Is This The Last Days Of The Caliphate?

The Economist: Islamic State’s messianic apocalypse is postponed

But the defeat of the jihadist group in the real world might revive realism among Sunnis.

THE fate of a small rural town in northern Syria might seem inconsequential when faced with a multinational assault on the group’s main stronghold, Mosul. But few places were more central to the image of Islamic State (IS). The jihadists lauded Dabiq as the locus, as cited in an obscure Hadith, or saying of the Prophet Muhammad, of the battle of the end of days; in their vision it would host an apocalyptic showdown between the self-styled caliphate’s faithful and Western crusaders. It named its glossy English-language e-zine after the town, and beheaded its victims, like Peter Kassig, an American aid worker, in its foothills. As the day of reckoning approached, observers reported that IS had fortified Dabiq with 1,200 fighters.

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WNU Editor: If this is the last days of the Caliphate, their supporters are certainly not showing it .... Islamic State takes control of half Iraqi town near Jordan-Syria border: sources (Reuters).