Protecting human rights in the era of uncertainty: How not to lose the war against ISIS

As the brutal and violent attacks on civilian populations multiply throughout the world perpetrated by the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS or ISIL, or the Islamic State, also known as Daesh), the need for an effective response to terrorism has grown in intensity. The ISIS attacks in Paris have in particular introduced a wave of nationalist, securitized alarm, reinforcing a general concern about the influx of immigrants and asylum seekers while underscoring the shift from a regional to international nature of both threat and risk. These issues of security and terrorism have also illustrated the willingness of great powers to support military actions against ISIS in order to stem the atrocities perpetrated by this group, while placing the overthrow of the Assad regime on the backburner for the time being at least. We argue that the defeat of ISIS need not be accomplished by stigmatizing refugees and subjecting them to religious litmus tests. Closing Europe's porous borders and politicizing the attempt to admit refugees at a time when the growing humanitarian crisis poses mounting human rights challenges to the international community is fundamentally wrongheaded. We argue that these approaches, while temporarily satisfying, strengthen the hand of ISIS and other terrorist groups that tend to portray such policies and practices largely in terms of civilizational clashes. Defeating ISIS requires strategic patience and long-term logical and prudent decision making. While doing so, it is important to avoid the enemy's repressive, atavistic, and unsavory methods. The burden is on the international community to fulfill the commitment to international human rights law and international humanitarian law, which continue to be one of the most effective and legitimate tools in our arsenal to confront terrorism.