The Head of the Snake

Ever since 1993 when President Bill Clinton first spent his Summer vacation on Martha's Vineyard, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi had been fascinated by the United States' willingness to have such a concentration of the nation's power elite, both governmental and otherwise, concentrated on this one-hundred square mile island in the Atlantic Ocean. It created such a perfect target for terrorists wanting to destabilize both the Administration and the nation as a whole. By August of 2015 al-Baghdadi was the leader of the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, more colloquially known as ISIS. Seeking political legitimacy and global recognition, the President of the United States offered the key to obtaining both. By forcing him to listen to the rationale for granting the new Caliphate full political recognition and, in the process, the latitude to consolidate lands once within the Muslim world's domain as part of the new Caliphate's sovereign territory, al-Baghdadi hoped to return the Islamic realm to its glory days of old. The time was now, and Martha's Vineyard offered a site for negotiation far from the distractions of Washington. What al-Baghdadi had to do was gain the undivided attention of the President and make him an offer which he could not refuse. To do so he was holding Israel hostage pending the outcome of the negotiations, giving the President no alternative but to see the Middle East in the same light as did he and his followers.