text: Guidelines for women on how to be the ultimate wives of Isis fighters in Syria and Iraq are now being distributed by the militant group's new media arm. 
   
   The Zora Foundation is the latest Isis media group operating across social networks. 
   
   Isis (also known as Islamic State) regularly release propaganda showing brutal executions and violent atrocities, training regimes for fighters and threats to the West as the US-led coalition air strikes continue. 
   
   But unlike most of Isis' propaganda that addresses men and attempts to recruit them, this specifically targets women supporting Islamist fighters by circulating advice on how to be 'good wives of jihad'. 
   
   The organisation's slogan is "preparing for the honour of jihad", with videos and tweets explaining the ways in which women can contribute to Isis' insurgency. Its social media accounts have already garnered over 2,000 followers after being established just over two weeks ago. 
   
   Zora's material, all of which is in Arabic, has been shared by Isis supporters across social media. 
   
   Charlie Winter, a researcher at counter-extremism think tank the Quilliam Foundation, said the organisation is aimed at those preparing to go out and support the group, while also acting as a facility for the women already out there. 
   
   He told The Independent: "It’s kind of a guideline on how to be a good supporter of jihad and have the best role in supporting 'your mujahidin' as a woman. 
   
   "I haven't seen anything like this before. There will probably be forums doing similar things online, but this is the first time I've come across an actual media organisation giving guidance to women on their role." 
   
   Zora's most recent post was a recipe shared on the al-Zora Media Twitter account. Mr Winter said the recipe was prefaced with the introduction: "To the victorious supporters [of jihad] and the beloved muhajiraat [for example, women who go to Syria], may Allah bless their efforts and reward them accordingly, we dedicate this first recipe to the heroes on the front line." 
   
