ISIL, ISIS, IS, Daesh

For some, the terrorist organization now commonly called IS, for Islamic State, was first ISIL, or Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant ("Levant" being a historical name for the lands east of the Mediterranean). For most Americans, it was and is ISIS, or Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham ("al-Sham," or "Bilad al-Sham," being a region of Syria in the 7th century). But now we're hearing a new name, which France adopted a while back: Daesh. In an opinion piece in the Boston Globe last year, writer Zeba Khan explained why everyone should use that name. The most obvious reason, she notes, is that, as President Obama pointed out, "ISIL is not Islamic, ... and [is] certainly not a state." Khan continues, "The term 'Daesh' is strategically a better choice because it is still accurate in that it spells out the acronym of the group’s full Arabic name, al-Dawla al-Islamiya fi al-Iraq wa al-Sham. Yet, at the same time, 'Daesh' can also be understood as a play on words—and an insult": https://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2014/10/09/words-matter-isis-war-use-daesh/V85GYEuasEEJgrUun0dMUP/story.html