Dear Future President,

I am writing to you about the terrorist group ISIS. I believe that this is a problem because ISIS, which stands for Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, is growing stronger every day. I care about this topic because we are not doing enough to stop ISIS and to help protect the world. You may think that none of this is our business but, actually, it is. We need to join forces with other countries trying to fight ISIS and see what we can do or else one day ISIS is going to ruin the world and treat us like we are pieces of dust. In fact, ISIS is already doing horrendous things to women.

Women, especially Yazidi women, are put in jails and according to the Daily Beast, “are being sold to Islamic fighters for $25-$150 or they can face daily rape and a slow death.” ISIS uses women that are as young as 14 years old as “sex slaves” for their own pleasure. Only some escape, and those who do often have to leave their daughters and other family members behind and will most likely never see them again. However, the majority of women do not escape and spend the rest of their lives in this hostile environment.

ISIS was created in 2004 by a Sunni terror group in Iraq called al Qaeda and then later the name transferred into ISIS. It was Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian Islamist who initiated the creation of the group. He later died in a battle. ISIS’s first goal is to take down the Shiites because when the Sunnis took over, it made the Shiites want revenge. Stated by the Globe and Mail, Saddam Hussein was a born Sunni and a secular president (Also know as a dictator) who treated the Shiites brutally. In 2010, during a US-Iraq operation, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi took over the group and led it ever since. ISIS is today one of the strongest militant groups in the world because they have monopolized large pieces of land. So what are we doing to stop them? In 2001, the UN created the Counter-Terrorism Committee. Five years later, they agreed upon the UN Global Counter-Terrorism Strategy. The UN said that “the four pillars” to help the International community to counter terrorism are:

1. Addressing conditions conducive to the spread of terrorism
2. Preventing and combating terrorism
   
3. Building Member States’ capacity to prevent and combat terrorism and to strengthen the role of the United Nations system in this regard
   
4. Ensuring the respect for human rights for all and the rule of law as the fundamental basics for countering terrorism.”
   

Even though the US has grouped up with the Iraqi Army, are these two forces enough to defeat ISIS? The Iraqi Army has tried numerous times to take back their land but have usually failed in doing so. ISIS is sending numerous suicide bombers, which is making it harder to regain certain areas of land. Because ISIS has so many small-scale attacks such as setting booby traps in homes, we are falling behind.

Thank you for reading my letter and I hope that we will never have to suffer under ISIS’ rule. Please think about what I wrote though, for this may be important someday.

Sincerely,

Faith W.

Sources

Damon, Arwa. “Is the US Doing Enough to Help Fight ISIS.” CNN, 11 Apr. 2016

Gander, Kashmira. "ISIS Flag: What Does It Mean and What Are Its Origins." Independant. N.p., 6 July 2015. Web. 4 Nov. 2016.\

Greene, Richard Allen, and Nick Thompson. "ISIS: Everything You Need to Know." CNN. CNN, 11 Aug. 2016. Web. 6 Nov. 2016.

Hanna, Jason. "Here's How ISIS Was Really Founded." CNN. CNN, 13 Aug. 2016. Web. 4 Nov. 2016.

Lister, Tim. “What Does ISIS Really Want.” CNN, 11 Dec. 2015, www.cnn.com/2015/12/11/middleeast/isis-syria-iraq-caliphate/

Sypher, Ford. “Rape and Sexual Slavery.” The Daily Beast, 28 Aug. 2014, www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/08/28/rape-and-sexual-slavery-inside-an-isis-prison.html.

“UNITED NATIONS ACTION TO COUNTER TERRORISM.” UNITED NATIONS, UNITED NATIONS, 2016, www.un.org/en/counterterrorism/.

“What Does ISIS Really Want.” Atlantic, 2016, www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/384980/