Radical ISIS agenda outlives latest leader

Kansas-born mom Allison Fluke-Ekren moved to Syria with her husband and two children in 2012. Over the next 10 years, she joined Islamic State as a translator, trainer, and terrorist. According to the FBI, Fluke-Ekren led an all-female brigade and taught them to use machine guns, grenades, and suicide belts. The former science teacher planned terrorist attacks against the United States but delayed carrying them out because she became pregnant, the FBI said. When her first husband died in combat, she married up through the ranks of ISIS, eventually wedding a commander who led the unsuccessful defense of Raqqa, the terror group’s capital in Syria, in 2017. Last week, the U.S. government brought her back to Virginia to stand trial on charges of supporting terrorists.

Meanwhile, before dawn on Thursday in Syria, the top leader of ISIS died during a raid by U.S. special forces. About two dozen commandos arrived by helicopter at the three-story compound where Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi and his lieutenant lived with their wives and children above a civilian family on the first floor. Pentagon spokesman John Kirby said the commandos evacuated the civilians, but al-Qurayshi blew up the third floor with himself and his family inside. At least 13 people, including women and children, died during the two-hour raid, according to Syrian rescue group the White Helmets.

The Islamic State has lost much of its previous wealth and territory, and the death of another leader damages its ability to plan and execute attacks. But the group carried on after the death of its last leader and remains a threat, counterterrorism experts say. Fluke-Ekren’s trial underscores the difficulty of eradicating the group’s extreme ideology.

After the U.S. killed previous ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi in 2019, al-Qurayshi helped develop ties with terrorist groups in Africa and elsewhere. He also planned attacks, including an attempt to free ISIS militants from a Syrian prison last week, U.S. officials said. His death may disrupt the terror group’s recent campaign to regain territory, said Katherine Zimmerman, a counterterrorism researcher and fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. But she noted that a delay to focus on personal security or choose a new leader doesn’t mean ISIS will dissolve. “When you’re leading a group of ideologues, of people who are fervent believers in this radical vision, it almost doesn’t quite matter who the leader is so long as the organization persists,” Zimmerman said. “And it will.”

Fluke-Ekren’s case demonstrates the difficulty of eradicating ISIS ideology. She had unusual influence for a female ISIS member, translating leaders’ speeches into English and vetting recruits, according to FBI witnesses. Bruce Hoffman, a senior counterterrorism and homeland security fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said her continued dedication after her husbands’ deaths and the loss of ISIS territory shows the difficulty of deradicalizing. And, he noted, her role training female fighters underscored ISIS efforts to involve women and children in its fighting.

“ISIS has in many instances strained definitions of what an innocent civilian is,” Hoffman said. Fluke-Ekren may serve 20 years in prison if convicted of aiding terrorists or a life sentence if she aided in the killing of anyone.

William Inboden, executive director of William P. Clements, Jr. Center for National Security at the University of Texas, said Thursday’s raid demonstrated the United States’ success in cutting ISIS power but also showed the importance of continuing counterterrorism efforts. “That ideology is still out there and it travels via social media and other internet platforms,” Inboden said. “Even though as a nation we are rightly focused on the first-tier national security threats now of China and Russia … this is a reminder that the jihadist threat is still there.”