Amir al-Mu'mininCaliph Ibrahim—was named as its caliph, and the group was renamed the Islamic State.
In January 2006, AQI merged with several smaller Iraqi insurgent groups under an umbrella organization called the "Mujahideen Shura Council". This was claimed to be little more than a media exercise and an attempt to give the group a more Iraqi flavour and perhaps to distance al-Qaeda from some of al-Zarqawi's tactical errors, notably the 2005 bombings by AQI of three hotels in Amman. Al-Zarqawi was killed in June 2006, after which the group's direction shifted again.
On 12 October 2006, the Mujahideen Shura Council joined four more insurgent factions and the representatives of a number of Iraqi Arab tribes, and together they swore the traditional Arab oath of allegiance known as Ḥilf al-Muṭayyabīn ("Oath of the Scented Ones").[b] During the ceremony, the participants swore to free Iraq's Sunnis from what they described as Shia and foreign oppression, and to further the name of Allah and restore Islam to glory.[c]
On 13 October 2006, the establishment of the Dawlat al-ʻIraq al-Islāmīyah, "Islamic State of Iraq" (ISI) was announced. A cabinet was formed and Abu Abdullah al-Rashid al-Baghdadi became ISI's figurehead emir, with the real power residing with the Egyptian Abu Ayyub al-Masri. The declaration was met with hostile criticism, not only from ISI's jihadist rivals in Iraq, but from leading jihadist ideologues outside the country. Al-Baghdadi and al-Masri were both killed in a US–Iraqi operation in April 2010. The next leader of the ISI was Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the current leader of ISIS.
On 8 April 2013, having expanded into Syria, the group adopted the name "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant", also known as "Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham." The name is abbreviated as ISIL or alternately ISIS or the uncapitalised Isis. The final "S" in the acronym ISIS stems from the Arabic word Shām (or Shaam), which in the context of global jihad—as in Jund al-Sham, for example—refers to the Levant or Greater Syria. ISIS was also known as al-Dawlah ("the State"), or al-Dawlat al-Islāmīyah ("the Islamic State"). These are short-forms of the name "Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham" in Arabic.
The name "Daʿesh" (pronounced "Daʔesh" and transliterated as "Dāʿesh") is used particularly by ISIS's detractors such as those in Syria. The term is based on the Arabic letters, Dāl, ʾAlif, ʿAyn and Šīn (Shin), which form the acronym (داعش) of the Arabic name translated as, "the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" (al-Dawla al-Islamiya fi Iraq wa ash-Sham). The group considers the term derogatory and reportedly uses flogging as a punishment for people who use the acronym in ISIS-controlled areas.
On 14 May 2014, the United States Department of State announced its decision to use "Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant" (ISIL) as the group's primary name. Which of these acronyms should be used to designate the group, ISIL or ISIS, has been discussed by several commentators.
On 29 June 2014, the establishment of a new caliphate was announced, and the group formally changed its name to the "Islamic State" (IS).[d]
In late August 2014, a leading Islamic authority, Dar al-Ifta al-Misriyyah in Egypt, advised Muslims to stop calling the group "Islamic State" and instead refer to it as "Al-Qaeda Separatists in Iraq and Syria" or "QSIS", because of the militant group's un-Islamic character.
Ideology and beliefs
ISIS is a Sunniextremist group that follows al-Qaeda's hard-line ideology and adheres to global jihadist principles. Like al-Qaeda and many other modern-day jihadist groups, ISIS emerged from the ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood, the world’s first Islamist group dating back to the late 1920s in Egypt. ISIS follows an extreme anti-Western interpretation of Islam, promotes religious violence and regards those who do not agree with its interpretations as infidels or apostates. Concurrently, ISIS—now IS—aims to establish a Salafist-orientated Islamist state in Iraq, Syria and other parts of the Levant.
ISIS's ideology originates in the branch 