ISIS INC: Jihadist Economy Is Churning For Looting Taxes

 Jihadist Economy Is Churning For Looting Taxes

Even under the rule of the jihadist, death and taxes remain the two great constants of life. Some learn that the hard way.As officials Isis religious tithe known as Zakat announced last summer, Mansour, Secretary of the grocery store at the age of 26 years in eastern Syria, stopped payment while tried to cook his books.High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details.A week later, four Isis officials stormed into his shop, ordered him out, and counted the bill themselves - to the displeasure they based calculated on the retail price of its shares. There were no price tags on the beef, canned meat, so I rode one tax collector around the city on his motorcycle compared to canned meat prices in other stores.After five hours, the full review. Bill: 32,500 Syrian pounds (about $ 108)."They told me: You are a liar... 'He said how victory will be achieved if you do not pay Zakat?" Mansour told the Financial Times through the website. Like all of those lands Isis who were interviewed by the FT, Mansour asked not to reveal his real name for his safety.Oil in Syria may ostensibly be more lucrative resources armed group, but even if the United States and the French and Russian planes succeed in an attempt to bring down the production of crude oil, can local revenues, such as taxes keep the economy churning Isis. FT investigation indicates Isis earns at least as much of the taxes and extortion, confiscation and oil.Western intelligence officials and former fighters Isis and people living in areas controlled by Isis says Zakat, fees and confiscation funded salaries that attract recruits and financial services such as street cleaning and supporting the bread that Isis touts as proof of a Palestinian state.
High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details.Mandatory form of Zakat in Islam, Zakat and dates back to the days of the Prophet Muhammad. It requires of Muslims with enough income to deliver 2.5 per cent of the capital, and can be given to those who are fighting for a holy issue, which is how Isis justify their collections.State or not, self-proclaimed caliphate that stretches nearly half a third of Syria and Iraq is adept at exploiting the population it governs, with the help of a small number of tax collectors and informants Army.Isis up to nearly every aspect of the economy in its territory, bringing in hundreds of millions of dollars a year. After months of interviews with officials and analysts and people on the ground, FT has discovered money from trade, agriculture, and transfers - even salaries paid by governments that are fighting it - all flowing into the coffers jihadists. ""They do not put any source of money untouched - this is a lifeline for them," says Omar, a commander of the Syrian rebels, who ran military operations in conjunction with Isis for a year before fleeing to Turkey, where he met the FT.Even the coalition led by the United States aimed at infrastructure Isis infrastructure with air strikes, one of the challenges facing the efforts to eradicate the group is successful in coining opportunities.Well before the Isis land which seizes funds from companies, and earn tens of millions of dollars of Mosul, Iraq's second largest city. RAND Corporation and the US-based think tank, estimated that, the team had built up before the June 2014 capture of Mosul $ 875m.Isis also seized more land, was first depends on the confiscation of income, looting banks and military bases and the homes of Iraqi officials. In each state, or province, Isis set up and continue to work on the so-called "spoils of war," the office that calculates the value of the dollar from looting and to pay the five militants who run the raid. Non-military goods are sold in the "spoils markets" local fighters and local residents say. And it allows members of Isis to buy at half price.

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details."You could buy anything: the doors of the house, refrigerators, washing machines, cars, and cows, furniture," says shop owner who works near a market in Salihiyeh, a village on the Syrian-Iraqi border. "It is all pure profit."Over the past year, and taxes and the confiscation of perhaps rivaled oil as the main source of income for the group, according to intelligence sources and ex-combatants. Oil revenues, which go directly to the senior leaders of the group, is estimated to have reached more than $ 450M over the past year.As income from one-time sources such as looting tails off, Isis and ensuring revenue flows over the long term. Apart from oil, Zakat and a range of other taxes levied locally. And residents who work for the provincial team says Wali, or governor, oversees the collection of zakat by the local council. This gives the flexibility officials to al-Qaida groups on local conditions - or fill their pockets with little oversight.Taxes on government salaries in the city of Mosul alone may team scored $ 23M this year, according to estimates by FT employee on charges by Iraqi officials. The Iraqi government continued to pay the salaries of nearly a year after he took control of the city jihadists.The amount of Zakat on grain and cotton collected Isis worth more than $ 20M, according to estimates by FT based on the statistics provided by Iraqi officials and farmers Syrians. If it included government seizures of grain stores, and took control of the set $ 200M.Alliance has developed the US-led air campaign to target more effective oil revenues and Isis. During the past two months, it has been hit facilities in the fields, including stations and vehicles used by insurgents pumping. But as long as the supply of goods merchants, farmers plow the fields and send remittances to relatives in the land of Isis, the jihadist organization find ways to profit.Financial experts with the coalition forces led by the United States to combat Isis says regional control of the group refutation of their work. As economic sanctions aimed at governments strain the lives of civilians and cripple companies, to reach the income Isis brings suffering to the people living under it.Matthew Levitt, a former US Treasury official, says prompted some members of the US Congress for a more aggressive campaign. "Some... Want to know why we're not just carpet bombing of Mosul and deal with such areas of France under Nazi control in WW2. But we are trying to minimize the impact on normal hostages citizen so they do not become more prone to [Isis]," he explains.Trade:High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details.On the south-western border of Turkey, and up to 600 truck trailer lined with a day to transport food and building materials in Syria. Many drivers and traders say that most of the goods passing through the rebel areas, and avoid the territory of President Bashar al-Assad and go directly to the so-called succession.