   Shape Created with Sketch. Timeline: The emergence of Isis Show all 40 left Created with Sketch. right Created with Sketch. Shape Created with Sketch. Timeline: The emergence of Isis 1/40 2000 Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (pictured here) forms an al-Qaeda splinter group in Iraq, al-Qa’eda in Iraq. Its brutality from the beginning alienates Iraqis and many al-Qaeda leaders. 2/40 2006 Al-Zarqawi is killed in a U.S. strike. Al-Zarqawi’s successor, Abu Ayyub al-Masri, announces the creation of the Islamic State in Iraq (ISI). Reuters 3/40 2009 Still al-Qaeda-linked ISI claims responsibility for suicide bombings that killed 155 in Baghdad, as well as attacks in August and October killing 240, as President Obama announces troop withdrawal from Iraq in March. Getty Images 4/40 2010 Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi becomes head of ISI, at lowest ebb of Islamist militancy in Iraq, which sees last U.S. combat brigade depart. 5/40 2012 In Syria, protests (pictured here starting in Daree) have morphed into what president Assad labelled a “real war” with emergence of a coalition of forces opposed to Assad’s regime. Syria group Jabhat al-Nusra are among rebel groups who refuse to join, denouncing it as a “conspiracy”. Bombings targeting Shia areas, killing more than 500 people, spark fears of new sectarian conflict. Sunni Muslims stage protests across country against what they see as increasingly marginalisation by Shia-led government. AP 6/40 2013 Al-Baghdadi renames ISI as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or Isis, as the group absorbs Syrian al-Nusra, gaining a foothold in Syria. In response, al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri (Bin Laden’s successor) concerned about Isis’ expansion orders that Isis be dissolved and ISI operations should be confined to Iraq. This order is rejected by al-Baghdadi. AFP 7/40 2014 - January Isis fighters capture the Iraqi cities of Fallujah and Ramadi, giving them base to launch slew of attacks further south. AP 8/40 2014 - June Isis declares itself the Caliphate, calling itself Islamic State (IS). The group captures Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city; Tal Afar, just 93 miles from Syrian border; and the central Iraqi city of Tikrit. These advances sent shockwaves around the world. 9/40 2014 - June Around the same time Isis releases a video calling for western Muslims to join the Caliphate and fight, prompting new evaluations of extremists groups social media understanding. 10/40 2014 - June Isis take Baiji oil fields in Iraq - giving them access to huge amounts of possible revenue. EPA 11/40 2014 - August James Foley is executed by the group as concerns grow for second American prisoner, fellow reporter Steven Sotloff. AP 12/40 2014 - August Obama authorises U.S. airstrikes in Iraq, helping to stall Isis’ along with action by Kurdish forces following the deaths of hundreds of Yazidi people on Mount Sinjar. 13/40 2014 - September Isis release video showing Steven Sotloff’s murder prompting Western speculation his executioner is same man who killed Mr Foley. EPA 14/40 2014 - September Obama tells us that America “will hunt down terrorists who threaten our country” EPA 15/40 2014 - September Isis release a video appearing to show David Haines, who was captured by militants in Syria in 2013, wearing an orange jumpsuit and kneeling in the desert while he reads a pre-prepared script. It later shows what appears to be the aid worker's body. Rex 16/40 2014 - September Peshmerga fighters scrabble to hold positions in the Diyala province (a gateway to Baghdad) as Isis fighters continue to advance on Iraqi capital. AFP 17/40 2014 - October Aid worker Alan Henning is killed. Self-imposed media blackout refuses to show images of him in final moments, instead focuses upon humanitarian care. AP 18/40 2014 - October Isis raise their flag in Kobani, which had been strongly defended by Kurdish troops. The victory goes against hopeful western analysis Isis had overextended itself, while alienating much of the Muslim population through the murder of Henning. Victory causes fresh waves of Kurdish refugees arriving in Turkey. 19/40 2014 - November American hostage, who embarced values of Islam, Peter Kassig and 14 Syrian soldiers are shown meeting the same fate as other captives. But intelligence agencies will be poring over the apparently significant discrepancies between this and previous films. Seramedig.org.uk 20/40 2015 - February Isis has released a video revealing the murder by burning to death of a Jordanian pilot held by the group since the end of December 2014. Reuters 21/40 2015 - February Isis militants have released videos which appear to show the beheading of Japanese hostages Haruna Yukawa and Kenji Goto. 22/40 2015 - February American aid worker, Kayla Mueller was the last American hostage known to be held by Isis. She died, according to her captors, in an airstrike by the Jordanian air force on the city of Raqqa in Syria, though US authorities disputed this. AP 23/40 2015 - February Isis militants have posted a gruesome video online in which they force 21 Egyptian Coptic Christian hostages to kneel on a beach in Libya before beheading them. Egypt vowed to avenge the beheading and launched air strikes on Isis positions. AP 24/40 2015 - February The British Isis militant suspected of appearing in videos showing the beheading of Western hostages has been named in reports as Mohammed Emwazi from London. Rex Features 25/40 2015 - March Isis triple suicide attack has killed more than 100 worshippers and hundreds of others were injured after the group members targeted two mosques in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa. AP 26/40 2015 - April Iraqi forces have claimed victory over Isis in battle for Tikrit and raised the flag in the city. EPA/STR 27/40 2015 - April Isis has claimed responsibility for a suicide bomb attack in Afghanistan that killed at least 35 people queuing to collect their wages and injured 100 more. EPA 28/40 2015 - April Isis’ media arm released a 29-minute video purporting to show militants executing Ethiopian Christians captives. The footage bore the extremist group’s al-Furqan media logo and showed the destruction of churches and desecration of religious symbols. A masked fighter made a statement threatening Christians who did not convert to Islam or pay a special tax. 29/40 2015 - May Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of Isis has been "incapacitated" by a spinal injuries sustained in a US air strike in Iraq. He is being treated in a hideout by two doctors from Isis’ stronghold of Mosul who are said to be "strong ideological supporters of the group". 