ISLAMIC extremists who have declared the creation of a Middle Eastern caliphate were yesterday branded “a threat to all countries” by Baghdad.
A member loyal to the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant waves an Isil flag in Raqqa [REUTERS]The gangs of al-Baghdadi are living in a fantasy world. You cannot establish a state through looting, sabotage and bombing
The brutal Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (Isis) trumpeted the formation of its caliphate straddling Iraq and Syria on Sunday and ordered all Muslims to follow its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
The 43-year-old Iraqi is seen as too extreme by Al Qaeda and the US State Department has put a £6million price on his head, dead or alive.
Isis has boasted of executing hundreds of opponents while fighting president Assad’s repressive regime in Syria.
And in the past three weeks it has swept through northern and western Iraq, seizing control of the country’s second city Mosul and the Iraq-Syrian border.
Renaming itself as the Islamic State, it claimed that al-Baghdadi is now caliph of the Muslim world, a medieval title last widely recognised in the Ottoman sultan deposed 90 years ago after the First World War.
Spokesman Abu Muhammad al-Adnani said: “He is the imam and caliph for Muslims everywhere.”
Members loyal to the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant wave Isil flags [REUTERS]The claim was made despite Isis regarding Shia Muslims – the majority in Iraq – as heretics.
Isis posted internet footage of its fighters parading in their northern Syrian stronghold of Raqqa under black flags while others raced around in pick-up trucks against a backdrop of celebratory gunfire.
In Raqqa, Isis has banned music, imposed an Islamic tax on Christians for protection and carried out public executions in the main square of violators of Islamic law.
The proclamation of a caliphate provoked anger across much of the Arab world and, with it, predictions that it could fracture the loose alliance of Sunni Muslims and Saddam Hussein loyalists fighting alongside Isis to topple the Shia Muslim government of Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki.
Iraqi army spokesman Qassim Atta said: “This declaration is a message by Islamic State not only to Iraq or Syria but to the region and the world. The message is that Islamic State has become a threat to all countries. I believe all the countries, once they read the declaration, will change their attitudes because it orders everybody to be loyal to it.”
The senior Islamic cleric, the Grand Mufti of Egypt, dismissed the new caliphate as an “illusion”.
A spokesman for rival rebel group, Army of Islam, said: “The gangs of al-Baghdadi are living in a fantasy world. You cannot establish a state through looting, sabotage and bombing.”
A protester holds a banner saying 'Islam is Freedom' during an anti-Isis demonstration in Holland [REUTERS]Aymenn al-Tamimi, an expert on Islamic militants in Iraq and Syria, said the caliphate could alienate some of Isis’s Sunni allies who are more interested in taking Baghdad than pursuing a religious agenda.
He said: “Now the insurgents in Iraq have no excuse for working with Isis if they were hoping to share power with Isis. The prospect of infighting in Iraq is increased.”
Meanwhile, heavy fighting continued around Saddam’s birthplace Tikrit yesterday as Iraqi government forces continued to try to drive out Isis fighters.
A US Marine corporal, declared a deserter nearly 10 years ago after disappearing in Iraq under mysterious circumstances, is back in military custody and will face charges.
Cpl Wassef Ali Hassoun, 34, turned himself in and was flown from an undisclosed location in the Middle East to Virginia on Sunday.
He claimed to have been kidnapped by insurgents in 2004 before turning up in Lebanon, returning to the US and then vanishing nine years ago.
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