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Which brings us back to the root of our disagreement
We're in agreement that he was part of ISI. I think we're also in agreement that ISI became ISIS
So do you consider ISI/AQI to be substantially different enough organization from ISIS to be worth drawing a distinction?
To me, I'd consider the distinction to be similar to quibbling over whether a software engineer worked for alphabet vs google, or Facebook vs meta. It's essentially the same organization with most of the same leadership, goals, methods, etc. just with some restructuring and a name change. A useful distinction if you're talking shop about the specific details of their structure and operation, but for the average layperson having a casual discussion on Lemmy they can be generally understood the be the same organization.
Yes, because AQI came before a lot of the baggage we associate with ISIS.
Was it? The way I understand it they were more of a resistance militia fighting against the US occupation of Iraq. Maybe it's because they didn't have the power to do more than that yet, but the average AQI-era soldier wouldn't be involved in the kind of flagrant attacks against civilians or human rights abuses that characterized and continue to characterize ISIS. I mean why would you attack civilians with the US army right there?
Al Qaeda has always been pretty clear on their Intentions in Iraq, in 2005 they specifically outlined a 4 stage plan
Step 1: expulsion of US forces from Iraq
Step 2: establish an Islamic Caliphate in Iraq
Step 3: extending the jihad to surrounding countries
Step 4: "the clash with Israel"
So yes, they were in opposition to the US occupation, but that was more of a means to an end, not exactly altruistic Iraq freedom fighters. And around that same time they were also carrying out attacks on Iraqi tribespeople and clashing with nationalist insurgents. Yes they got somewhat more extreme over time, but like you said a lot of that can be attributed to them growing in power, and arguably dealing with the US occupation was more pressing to them at the time so that's where most of their resources went.
And step 3 definitely seems to be in line with expanding operations into Syria.