30/40 2015 - May Isis has also claimed responsibility for killing 300 of Yazidi captives, including women, children and elderly people in Iraq AP 31/40 2015 - May Isis attack on Prophet Mohamed cartoon contest in Texas was its first action on US soil. Two gunmen were shot and killed after launching the attack at the exhibition. Elton Simpson and Nadir Soofi have been named as the attackers at the Curtis Culwell Centre arena in Garland. 32/40 2015 - May Isis’s deputy leader, Abu Alaa Afri, a former physics teacher who was thought to have taken charge of the deadly terrorist group, has been killed in a US-led coalition airstrike. 33/40 2015 - May US special forces have killed a senior Isis leader named as Abu Sayyaf in an operation aiming to capture him and his wife in Syria. Getty Images 34/40 2015 - May Iran-backed militias are sent to Ramadi by the Iraqi government to fight Isis militants who completed their capture of the city. Government soldiers and civilians were reportedly massacred by extremists as they took control and the army fled. Charred bodies were left littering the city streets as troops clung on to trucks speeding away from the city. Ramadi is the latest government stronghold to fall to the so-called Islamic State, despite air strikes by a US-led international coalition aiming to stop its advance in Iraq and Syria. AFP 35/40 2015 - May Isis rounded up civilians trapped in Palmyra and forced them to watch 20 people being executed in the historic city’s ancient amphitheatre. The Unesco World Heritage site was overrun by militants, threatening the future of 2,000 year-old monuments and ruins. Thousands of Palmyra’s residents fled but many are still living within the city walls, while the UN human rights office in Geneva said it had received reports of Syrian government forces preventing people from leaving until they retreated from the city. Getty 36/40 2015 - May A group of Isis-affiliated fighters have captured a key airport in central Libya. The militants took control of the al-Qardabiya airbase in Sirte after a local militia tasked with defending the facility withdrew from their positions. Affiliates of Isis, already control large parts of Sirte, the birthplace of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and a former stronghold of his supporters. 37/40 2015 - June The US Air Force has destroyed an Isis stronghold after an extremist let slip their location on social media. According the Air Force Times, General Herbert "Hawk" Carlisle, commander of Air Combat Command, said that Airmen at Hulburt Field, Florida, used images shared by jihadists to track the location of their headquarters before destroying it in an airstrike. Reuters 38/40 2015 - June Kurdish forces captured a key military base in a significant victory in Raqqa as well as town of Tell Abyad. YPG fighters, backed by US-led airstrikes and other rebels, consolidated their gains, when they seized the key town on the Syria-Turkey border. They are now just 30 miles to the north of Raqqa and have cut off a major supply route deep inside Isis-held territory. Ahmet Silk/Getty 39/40 2015 - June Isis has released gruesome footage claiming to show the murder of more than a dozen men by drowning, decapitation and using a rocket-propelled grenade as it seeks to boost morale among its fanatical supporters. 40/40 2015 - June Isis has begun carrying out its threat to destroy structures in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, blowing up at least two monuments at the Unesco-protected site as Syrian government troops made advances on the Islamist’s positions. AFP 1/40 2000 Abu Musab al-Zarqawi (pictured here) forms an al-Qaeda splinter group in Iraq, al-Qa’eda in Iraq. Its brutality from the beginning alienates Iraqis and many al-Qaeda leaders. 2/40 2006 Al-Zarqawi is killed in a U.S. strike. Al-Zarqawi’s successor, Abu Ayyub al-Masri, announces the creation of the Islamic State in Iraq (ISI). Reuters 3/40 2009 Still al-Qaeda-linked ISI claims responsibility for suicide bombings that killed 155 in Baghdad, as well as attacks in August and October killing 240, as President Obama announces troop withdrawal from Iraq in March. Getty Images 4/40 2010 Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi becomes head of ISI, at lowest ebb of Islamist militancy in Iraq, which sees last U.S. combat brigade depart. 5/40 2012 In Syria, protests (pictured here starting in Daree) have morphed into what president Assad labelled a “real war” with emergence of a coalition of forces opposed to Assad’s regime. Syria group Jabhat al-Nusra are among rebel groups who refuse to join, denouncing it as a “conspiracy”. Bombings targeting Shia areas, killing more than 500 people, spark fears of new sectarian conflict. Sunni Muslims stage protests across country against what they see as increasingly marginalisation by Shia-led government. AP 6/40 2013 Al-Baghdadi renames ISI as the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, or Isis, as the group absorbs Syrian al-Nusra, gaining a foothold in Syria. In response, al-Qaeda chief Ayman al-Zawahiri (Bin Laden’s successor) concerned about Isis’ expansion orders that Isis be dissolved and ISI operations should be confined to Iraq. This order is rejected by al-Baghdadi. AFP 7/40 2014 - January Isis fighters capture the Iraqi cities of Fallujah and Ramadi, giving them base to launch slew of attacks further south. AP 8/40 2014 - June Isis declares itself the Caliphate, calling itself Islamic State (IS). The group captures Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city; Tal Afar, just 93 miles from Syrian border; and the central Iraqi city of Tikrit. These advances sent shockwaves around the world. 9/40 2014 - June Around the same time Isis releases a video calling for western Muslims to join the Caliphate and fight, prompting new evaluations of extremists groups social media understanding. 10/40 2014 - June Isis take Baiji oil fields in Iraq - giving them access to huge amounts of possible revenue. EPA 11/40 2014 - August James Foley is executed by the group as concerns grow for second American prisoner, fellow reporter Steven Sotloff. AP 12/40 2014 - August Obama authorises U.S. airstrikes in Iraq, helping to stall Isis’ along with action by Kurdish forces following the deaths of hundreds of Yazidi people on Mount Sinjar. 