Security
After ISIS defeat, international coalition keeps up the fight
Since vanquishing ISIS in Iraq and Syria, the coalition has worked to keep the group in check and to shut down its propaganda networks.
![US and Iraqi military personnel work together during a training in June in Iraq. [Operation Inherent Resolve]](/gc1/images/2024/07/15/47096-inherentresolve-600_384.webp)
By Al-Fassel |
The international coalition to defeat the "Islamic State of Iraq and Syria" (ISIS) continues to carry out its mission as it adapts its strategies to reflect current threats.
The coalition, officially known as Combined Joint Task Force - Operation Inherent Resolve, was established in October 2014 to oust ISIS from swathes of territory it had seized in Iraq and Syria.
A decade after ISIS declared its so-called "caliphate," it has lost all of the territory it held, many prominent leaders have been killed or jailed, and the group is no longer terrorizing the population with its brutality.
The US-led coalition, with more than 80 member nations, achieved its main objective in March 2019, pushing out the final remnants of ISIS from the village of al-Baghouz in eastern Syria's Deir Ezzor province.
In October that year, ISIS's founding leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi blew himself up in a tunnel, killing two small children with him, during a US raid on his compound in Syria's Idlib province.
Since then, coalition forces have killed three other ISIS leaders in Syria.
Targeting ISIS propaganda
While the threat ISIS presents has been curtailed, its regional branches have gained strength, particularly in Afghanistan and Africa.
Coalition partners are working to prevent the group from spreading extremist content online, weaken its networks and reduce its ability to recruit new members.
On June 18, the Spanish Civil Guard, Europol and the US Federal Bureau of Investigation dismantled one of the largest ISIS media networks.
They arrested nine network members and shut down servers in Germany, the Netherlands, Iceland and the United States.
"The network was inciting terrorism in 30 languages," the international coalition said in a video posted July 9.
According to Operation Inherent Resolve commander US Army Maj. Gen. J.B. Vowell, "ISIS remains a threat to international security," AP reported June 28.
"We maintain our intensity and resolve to combat and destroy any remnants of groups that share ISIS ideology," he said.