Forces at the Doorstep of ISIS’ Apocalyptic Battlefield Dabiq

A dramatic development in the fight against the Islamic State is being overshadowed by the capturing of Fallujah by Iran-backed Iraqi forces. While attention is focused on upcoming offensives against Mosul and Raqqa, Syrian rebel forces (including Al-Qaeda) are on the doorstep of Dabiq, the centerpiece of ISIS’ apocalyptic ideology and arguably the most important piece of land to the group.

If you look at the picture below from a Syrian civil war map, you’ll see that there’s a straight shot to the capital of the Islamic State in Raqqa (colored in grey) by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, a coalition of Kurdish, Assyrian Christian and Sunni Arab rebels.

The Western media is fixated on Raqqa as the big prize because we’re still thinking in terms of conventional warfare but, for the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL), the only thing special about Raqqa is that it was a good spot to set up its headquarters. Its loss would be a major contribution towards undercutting ISIS’ claims that Allah is delivering rewarding it with success, but the land itself has no unique ideological value for them.

The ideological linchpin of the ISIS caliphate is Dabiq, a small town in northwestern Syria. The town’s centrality to the ISIS’ ideological legitimacy is apparent in that it is the name of its English-language magazine and every issue references prophecies about it.

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