13/40 2014 - September Isis release video showing Steven Sotloff’s murder prompting Western speculation his executioner is same man who killed Mr Foley. EPA 14/40 2014 - September Obama tells us that America “will hunt down terrorists who threaten our country” EPA 15/40 2014 - September Isis release a video appearing to show David Haines, who was captured by militants in Syria in 2013, wearing an orange jumpsuit and kneeling in the desert while he reads a pre-prepared script. It later shows what appears to be the aid worker's body. Rex 16/40 2014 - September Peshmerga fighters scrabble to hold positions in the Diyala province (a gateway to Baghdad) as Isis fighters continue to advance on Iraqi capital. AFP 17/40 2014 - October Aid worker Alan Henning is killed. Self-imposed media blackout refuses to show images of him in final moments, instead focuses upon humanitarian care. AP 18/40 2014 - October Isis raise their flag in Kobani, which had been strongly defended by Kurdish troops. The victory goes against hopeful western analysis Isis had overextended itself, while alienating much of the Muslim population through the murder of Henning. Victory causes fresh waves of Kurdish refugees arriving in Turkey. 19/40 2014 - November American hostage, who embarced values of Islam, Peter Kassig and 14 Syrian soldiers are shown meeting the same fate as other captives. But intelligence agencies will be poring over the apparently significant discrepancies between this and previous films. Seramedig.org.uk 20/40 2015 - February Isis has released a video revealing the murder by burning to death of a Jordanian pilot held by the group since the end of December 2014. Reuters 21/40 2015 - February Isis militants have released videos which appear to show the beheading of Japanese hostages Haruna Yukawa and Kenji Goto. 22/40 2015 - February American aid worker, Kayla Mueller was the last American hostage known to be held by Isis. She died, according to her captors, in an airstrike by the Jordanian air force on the city of Raqqa in Syria, though US authorities disputed this. AP 23/40 2015 - February Isis militants have posted a gruesome video online in which they force 21 Egyptian Coptic Christian hostages to kneel on a beach in Libya before beheading them. Egypt vowed to avenge the beheading and launched air strikes on Isis positions. AP 24/40 2015 - February The British Isis militant suspected of appearing in videos showing the beheading of Western hostages has been named in reports as Mohammed Emwazi from London. Rex Features 25/40 2015 - March Isis triple suicide attack has killed more than 100 worshippers and hundreds of others were injured after the group members targeted two mosques in the Yemeni capital of Sanaa. AP 26/40 2015 - April Iraqi forces have claimed victory over Isis in battle for Tikrit and raised the flag in the city. EPA/STR 27/40 2015 - April Isis has claimed responsibility for a suicide bomb attack in Afghanistan that killed at least 35 people queuing to collect their wages and injured 100 more. EPA 28/40 2015 - April Isis’ media arm released a 29-minute video purporting to show militants executing Ethiopian Christians captives. The footage bore the extremist group’s al-Furqan media logo and showed the destruction of churches and desecration of religious symbols. A masked fighter made a statement threatening Christians who did not convert to Islam or pay a special tax. 29/40 2015 - May Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the leader of Isis has been "incapacitated" by a spinal injuries sustained in a US air strike in Iraq. He is being treated in a hideout by two doctors from Isis’ stronghold of Mosul who are said to be "strong ideological supporters of the group". 30/40 2015 - May Isis has also claimed responsibility for killing 300 of Yazidi captives, including women, children and elderly people in Iraq AP 31/40 2015 - May Isis attack on Prophet Mohamed cartoon contest in Texas was its first action on US soil. Two gunmen were shot and killed after launching the attack at the exhibition. Elton Simpson and Nadir Soofi have been named as the attackers at the Curtis Culwell Centre arena in Garland. 32/40 2015 - May Isis’s deputy leader, Abu Alaa Afri, a former physics teacher who was thought to have taken charge of the deadly terrorist group, has been killed in a US-led coalition airstrike. 33/40 2015 - May US special forces have killed a senior Isis leader named as Abu Sayyaf in an operation aiming to capture him and his wife in Syria. Getty Images 34/40 2015 - May Iran-backed militias are sent to Ramadi by the Iraqi government to fight Isis militants who completed their capture of the city. Government soldiers and civilians were reportedly massacred by extremists as they took control and the army fled. Charred bodies were left littering the city streets as troops clung on to trucks speeding away from the city. Ramadi is the latest government stronghold to fall to the so-called Islamic State, despite air strikes by a US-led international coalition aiming to stop its advance in Iraq and Syria. AFP 35/40 2015 - May Isis rounded up civilians trapped in Palmyra and forced them to watch 20 people being executed in the historic city’s ancient amphitheatre. The Unesco World Heritage site was overrun by militants, threatening the future of 2,000 year-old monuments and ruins. Thousands of Palmyra’s residents fled but many are still living within the city walls, while the UN human rights office in Geneva said it had received reports of Syrian government forces preventing people from leaving until they retreated from the city. Getty 36/40 2015 - May A group of Isis-affiliated fighters have captured a key airport in central Libya. The militants took control of the al-Qardabiya airbase in Sirte after a local militia tasked with defending the facility withdrew from their positions. Affiliates of Isis, already control large parts of Sirte, the birthplace of former Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi and a former stronghold of his supporters. 37/40 2015 - June The US Air Force has destroyed an Isis stronghold after an extremist let slip their location on social media. According the Air Force Times, General Herbert "Hawk" Carlisle, commander of Air Combat Command, said that Airmen at Hulburt Field, Florida, used images shared by jihadists to track the location of their headquarters before destroying it in an airstrike. Reuters 38/40 2015 - June Kurdish forces captured a key military base in a significant victory in Raqqa as well as town of Tell Abyad. YPG fighters, backed by US-led airstrikes and other rebels, consolidated their gains, when they seized the key town on the Syria-Turkey border. They are now just 30 miles to the north of Raqqa and have cut off a major supply route deep inside Isis-held territory. Ahmet Silk/Getty 39/40 2015 - June Isis has released gruesome footage claiming to show the murder of more than a dozen men by drowning, decapitation and using a rocket-propelled grenade as it seeks to boost morale among its fanatical supporters. 40/40 2015 - June Isis has begun carrying out its threat to destroy structures in the ancient Syrian city of Palmyra, blowing up at least two monuments at the Unesco-protected site as Syrian government troops made advances on the Islamist’s positions. AFP 
   
