Irak en crisis: yihadistas avanzan para tomar el control. +18 (IMAGENES FUERTES)

This Might Be The Most Horrific Atrocity ISIS Has Committed

BEN WINSOR

OCT. 30, 2014, 6:25 PM 547,858 166
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Warning: This article contains images and descriptions of extreme violence.

Islamic State militants drove 600 Shia, Christian, and Yazidi male prisoners into the middle of the desert, lined them up along the edge of a ravine, and executed them at point blank range, according to a report by Human Rights Watch released Thursday.

The inmates, taken from a local prison, were forced to count themselves as they lined up before members of the jihadist militant group opened fire on them with machine guns.

Human Rights Watch says it spoke to nine survivors of the massacre. They told the organization they made it out alive by rolling into the ravine and pretending to be dead, or were shielded by the bodies of other prisoners who fell on top of them.


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Agency France Presse confirms that these images were released by ISIS, and they appear to show a similar execution.

Militants from the Islamic State (also known as ISIS or ISIL or Daesh) separated the group from more than 1,500 prisoners along religious and ethnic lines.

A survivor recounts an ISIS leader as saying “the Sunnis must stand on one side. The Shia, Kurds, and Yazidis must stand on the other. If I find out that a Shia is among the Sunnis, I’m going to cut off his head with a sheet of metal.”

The moment they made us give up all of our possessions, I knew they were going to kill us.
The men were interrogated about their beliefs, names, hometowns, and other details — witnesses said about 100 Shia prisoners were successful at pretending to be Sunni to escape further violence.

The remaining Shia, Kurdish, Christian, and Yazidi prisoners were then searched.

“They took everything from us — money, watches, rings, identity cards,” one survivor said. “The moment they made us give up all of our possessions, I knew they were going to kill us.”

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The Long War Journal reposted these images, released by ISIS, which it says show Iraqi soldiers being rounded up by the group.

The prisoners had been given no food or water for 24 hours, but ISIS militants promised them supplies as they drove them deeper into the desert. When they arrived, the militants told them “you’ll have water in paradise.”

The militants then made the men kneel in a single line along the rim of a curved ravine 6 to 12 feet deep. They were then asked to number themselves off, with each person forced to “raise his hand and say his number.”

Survivors said many of the gunmen were young. Some appeared nervous. Others were excited, including some who joked at the end of the count that they had “a nice-size herd,” and were "going to eat well tonight."

After we said goodbye to each other, I took my daughter’s picture and kissed it, and I prayed to God to save me for her.
One survivor says that after the count, the militants decided that shooting was the most efficient way to exterminate the group.

“One put his knife to an inmate’s neck, planning to cut his throat, but the other guy said, 'There are too many and we’re not enough, so let’s kill them with bullets.' So he went to the first one and he fired several shots into his back. Then they opened fire on all of us.”

“Before they started shooting, I managed to kiss the men on each side of me, because we knew we were going to die. After we said goodbye to each other, I took my daughter’s picture and kissed it, and I prayed to God to save me for her, because I have no one else,” another survivor said.

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The Long War Journal says this image, posted by ISIS, shows the group transporting prisoners.

Seeing some had survived the first round of shootings, the militants came back for a second volley. The fired until they ran out of ammunition.

“My face was down in the sand. I heard the footsteps of the ISIS guy, he was standing over me and he shot the man lying next to me in the head. He shot me too but the bullet hit my right forearm. I heard death gasps. I felt something coming under me. It was warm. It was the blood of my friend Haider. I took some of that blood and put it on my face and head so that if they came back they would think I am dead,” a survivor told Human Rights Watch.

Another said he used a small knife to cut his own head and neck so that the blood would make it look as if he had been shot. After the gunmen left, he says he raised his head.

They set my right leg on fire. But I had to withstand the pain so they wouldn’t know that I was still breathing.
“I saw one body without a leg, another with his head blown apart. One man went up a nearby hill to see where ISIS was. One of their [ISIS’s] cars saw that guy so they turned around and came back. We fell back to the ground. They started to shoot at us again. Then one of the men from ISIS told the others, 'Let’s leave. We’re out of ammunition.'"

