On Friday March 17, the American-led coalition launched airstrikes targeting the western part of ISIS-controlled al-Mosul in northern Iraq. This operation killed over three hundred civilians and forced many more to flee the city. Hundreds of bodies have been left in the streets with no one to bury them. Almost four million Iraqi citizens are now displaced, and Mosul’s destruction has cost billions of dollars.

At this price, we must ask if winning the war against ISIS will end terror in Iraq.

ISIS’s appearance in Iraq on June 10, 2014 surprised many, but, in fact, Mosul had fallen under its partial control, albeit indirectly and informally, since 2004. ISIS only announced its existence in 2006 and has spent the past decade building its military and ideological powers.