   The text explains the recipe is "a quick, light recipe that should be taken with coffee and will replenish the mujahidin”. 
   
   It adds: “Or it can be taken with water and is especially good in between battles. They contain many calories, and will prolong the strength and power of the mujahid". Zora also posted a YouTube video detailing the ways in which women, who Isis believe should never undertake combat roles, can contribute to jihad through "feminine manual labour" such as cooking and nursing fighters. 
   
   The video uses crude animations and brightly coloured backgrounds with images of a sowing machine, a first aid box, a fridge a gas cooker and a microwave appearing throughout. Mr Winter explained: "The video talks about nursing and administering first aid, the cooking and preparation of food, the books of God, sharia science and the preparation of women for there contribution to jihad - essentially getting others to go out there. 
   
   "After sharia science, it talks about courses in making slide shows and editing them – effectively making propaganda - before the video finishes." 
   
   The accounts appear to be primarily targeting Arab women as opposed to Western women because of the language used in all. Mr Winter said: "The phenomenon of women going over to Syria or Iraq is not new and it is not a purely Western phenomenon. There are more women going from countries like Saudi Arabia." ||||| People watch as smokes rises from the town of Kobani, also known as Ain al-Arab, at the Turkish border near the southeastern village of Mursitpinar, Sanliurfa province, on Oct. 26, 2014. 
   