Militants set fire to brush around the ravine, and worked to spread the flames toward the corpses.

“They set my right leg on fire. But I had to withstand the pain so they wouldn’t know that I was still breathing. When they saw that I didn’t move, they told each other that I was dead. Then they burned the person next to me,” one survivor said.

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Another image, apparently released by ISIS, appears to show a similar massacre taking place.

The witnesses told Human Rights watch that 30 to 40 men survived the shooting, though several later died while trying to crawl or stagger away. After the militants left, the survivors fled.

“I took a few steps and fell to the ground because I was losing too much blood," one survivor said. "I was with a group of 11 survivors. One was not shot and he helped me walk. We sat under a bridge. The man who helped me, he put his urine in a bottle. We all drank the urine. Otherwise we would have died of thirst."

Human Rights Watch says the day after the June 10 massacre, ISIS gunmen carried out a similar mass killing of Shia soldiers in the city of Tikrit. ISIS claimed to have executed 1,700 Shia troops and posted videos on the internet showing their gunmen shooting at hundreds of captive men.


Survivors of the June 10 massacre said they saw a man filming the events with a video camera, though Human Rights Watch says no video has been posted online.

Human Rights Watch says that attacks by the Iraqi Government and anti-ISIS militias have also targeted and killed hundreds or even thousands of Sunni Muslims, giving a boost to ISIS support among Sunnis in the area.

Read the full Human Rights Watch report here.
SEE ALSO: ISIS Is Actively Recruiting Female Fighters To Brutalize Other Women

SEE ALSO: 10 Ways ISIS Is Violating The Laws Of Islam

Reuters / StringerVeiled women walk past a billboard that carries a verse from Koran urging women to wear a hijab in Raqqa. Punishments and beatings are often carried out by other women employed by ISIS to impose their laws.
Kurdish forces and the US-backed coalition aren't the only forces with female soldiers fighting in Syria and Iraq. The militant group The Islamic State (ISIS) is recruiting women, too.

Since February, ISIS has controlled at least two all-female battalions, recruiting single women between 18 and 25 and paying a monthly salary of roughly $150.

Al Arabiya reports the groups were initially formed to “expose male activists who disguise in women’s clothing to avoid detention when stopping at the ISIS checkpoints.”

The battalions are also used to enforce ISIS's strict laws of individual conduct on women — sometimes violently. Abu Ahmad, an ISIS official in Syria, told Syria Deeply, "We have established the brigade to raise awareness of our religion among women, and to punish women who do not abide by the law."

Thomas Hegghammer, an expert on violent Islamism, told The Atlantic that it appeared the female battalions were restricted to the ISIS-controlled Syrian city of Raqqa.

"There is a process of female emancipation taking place in the jihadi movement, albeit a very limited and morbid one," Hegghammer said. "Many of them are eager to portray themselves as strong women and often make fun of the Western stereotype of ‘the oppressed Muslim woman.'"

But the battalions aren't evidence that ISIS is embracing female empowerment. It's the just the opposite.

"ISIS created it to terrorize women," Raqqa-based activist Abu al-Hamza told Syria Deeply, telling of a raid the group conducted at a girls school. "After arresting those women and girls they took them to ISIS prisons and locked them in for six hours and punished some of them with 30 whips each."

The girls and women were accused or wearing veils which were two thin, or exposed too much of their faces.[
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Reuters / StringerUn Muayad, a Ramadi woman, joins tribal forces in a firefight against ISIS. It seems all sides are using women to fight for their cause.

Zainab, a teenager in Raqqa, told Syria Deeply she was arrested by the group.

"I was walking down the street when a car suddenly stopped and a group of armed women got out," she reportedly said. "They insulted me and yelled at me. They took me to one of their centers and kept me locked in a room. Nobody talked to me or told me the reason for my detention. One of the women in the brigade came over, pointing her firearm at me. She then tested my knowledge of prayer, fasting and hijab."

According to Syria Deeply, the fighter told Zainab she was arrested because she had been in public without an escort and her hijab was not being worn properly.

"You should be punished for taking your religion lightly," the female fighter said, threatening Zainab with a harsher punishment if she was caught again, according to Syria Deeply.

