Washington Post journalist Joby Warrick chronicles how a fanatic movement led by a onetime thug, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, has been transformed into the Islamic State, now menacing whole parts of the Middle East. In Black Flags: The Rise of ISIS (Doubleday, $28.95), Warrick provides an extensive biography of Zarqawi, from his early years in Jordan to his leadership of a violent resistance network in Iraq following the U.S. invasion. Since Zarqawi’s death in 2006, his successors have built the Islamic State into an organization that has eclipsed al Qaeda in influence and ambition. Now led by Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, known as “the invisible sheik,” the Islamic State has seized large swaths of territory in both Syria and Iraq, running oil fields, banks, schools, and a formidable military while spreading terror through gruesome acts. Warrick’s revealing, well-written account is valuable for anyone trying to understand the Islamic State’s origins and aims—and how U.S. missteps along the way contributed to the group’s rise.
