Latest in Podcasts and Multimedia

The Lawfare Podcast: An Islamic State Jailbreak

Jen Patja Howell, Jacob Schulz, Leah West
Friday, January 28, 2022, 12:00 PM

Published by The Lawfare Institute
in Cooperation With
Brookings

Late last week and early this week saw fighting between Islamic State fighters and Syrian democratic forces after the Islamic State attempted a jailbreak of a Kurdish prison containing significant numbers of alleged Islamic State fighters. The makeshift jail housed Syrians, Iraqis, and also alleged fighters from Western Europe and North Africa. It's the most significant jailbreak since ISIS’s territorial defeat—and a major national security story that's gone under the radar.

To talk it all through and to think about the scale of the damage and all of the things that led to this point, Jacob Schulz talked with Leah West, assistant professor of international affairs at Carleton University, and Louisa Loveluck, the Baghdad bureau chief at the Washington Post. They broke down what's happened so far and what to make of it all.


Jen Patja Howell is the editor and producer of The Lawfare Podcast and Rational Security. She currently serves as the Co-Executive Director of Virginia Civics, a nonprofit organization that empowers the next generation of leaders in Virginia by promoting constitutional literacy, critical thinking, and civic engagement. She is the former Deputy Director of the Robert H. Smith Center for the Constitution at James Madison's Montpelier and has been a freelance editor for over 20 years.
Jacob Schulz is the former managing editor of Lawfare. He previously served as deputy managing editor and associate editor. He hails from Pennylvania and attended Amherst College.
Leah West is an assistant professor at the Norman Paterson School of International Affairs and a former national security lawyer with Canada’s Department of Justice.