   People watch as smokes rises from the town of Kobani, also known as Ain al-Arab, at the... Read More 
   
   People watch as smokes rises from the town of Kobani, also known as Ain al-Arab, at the Turkish border near the southeastern village of Mursitpinar, Sanliurfa province, on Oct. 26, 2014. Close 
   
   Turkish traders of everything from Red Bull energy drinks to cement are profiting from Islamist conquests in Syria, while the militants are boosting their coffers with fees from the cross-border business. 
   
   Turkey shipped $1.3 billion in goods to Syria through September, the highest nine-month total on record, according to trade statistics published in Ankara last week. The increase came after President Bashar al-Assad’s government in Damascus lost control of most border crossings with Turkey, leaving them to rebel groups such as the Free Syrian Army and Islamic Front, as well as Islamic State extremists. 
   
   “Whoever controls either side of any international border claims license to exact tolls and fees,” said Francis Ricciardone, a former U.S. ambassador to Turkey and now a director at the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East in Washington. “Where there is no law, criminal gangs will extort all that the market will bear.” 
   
   Turkey’s Continental Divide 
   
   The exchange of goods reflects how entrenched the Syrian conflict has become and how elusive any peace agreement remains. The fighting, which started in March 2011 and flared into a civil war, has left more than 190,000 people dead and displaced millions, according to the United Nations in August. 
   
   Photographer: Kemal Karagoz/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images More than $260 million this year crossed via Cilvegozu and Oncupinar, the Turkish figures show. They are towns adjacent to Bab al-Salamah and Bab al-Hawa in northern Syria, which are controlled by the Islamic Front, a coalition of militants fighting both the Assad regime and Islamic State. Close More than $260 million this year crossed via Cilvegozu and Oncupinar, the Turkish... Read More Close Open Photographer: Kemal Karagoz/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images More than $260 million this year crossed via Cilvegozu and Oncupinar, the Turkish figures show. They are towns adjacent to Bab al-Salamah and Bab al-Hawa in northern Syria, which are controlled by the Islamic Front, a coalition of militants fighting both the Assad regime and Islamic State. 
   
   While Turkey imposed financial sanctions on Assad three years ago, the trade is legal and shows up in Turkish customs data. Transporters enter a no-man’s land where state control is absent and they pay whoever controls the crossing. 
   
   Energy Drinks 
   
   “Every day we have four or five trucks carrying Red Bulls to Syria,” Mustafa Yilmaz, owner of Turkish trucking company Cem-Ay Transport, said in a telephone interview on Oct. 28. 
   
   More than $260 million this year crossed via Cilvegozu and Oncupinar, the Turkish figures show. They are towns adjacent to Bab al-Salamah and Bab al-Hawa in northern Syria, which are controlled by the Islamic Front, a coalition of militants fighting both the Assad regime and Islamic State. Another $320 million in goods crossed into Syria from nearby Gaziantep, according to the figures. 
   
   Buyers on the Syrian side don’t identify themselves to the transporters, Yilmaz said. Goods are then transferred onto Syrian trucks in a 3-kilometer-wide (2 miles) zone at the Cilvegozu crossing, he said. 
   
   Turkish Customs Ministry press officer Yakup Bulut said on Nov. 3 nobody was available to comment. The Economy Ministry didn’t respond to written questions this week. 
   
   Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg While the U.S. has pushed Turkey to join the fight against Islamists across the border, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says his nation will participate only if the U.S.-led coalition also makes plans to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Close While the U.S. has pushed Turkey to join the fight against Islamists across the border,... Read More Close Open Photographer: Krisztian Bocsi/Bloomberg While the U.S. has pushed Turkey to join the fight against Islamists across the border, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says his nation will participate only if the U.S.-led coalition also makes plans to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. 
   
   Displaced People 
   
   The Aleppo Chamber of Industry rejected the idea of an increase in trade. Fares Shihabi, head of the organization, said imports from Turkey plunged about 90 percent because of the war. 
   
   “There are no functioning routes,” he said by telephone from Damascus. “Let’s assume there’s regular trade, there’s no war, they’re not supporting the terrorists and everything is normal. The size of the market has shrunk because 3 to 4 million people are outside the country.” 
   
   Aleppo is less than 30 miles as the crow flies from the Cilvegozu border crossing. Shihabi’s views contrast with Ali Altinel, a partner at Syrian Trade Office, a business consultancy in Aleppo. Demand for Turkish goods is so high that trucks can wait five days at the frontier, he said. 
   
