On October 15, 2006 Al-Qa’ida in Iraq (AQI) and its allies declared the independent Islamic State of Iraq (ISI) across a swath of Western Iraq. Some secularist elements of the Iraqi insurgency and even jihadi scholars have been slow to support the new organization. The ISI’s defenders have developed a series of theological, philosophical, and practical arguments to justify the ISI’s existence to the ulema—Islamic scholars. The most comprehensive defense was authored by Uthman Bin Abd al-Rahman al-Tamimi.

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