{"id":2253,"date":"2017-11-20T20:59:20","date_gmt":"2017-11-21T01:59:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/?p=2253"},"modified":"2017-11-20T20:59:20","modified_gmt":"2017-11-21T01:59:20","slug":"map-of-the-week-expansion-of-isis","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/2017\/11\/20\/map-of-the-week-expansion-of-isis\/","title":{"rendered":"Map of the Week: Expansion of ISIS"},"content":{"rendered":"

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In today\u2019s modern times, many different governments and organizations are in constant conflict.\u00a0 While these are mostly foreign policy issues, the reality is countries in complete disagreement with one another and this leads to unease in how to resolve the situation.\u00a0 On top of this is the idea of terrorism, which has been a constantly evolving threat for the past few decades.\u00a0 Currently, the main organization that is a threat is ISIS, which has all parts of the world nervous. They are a radical group that is constantly growing in members and in their attacks. One of the most frightening aspects of ISIS is that they no longer are attacking a singular region. They have evolved into attacking places all over the world. \u201cISIS\u201d, which stands for the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria, is no longer a group of individuals in that region that are wreaking havoc throughout the Middle East. They now are recruiting members from places all over the world. Places such as Canada, where ISIS presence was unprecedented, are now producing new members. Their range of base has now moved out of just Iraq and Syria into places such as: Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Lebanon, Iran, Egypt, Tunisia, Russia, Jordan, and others. Their reach now is significant and has foreign governments worried. They inflict mass destruction without the slightest sense of care. For instance, in 2016, a man affiliated with ISIS drove a truck through crowds in Nice, France. These people were celebrating France\u2019s National Day and he ended up killing 84 and injuring many more. They are brutal individuals who do not care about how many people they kill, and their mission is to inflict pain and suffering around the world.<\/p>\n

The chosen map details the growing regions of attacks and demonstrates the magnitude of their destruction. This map was created by GeoCurrents, a news outlet for all of the noteworthy events in the world pertaining to people and places, offering various discussions of current events. The mission of this article, along with many of their others investigating the growth of ISIS, it to focus on specific regions and then update those maps frequently in accordance with what movements ISIS is making. It shows many of their attempts and the locations they are primarily focusing on in Europe. The most frequently attacked countries in Europe by ISIS are France, Germany, and the United Kingdom.\u00a0 This map also illustrates the number of foreign fighters in each region. These terrorists have killed thousands of people and injured many more. This map uses many intelligent symbols in order to depict all that is occurring within these countries. For example, a country with an orange box around its name means that it is a target of ISIS through their threats and recruitment. Over time, these icons have grown vastly throughout the regions of this map. Another example of an intelligent symbol is the explosion icon. Red means it was a direct ISIS coordinated attack and yellow means that it was an ISIS-inspired attack. Additionally, explosion symbols with a black dot in the center indicate that the attack was thwarted. The cartographers of this map have a very keen sense of detail in order to illuminate all the actions ISIS is making.<\/p>\n

This map is important because it shows to what degree ISIS\u2019s attacks and targets have grown. They are no longer simply a regional terrorist organization, they are now an international group of radicals whose sole mission is attacking countries worldwide. They are constantly evolving and becoming more of a global threat. Their mass destruction is becoming more commonly talked about and governments are working tirelessly on plans to combat this terrorist organization.<\/p>\n

Terrorism, to most people, seems like something that will never affect them. More often than not, we tend to think these actions are something that simply occurs in the Middle East and could not ever happen in our home country. Most people don’t think their region of the world will really be affected by terrorism and that is why in most cases they overlook it. In reality, it is imperative that more maps like this continue to be released, not only for the general public to be made aware of, but for governments worldwide. These are difficult issues in many parts of the world and they cannot continue to be overlooked. While this map is quite helpful in understanding the attacks that ISIS has attempted and completed, I find that it fails to illustrate the magnitude of destruction they have caused. It is distorted in the sense that it primarily only focuses on Europe with only smaller portions of other countries represented. Yes, the majority of ISIS\u2019s attacks have been in Europe and the Middle East, however, this map leaves out countries such as the United States, most of Russia, and virtually all of the Middle East. While it does an impressive job of showing the degree to which these countries have been impacted, it is also distorted because it is leaving out larger portions of the world. The producer of this map does demonstrate some bias being that the majority of the map is centralized on Europe without displaying many of the other target locations of ISIS\u2019s attacks. Despite this, The International Centre for the Study of Radicalisation and Political Violence\u2019s mission is to further educate the public and policymakers to further aid in combating the acts of terror that groups such as ISIS commit. Through their vast research of attacks and the accumulation of data, it leads to maps that can help us further investigate their agenda and targeted areas. It is organizations like these that can make a significant difference in the way we fight terror and better prepare ourselves for it.\u00a0 Maps like these need to become more readily available and continue the talking between governments. Only through the collaboration of governments will this radical organization be stopped and a greater sense of safety be restored throughout the world. The maps created with the data from the ISCR assist in calculating the number of attacks attempted, and though they might appear to have no direct correlation, they demonstrate just how serious and rapidly increasing the threat of ISIS is. Through maps like this, we gain a broader knowledge that can only benefit the global situation and allow us to continue making advancements with the goal of ending terrorism.<\/p>\n

References:<\/p>\n

Lister, Tim. \u201cISIS: 143 Attacks in 29 Countries Have Killed 2,043.\u201d CNN, Cable News Network, 13 Feb. 2017, www.cnn.com\/2015\/12\/17\/world\/mapping-isis-attacks-around-the-world\/index.html.<\/p>\n

Bremmer, Ian. \u201cISIS Foreign Fighters: Which Countries Do They Come From?\u201d Time, Time, 14 Apr. 2017, time.com\/4739488\/isis-iraq-syria-tunisia-saudi-arabia-russia\/.<\/p>\n

\u201cHome \/ ICSR.\u201d ICSR, icsr.info\/.<\/p>\n

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  In today\u2019s modern times, many different governments and organizations are in constant conflict.\u00a0 While these are mostly foreign policy issues, the reality is countries in complete disagreement with one another and this leads to unease in how to resolve … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3445,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[21024],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2253","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-maps-of-the-week"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2253","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3445"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2253"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2253\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2253"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2253"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.richmond.edu\/livesofmaps\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2253"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}