly, it has been discovered that since 2008, Al-Qaeda has gained approximately one hundred twenty-five million dollars from kidnapping ransoms with the vast majority of victims being Europeans (7). It can be seen in the chart that throughout time, Al-Qaeda is gaining more and more revenue from kidnapping. This is showing how reliant they are getting on kidnapping victims which go along with the higher ransoms they are asking for as well as the cruel punishments they give to the kidnappers for not paying Al-Qaeda right away which many find unaffordable (see figure 2). Al-Qaeda is also very reliant on smuggling drugs to gain money which also is a major problem in

Figure 2
North Africa, and the country that has the biggest problem with this is Algeria. A rebel group named (FARC) in Columbia helps Al-Qaeda members in Algeria that are members of AQIM get the drug cocaine by first flying over from Colombia to Algeria (Bond and Hill 7). What happens next is that it travels to Europe through the Strait of Gibraltar and then makes its way to the rest of Western Europe (9). Al-Qaeda has gained approximately two hundred thirty-eight million dollars in the amount of Cocaine they have sold to Europe (2). ISIS unlike Al-Qaeda who gets their resources far away gets their resources nearby. ISIS takes advantage of the land they control by using its resources efficiently (Deshpande 8). ISIS has control over vast portions of Iraq and Syria, which are very oil rich and well protected. The chart shows how much money ISIS is gaining by selling
Figure 3

oil to the foreign market. It is estimated that every month, ISIS gains ninety-seven
million dollars from the oil they gain which is the resources around them (see figure 3). Overall, Al-Qaeda and ISIS both use different ways to gain money which shows an example of a difference which tore them away from each other.
When it comes to trying to achieve what they want, Al-Qaeda and ISIS both have different ways to fulfill their goals.

For instance, when the two groups plan terrorist attacks, ISIS focuses more on the quantity of attacks unlike Al-Qaeda who feels quality is more important. ISIS may not have strong attacks, but they try to perform them as much as possible. This also means that if they do attack, it is usually frequent and usually aren't planned long before they are performed. Al-Qaeda on the other hand concentrates more on the structure of the attack and the dynamics of it. Al-Qaeda usually doesn’t perform terrorist attacks that frequently, but when they do, they are very massive and planned over a long period of time. Also, Al-Qaeda uses terror attacks as their main method of achieving what they want (Schmitt 23). Most of Al-Qaeda’s attacks have taken place in the late 1990s and the early 2000s. Al-Qaeda has bombed several US embassies in the late 1990s, including embassies in Nairobi, Kenya and Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania which killed over 200 people and injured 5000 (Johnston, Van Natta Jr., and Miller 45). Also, in October of 2000, Al-Qaeda sunk the American warship USS Cole which killed 17 people (43). The most major attack Al-Qaeda has ever performed was on September 11th, 2001, when four planes were hijacked and two crashed into the twin towers, one into the pentagon, and one into a Pennsylvania field which killed a grand total of over 3000 and injuring over 6000

(32). Ever since the 9/11 attacks, Al-Qaeda has not performed a whole lot of attacks, but the ones they did do were heavy deadly bombings of the Middle East, North Africa, and Southeast Asia (57). ISIS may perform some terrorist attacks, but they feel that their main responsibility is to expand as much as possible (“Deshpande 5”). Currently, ISIS has control over a vast amount of land consisting at its peak in the middle of 2015 of over half of Syria and a third of Iraq (2). Al-Qaeda has much less land than ISIS and the reason this exists is because ISIS believes in the same Islam as what was believed when Islam first existed in the 7th century and also believes that they should have control over the massive empire that existed at the time as well (5). Overall, there are many more ways that Al-Qaeda and ISIS differ in as can be seen from the Venn diagram. It can also clearly be stated that Al-Qaeda is more modern than ISIS. Other than terrorist attacks, Al-Qaeda makes their own

Figure 4
weapons and usually likes defending its territory instead of invading places like ISIS. Also, ISIS likes giving their prisoners medieval punishments and also likes to perform medieval rituals which were performed many centuries ago. In addition, ISIS performs more barbaric forms of violence in the territories they invade and has many social services and a government hierarchy system (see figure 4). Hence, Al-Qaeda and ISIS both have opposing views on how they should achieve what they want which has led to the split up between the two groups.
Finally, the prime enemy Al-Qaeda and ISIS have are not the same either. Al-Qaeda feels that their main priority is to destroy the western nations, including the United States and Europe with the United States being the most major one. Osama bin Laden has once stated his most important goal by explaining that “I'm fighting so I can die a martyr and go to heaven to meet God, our fight now is against the Americans” (Osama bin Laden). Bin Laden is trying to say that his ultimate goal is to go the heaven and meet god but as long as he is alive, he must destroy the Americans. Bin Laden has performed many attacks on the United States, whether it was sinking American naval ships or destroying American landmarks. Bin Laden feels that it is his obligation in the name of Islam to destroy the United States. It doesn’t seem the matter what he does and how he does it, but his main focus ever since he died in 2011 was to terminate the existence of the United States (“Al-Qaeda” 3). While Al-Qaeda focuses on destroying the west, ISIS actually wants to destroy virtually everyone that goes against them, but no one causes them more anger than the Shiite branch of Islam (Deshpande 6). Ever since the beginning of 2015 when it has been more frequent, ISIS has performed multiple attacks on Shiite dominated towns and Shiite mosques. ISIS feels that the right thing to do is to ethnically cleanse the Shiites because they feel that Sunni Islam is much more ethical than Shiite Islam. Sunni Islam has different views than Shiite Islam and because of that, ISIS feels that there should only be one branch of Islam and that branch is the Sunni branch (3). In general, Al-Qaeda and ISIS both feel they have different obligations in whom they feel they need to eliminate and that is a significant reason for why the breakup between the two groups occurred.
Al-Qaeda has existed for a long time with ISIS under its influence, but eventually, many difficulties led to the separation of ISIS to form a separate group from Al-Qaeda. Al-Qaeda and ISIS both have different ways to obtain the money they use to fund their groups. Also, Al-Qaeda and ISIS differ in the tactics they use to accomplish their goals. Another issue that the two groups contradict in is that they both have different enemies which they feel are their main priority to defeat. Generally speaking, Al-Qaeda and ISIS conflict in many ways concerning how the groups should operate which is why the two groups decided to move away from each other and go on their own paths even though they were once in unity.