Quran and cash

Over the past month, the total income of the Islamic State (IG), according to experts, exceeded $ 200 million, the families of the dead “heroes” of the Caliphate will soon begin to receive compensation in dinars - a new national currency. How Islamists earn - The New Times found out

One of the supporters of the IG goes with the flag of the organization on Rakki Street (Syria). June 29, 2014/ Photo: Reuters/ Stringer

The Islamic State has already reached the parameters of a middle European country - with 6-8 million people, 30 thousand devoted soldiers recruited in Europe, Africa and the Middle East, and an income of $ 3 million per day only due to the sale of oil. The new caliphate is built on the growth and strengthening of the territory, its strategy is “to stay and expand” (Baqiyya Wa Tatamaddad), sweeping away everything that will meet in the way. To strike a blow to the economy of the IG, it is not enough to apply sanctions against rich Sunnis - you need to at least bomb oil production places. This is “the richest group that we have ever had to fight,” says former US Treasury Employee Matthew Levit (according to the UN annual budget of IS is $ 2 billion).

Chameleons of the economy

Cash comes from smuggling raw oil: from deposits controlled in Iraq and Syria, up to 70 thousand barrels per day are extracted, while one barrel in Manbij (Syria), where the distribution point is from $ 10 to $ 22. However, the oil processed into underground oil refineries and delivered to Turkey, oil costs from $ 25 to $ 60 per barrel. If oil passes through Turkish and Lebanese intermediaries, the price is already $ 60.

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Moving in the development of territories, IS became an expert in archeology: the traffic of material historical values ​​brought him $ 36 million, and this is only according to one Syrian site. Money is intended for recruitment of Europeans living on a crisis continent, where there is not enough work: more than 2000, not counting hundreds of Americans and thousands of Turks.

“Ankara has already seized 15 tons of fuel and isolated 3 km of an underground oil pipeline crossing the Turkish border, but this is a drop in the sea. In the Iraqi Mosul, which is under the control of the IG, gasoline is three times more expensive today than $ 1.5 per liter of IS solders, traveling on a tanning station, all - without without the territory in Turkey, in Turkey, in Turkey, in Turkey, in Turkey, in Turkey, Iraq, Kurdistan and, even to his own enemy, President of Syria Bashar Assada - to protect the areas controlled by them from bombing. Europe, managed to establish and restart many from the units destroyed by the war.

Another article of income is the collection of travel around the caliphate: $ 50 for each passenger car, $ 400 - from each truck. In addition, the caliphate soldiers ensure the safety of infrastructure, provide various services and take a fee for this: in Racke, merchants must pay “contributions for the Levant Army” in exchange for garbage collection. The payment of taxes is under the control of the special manager - the former chief of the police of the Iraqi province of Nainava Mahadi Garavi: his subordinates bring to the treasury of IS at least $ 8 million a month.

The system of state enterprises is built on the expanses of the caliphate: mini-cement plants, structures for the distribution of electricity ...

Against the backdrop of the economic strategy of IS, al-Qaeda looks pale: Ben Laden just had money, the caliphate earns it: IG-the economies that can survive in a crisis better than the markets of other “real” states. In addition, IS had just received additional financial support from Al-Qaeda of the Arabian Peninsula and Al-Qaeda Maghreb-these two wings of organizations turned away from Ayman Az-Zavakhiri, an unharismatic heir to Ben Laden, hostile to the new caliphate.

Dinars for the caliphate

Caliph al-Baghdadi is about to start minting his own currency-dinars depicting the Mosque of the Omeyayads in Damascus: cry, Bashar al-Assad! This dinar will be cast from pure gold or silver-exactly like during the period of “first Islam” hundreds of years ago. He will serve against the “Western Satanian financial system, imposed on all Muslims in the world,” says al-Baghdadi. According to the sources of The New Times in Kuwait, it is planned to issue not only coins, but also banknotes.

Moving in the development of territories, IS became an expert in archeology: the traffic of material historical values ​​brought him $ 36 million, and this is only according to one Syrian site. Money is intended for recruitment of Europeans living on a crisis continent, where there is not enough work: more than 2000, not counting hundreds of Americans and thousands of Turks.

Revenues are also sources of abduction for the purpose of ransom and voluntary donations. Earned funds are invested in the imaginary GDP of the caliphate - unlike Ben Laden and the company that spent millions of dollars on the organization of spectacular terrorist acts abroad, far from the house.

A week ago, a rumor flashed through the Middle East - as if a caliph al Baghdadi, whose head was declared a reward of $ 10 million, was wounded or even killed. But if the murder of Ben Laden outlined the sunset of his group, then the caliph al-Baghdadi, dead or alive, continues to earn money.