Few Western leaders understand what ISIS really is but, argues a detailed analysis in The Atlantic, they are wrong to think it applies the logic of Al-Qaeda. ISIS has eclipsed Bin Laden’s organisation and jihadism has evolved.

The West needs to see ISIS as “more than a collection of psychopaths” – it has a clear set of beliefs, among them that it will help usher in the apocalypse.

As a functioning state that is now bigger than the size of the UK, ISIS rejects peace as a matter of principle. It “hungers for genocide” and considers itself a “headline player in the imminent end of the world,” this report says. ISIS is trying to recreate the earliest days of Islam and is faithfully reproducing its norms of war.

But its beliefs about the path to Armageddon, argues author Graeme Wood, can help the West to predict ISIS’ behaviour and to “ultimately know its enemy”.

Source: The Atlantic