The all-female battalions may be just another way that ISIS inflicts rampant gender-based violence on its captive population. The Islamic State has been disastrous for women living under its control, who are reportedly subject to rape, beatings, and arbitrary arrest and are ordered to wear coverings more extreme than the vast majority of Islamic societies. Women must also be accompanied by male guardians in public.

SEE ALSO: This One Document Tells How A Teenage Girl From The Colorado Suburbs Got Involved With ISIS

Iraq: ISIS Executed Hundreds of Prison Inmates
About 600 Shias Killed in Desert During Mosul Capture

OCTOBER 30, 2014
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A wounded survivor of the mass killing of Badoush Prison inmates by ISIS on June 10, 2014.
© Human Rights Watch 2014

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"M.A.," a survivor of the ISIS mass killing of some 600 inmates from Badoush Prison near Mosul, Iraq, on June 10, 2014.
© 2014 Human Rights Watch
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People of every ethnicity and creed should condemn these horrific tactics, and press Iraqi and international authorities to bring those responsible to justice.
Letta Tayler, senior terrorism and counterterrorism researcher
(Erbil) – Gunmen from the Sunni extremist group Islamic State systematically executed some 600 male inmates from a prison outside the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on June 10, 2014, according to survivors’ accounts. The vast majority of those killed were Shia.

After seizing Badoush Prison near Mosul, the gunmen from Islamic State, also known as ISIS, separated the Sunni from the Shia inmates, then forced the Shia men to kneel along the edge of a nearby ravine and shot them with assault rifles and automatic weapons, 15 Shia prisoners who survived the massacre told Human Rights Watch. The gunmen also killed a number of Kurdish and Yezidi inmates of Badoush Prison, the survivors said.

“The gruesome details of ISIS’ mass murder of prison inmates make it impossible to deny the depravity of this extremist group,” said Letta Tayler, senior terrorism and counterterrorism researcher. “People of every ethnicity and creed should condemn these horrific tactics, and press Iraqi and international authorities to bring those responsible to justice.”

The mass summary executions amount to war crimes and most likely crimes against humanity, Human Rights Watch said.

ISIS fighters broke into Badoush the day they captured Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city, which is 10 kilometers southeast of the prison. The gunmen herded up to 1,500 inmates onto trucks and drove them to an isolated stretch of desert about 2 kilometers from the prison, survivors said. The prisoners had been serving sentences for a range of crimes, from murder and assaults to nonviolent offenses.

The fighters separated out several hundred Sunni and a small number of Christian men and drove them away in trucks, the witnesses said. They then robbed and insulted the Shia and other remaining prisoners, marched them to a ravine, and forced them to form one long line along its edge. There, they made the inmates count their number in the line before opening fire. A survivor, A.S., described the death count:

They started by saying, “Each person raise his hand and say his number.” I was number 43. I heard them say “615,” and then one ISIS guy said, “We’re going to eat well tonight.” A man behind us asked, “Are you ready?” Another person answered “Yes,” and began shooting at us with a machine-gun. Then they all started to shoot us from behind, going down the row.

Human Rights Watch is withholding the prisoners’ full names to protect them from possible retaliation.

Nine survivors Human Rights Watch interviewed said that they heard their fellow inmates at the end of the line call out numbers from the low 500s to 750. Five of them heard numbers between 615 and 680, while other survivors said the count went into the “hundreds.”

Most people were shot in the head, the back and the side, said survivor H.K.:

A bullet hit my head and I fell to the ground, and that’s when I felt another bullet hit my arm. I was unconscious for about 5 minutes. One person was shot in the head, in the forehead, it [the bullet] went out the other side, and he fell on top of me.

Before they started shooting, I managed to kiss the men on each side of me, because we knew we were going to die. After we said goodbye to each other, I took my daughter’s picture and kissed it, and I prayed to God to save me for her, because I have no one else [to take care of her].



The gunmen returned for a second round of shooting when they saw one prisoner stand up, and only stopped when they ran out of ammunition, the survivors said.

“They were shouting, ‘This is how we serve justice!’ and, ‘This one’s alive, shoot him again!” witness F.S. said. “I got shot. Then I heard someone say, ‘Let’s leave, we’re out of bullets.’”

