Taxation and Extortion Rival Oil Trade as Main Income Sources for Daesh

The Islamic State jihadist group's income from taxes, confiscations and extortion rival the terrorists' profit from oil trade, media reported Tuesday.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — While the militant group's income from its oil trade has been given much attention, Russian, French and United States airstrikes cannot undermine the militants' local income extracted from the Syrian and Iraqi population living in ISIL (IS, or Daesh in Arabic) territories, the Financial Times news outlet said.

Having interviewed a variety of people who have lived, or are still living under Daesh rule, the newspaper outlined the Islamic zakat tax, which is collected at a rate of 2.5 percent of capital owned by people with sufficient income, loot markets, customs duties, salary and remittance taxes as major revenue sources for the terrorists.

With revenues of $20 million from farming and $23 million from salary taxation in Iraqi's Mosul alone, Daesh now benefits from trade with Turkish suppliers who have been contributing $140 million a year in duties, according the newspaper's research.

Around 600 merchant trucks cross Turkey's border with Syria daily, the research showed. As salary taxes continue to yield millions, much of this comes from the Iraqi government which continued to pay salaries to some 400,000 of its employees still working in Daesh-controlled territory.

The Daesh terrorist group has been in control of large areas of Syria and Iraq since 2014. The violent religious extremist group is outlawed in many countries including Russia, where it is classified as a terrorist organization. Last week, Russia presented evidence of oil smuggling by the group across the border with Turkey.