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details."Ninety per cent are from what we sell now rely on Isis... They have purchasing power," says Marwan, who brings the cooking oil, detergent and rice to the territories controlled by Isis.During the five years of civil war, and said that he paid the daily bribes at checkpoints held by militia loyal to Assad and rebels who are fighting them. With Isis, he flashes the delivery proves his company paid an annual zakat to him, and waved through.And it is loaded trucks to travel from Iraq to land Isis customs duties, which resulted in $ 140MA annually, according to the accounts of trucks and Iraqi analysts drivers.Abu Mohammed, another dealer who sells vegetables from rebel areas to areas Isis also wanted to remain anonymous, says some of his friends moved to trade land Isis because the work is more secure. "You could leave the stores open and no one steals the pin. All you have to do is pay zakat," he says.Isis impose a common Zakat through its territory. It takes 2.5 percent of the capital of the wealthy residents and businesses, whether it is a factory or work truck with one driver. Of farmers, Isis impose the equivalent of 5 per cent of irrigated crops and 10 per cent of rain-fed crops. But it can be flexible. Some services require Isis officials on the money: doctors in eastern Syria do not pay zakat but to volunteer once a week in the hospital Isis.Agriculture:High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details.Agriculture is one of the most lucrative sources of Zakat, with wheat, barley, cotton and raw products. He said Iraqi farmers contacted by the FT paid zakat in livestock and crops, while farmers in Syria report that many of the tax collectors Isis market prices account and ask for the cash equivalent.Isis pay special attention to the amount of land each farmer and agriculture. Farmers FT said that tax collectors Isis intimidate local companies harvest and encourage farmers to report earnings each other in order to estimate the amount of tax that should be charged.Azzam says, a farmer who grows wheat, barley and vegetables on the outskirts of Mosul, he was shocked by the extent of the involvement of many of the Isis activists in the process of tax collection."- And it was some Iraqis, Syrians, and was so foreign to them came in all sizes and colors," he said of the FT by telephone. "There were a lot of them, it was like a convoy of government."

High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details.Group profit rose several times from the same crop, according to traders and farmers who have worked with the jihadists. It takes Zakat crops of wheat, for example, but also buy the remaining portion of the crop sold later in the season the best price, and then taxes on trucks transporting it.Salaries:High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details.It has been one of the largest collection of Isis source of income last year indirectly from an unexpected source: the Iraqi government. The Baghdad are still employees who live in the land transfer Isis' salaries, including Mosul, the second largest city in Iraq, which is home to the Iraqis at least 1M. Number of staff estimates vary. Senior Iraqi officials estimate that up to 400,000 government employees remain in the land of Isis.He says members of the Iraqi parliamentary Finance Committee reached the payment of salaries to more than $ 1BN. Isis payroll tax rate of between 10 and 50 per cent."There was no other alternative but to cut salaries," says Haitham al-Jubouri, deputy head of the Iraqi Parliamentary Finance Committee. "We could not find another way."Officials of Mosul, however, have criticized the decision, warning that further sanctions inflicted on the population. "People will go hungry, and they will be pushed into the arms of Isis" a former municipal official who fled the city and met FT in the city of Arbil in northern Iraq, he said.Even with the salary transfer stop, and remittances from relatives abroad to those who live under the control of Isis "offers a chance taxes. Relatives of use" hawala, "an informal arrangement to convert similar money to Western Union, which is almost impossible to regulate. Residents say Local streets are now lined with hawala offices, carefully monitored by armed Isis, who skim a small percentage."Everyone has a relative abroad get help," says Abu Rami, who gave up his government job in tenderness when he took over the Isis. "My brother in Lebanon. Every month he would send me $ 100, which is what was happening in two days. $ 100 that lasted me the whole month."The coalition is trying to US-led push to reduce the territory controlled by Isis, the organization Western officials are expected to resort to extortion and brutality increasingly to keep the sources of income.Syrians and Iraqis who live under the Isis were fleeing, which reduces the pool of taxpayers. Ali, a teacher in primary schools from the areas of the city who fled last month, most of the doctors, engineers and teachers say they fled from the town during the summer.Agricultural official from Mosul, meanwhile, says will be planted less than 2M acres (50,000 hectares) in the land of Isis this year, down from 3M a year ago. The number of cattle, he says, have already dropped by half.High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut and paste this article. We see our TS & C policy and copyright for more details."The agricultural area will keep shrinking, and the production deteriorate So in the end the farmer on his own will resign from his post just because it does not work," says the official.Perhaps out of fear that her "State" will empty of people, Isis has been trying hard to prevent people from leaving the country. The organization issued orders banning people from going to the "land of the infidels" only urgent medical reasons.But many say there is a limit to the pressure Isis can exert on the rest of the population. In the front areas and villages are very poor, and officials Isis exactly a small flat fee or just give up completely Zakat. Says Ali, the school teacher, Isis tried to impose a fee of 20,000 pounds (about $ 50) for textbooks newly produced earlier this year but canceled it when locals stopped sending children to school.Syrians who have lived through five years of war warn that Isis economy is unlikely to fall apart, pointing out that as long as the local people are making money in order to survive, you will find a ways of taxing them.On a recent trip to the land of Isis, Marwan, a trader, says he watched in disbelief as farmers plow the fields along the front lines. "You see missiles flying overhead and farmers plowing there... If they can not work, how to eat?"