   “The Syrian state takes 40 percent in taxes, but in other areas there’s no such thing,” Altinel said by phone from the Turkish port city of Mersin on Oct. 28. “Islamic State also takes its extortion fees, everyone does. As long as people are getting paid, there’s no danger.” 
   
   Turkish Policy 
   
   While the U.S. has pushed Turkey to join the fight against Islamists across the border, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says his nation will participate only if the U.S.-led coalition also makes plans to topple Assad. 
   
   Turkey allowed Kurdish fighters from northern Iraq to travel to the Syrian city of Kobani to help defend it against Islamic State. Erdogan is also advocating training and arming fighters from the Free Syrian Army, which cooperates with Islamist fighters to control some of the border points with Turkey, according to Charles Lister, a specialist in Middle East insurgents at the Brookings Doha Center in Qatar. 
   
   “Groups are widely known to take transit fees from incoming trucks and this has come to represent a key internal revenue stream,” he said by e-mail this week. “This is unfortunately reinforcing the war economy that rebel groups have become so dependent upon.” 
   
   Deliberate Effort 
   
   The surge in exports may represent a “success story” in that the U.S. and other suppliers of humanitarian relief to Syria are “deliberately procuring as much as possible from the Turkish economy,” according to Ricciardone, the former ambassador. That’s part of a concerted effort to offset some of the costs of the war, he said. 
   
   Turkish exports to Syria were $1.3 billion in 2011, the year Syria’s civil war began, then fell to $391 million a year later, according to official data. Erdogan said Nov. 3 that Turkey has spent $4.5 billion hosting more than a million refugees in the country. 
   
   The latest records from Turkey’s statistics agency now show everything from vegetable oils to motorcycles being shipped into Syria. The largest amount was listed in a miscellaneous category titled “personal household goods, provisions.” 
   
   Some of that recent increase may also reflect Syrian industrialists switching factories to Turkey since 2011 and then exporting products back home. 
   
   No Choice 
   
   “Many Syrian businessmen moved their production lock, stock and barrel to Turkey because it is safer,” Henri Barkey, a Turkey expert at Lehigh University in Pennsylvania, said by e-mail on Nov. 3. “The war is damaging so much of the infrastructure and the agricultural sector that the Syrians have no other choice but to increase their imports from Turkey.” 
   
   In choosing to continue doing business with armed groups at the border, Turkey is accepting the reality that it may not have an official government counterpart to deal with in Syria for some time, according to Nihat Ali Ozcan, an analyst at the Ankara-based Economic Policy Research Foundation. 
   
   “Turkey will probably have to live with non-state actors on its southern border maybe for a decade, if not more,” Ozcan said in a phone interview on Nov. 3. “Merchants are forced to deal with several different groups, like in the Middle Ages, as their goods pass through their territory.” 
   
   To contact the reporters on this story: Fercan Yalinkilic in Istanbul at fyalinkilic@bloomberg.net; Benjamin Harvey in Istanbul at bharvey11@bloomberg.net; Ercan Ersoy in Istanbul at eersoy@bloomberg.net 
   
   To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alaa Shahine at asalha@bloomberg.net Rodney Jefferson
target: – Red Bull gives you wings, and if you're an Islamic militant, apparently, extra stamina to keep fighting. Turkish traders are shipping the energy drink and other items into Syria across borders that are controlled by rebels belonging to ISIS, the Free Syrian Army, and the Islamic Front, and business is apparently booming: According to trade stats out of Ankara, Turkey sent $1.3 billion in goods to Syria through September, its highest total for a nine-month period ever recorded, Bloomberg reports. Those who wield power over the border—and right now that's militants in at least three border towns—are the ones who reap the profits, pocketing tolls and fees from transporters. While Turkish customs and economy officials either wouldn't comment or didn't respond to Bloomberg, the owner of a Turkish trucking company said that "every day we have four or five trucks carrying Red Bulls to Syria." He adds that those picking up the goods on the Syrian side don't ID themselves, and the imports are then loaded onto Syrian trucks and driven away. Meanwhile, caffeinated militants may also be fortified by the "good wives of jihadi": The Independent recently documented a new ISIS media arm that posts and tweets out nursing, morale, and cooking advice for militants' wives, including recipes to "replenish the mujahidin." (Here's how you can get your portion of a $13 million Red Bull payout.)