One of the first things ISIS did upon conquering territory a few months ago was destroy tobacco products and ban smoking, forcing shops to stop selling cigarettes and criticizing the habit as a form of “slow suicide.”
Faced with declining approval ratings in the wake of their bloodthirsty genocidal rampage, however, they’ve decided to reconsider, according to Al Arabiya News.
“The decision [to allow shops to sell cigarettes] came as an attempt to gain popularity after the group’s extremist actions began to appall residents,” they explained. “Particularly after security forces, aided by international support, began to attack ISIS.”
The United States has been bombing ISIS territories for six weeks now, although recent reports from the area are less than optimistic about Iraq’s future. “The Islamic State is still dealing humiliating blows to the Iraq government forces,” The New York Times reported Monday evening.
ISIS also recently released a new propaganda video, urging Muslims to kill non-Muslims, and specifically attacking President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry. “If you can kill a disbelieving American or European – especially the spiteful and filthy French – or an Australian, or a Canadian, or any other disbeliever from the disbelievers waging war, including the citizens of the countries that entered into a coalition against the Islamic State … kill him in any manner or way however it may be,” said the spokesman, Abu Mohammad al-Adnani.
He also criticized Obama and Kerry for saying that ISIS is not Islamic and distorts the teachings of Islam. “Kerry, the uncircumcised old geezer, suddenly became an Islamic jurist, issuing a verdict to the people that the Islamic State was distorting Islam, that what it was doing was against Islamic teachings, and that the Islamic State was an enemy of Islam. … Obama, the mule of the Jews, suddenly became a sheikh, mufti [Islamic scholar that issues verdicts], and an Islamic preacher, warning the people and preaching in defense of Islam, claiming that the Islamic State has nothing to do with Islam.” (RELATED: ISIS Apologizes For Releasing Sotloff Beheading Video Early)
Kerry spoke out against ISIS again Monday, highlighting its brutality toward women and children.
“We have witnessed their unbelievable, brutal mass murder, executions of soldiers, journalists,” he said. “What is far less well known but equally intolerable is the amount of atrocity committed against innocent women and girls. ISIL has savagely raped and kidnapped countless Iraqi and Syrian women. It has forced young girls into marriages with ISIL fighters. It has awarded young women to jihadists as a reward for entering jihad. It has abducted Yezidi and Christian women and sold them off as slaves to jihadists. This is who ISIL is.” (RELATED: Congress Demands Retaliation Against ISIS)
ISIS’s most recent statement ended with an admission that they don’t know how to defend against the airstrikes, saying “O Allah, you know our weakness. We have no way to deal with their airplanes. … O Allah, you have placed them above us by their airplanes. O Allah, you know we have no power nor strength against their planes except through You. O Allah, do not let them be above us while You are above them. O Allah, do not let them be above us while we are higher than them.”