Most of those shot fell into the ravine, the survivors said. The gunmen then set fire to brush in and around the ravine, and flames spread to the corpses.

The witnesses estimated that 30 to 40 prisoners survived, most by rolling into the ravine and pretending to be dead, or because they were shielded by the bodies of other prisoners who fell on top of them. Survivors said several men wounded by the shooting later died while trying to crawl or stagger away.

ISIS fighters drove the prisoners claiming to be Sunnis and Christians for about four hours to another desert location, one Sunni man who was among that group told Human Rights Watch. He was unable to identify the location but said some in the group believed it was in Iraq’s Anbar province while others thought it might have been in Syria. The witness said that on the first evening ISIS fighters removed between 50 and 100 men from this group on grounds that they were Shia posing as Sunni. He said they did not return. Three days later ISIS fighters drove the others back to Mosul and set them free, he said.

Human Rights Watch interviewed the 15 Shia survivors and four other former Badoush Prison inmates in semi-autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan, where they had surrendered or been picked up by local authorities after fleeing ISIS-controlled areas. The interviews took place in two prisons where the Iraqi Kurdish authorities were holding the men. Nearly all the Shia prisoners showed scars from bullet wounds or burns that they said they had sustained during the massacre.

The injured survivors had received medical care. All Arab survivors said they wanted to be moved to prisons outside of Iraqi Kurdistan because their relatives could not visit them in Kurdish-controlled areas. On October 23, the Kurdish Regional Government said the inmates had been transferred to other prisons that are run by the central Iraqi government still located in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Twelve of the inmates told Human Rights Watch that officials and guards at Badoush Prison had abandoned their posts the night before ISIS broke into the prison.

Neither Human Rights Watch nor Iraqi government officials have been able to access Badoush Prison or the alleged killing site because the area remains under ISIS control.

ISIS has systematically killed, abducted, and expelled Shia Muslims and religious and ethnic minorities during its military sweep through Iraq, and has forcibly married Yezidi women and girls to ISIS gunmen.

The day after the June 10 massacre, ISIS gunmen carried out a similar mass killing of Shia soldiers in the city of Tikrit, 225 kilometers south of Badoush. The group claimed to have executed 1,700 Shia troops in that killing and posted videos on the internet showing their gunmen shooting at hundreds of captive men.

A Human Rights Watch investigation that included analysis of satellite imagery found strong evidence that between 560 to 770 captives, all or most of them apparently Iraqi soldiers, died in that massacre, and did not rule out that many more had been killed.

Human Rights Watch also documented the apparent unlawful executions of at least 255 Sunni prisoners in six Iraqi cities and villages in June by Iraqi government forces, most of whom are Shia, and by Shia pro-government militia.

The United Nations Human Rights Council in September ordered a UN investigation into crimes committed by ISIS. That investigation should include the massacre near Badoush Prison to identify those responsible and ensure they are held to account, Human Rights Watch said. The UN investigation also should document major crimes by Iraqi government forces and Shia pro-government militias including indiscriminate airstrikes, mass executions of Sunni prisoners, and summary executions of Sunnis throughout the country.

The UN investigation also should examine whether the Iraqi authorities could have done more to protect the Badoush prisoners and Mosul residents from ISIS, Human Rights Watch said.

“While no amount of government negligence excuses the atrocities of ISIS, the authorities need to do all they reasonably can to protect Shia and others from being massacred,” Tayler said. “In addition, the Iraqi authorities should as soon as possible transfer the survivors of this slaughter to prisons in areas of Iraq where they can have regular family visits.”


Witness Accounts
Human Rights Watch conducted separate, individual interviews with 11 of the Shia survivors, the Sunni inmate who ISIS released, and three Badoush inmates – one Yezidi and two Sunni – who escaped capture the morning of June 10. All provided detailed and consistent accounts. Human Rights Watch interviewed four other Shia survivors together who also said ISIS segregated Sunni and Shia prisoners and killed the Shia.

The Shia and Sunni survivors said most of their family members could not visit them in Iraqi Kurdistan because of the risk of passing through conflict zones to reach them, and the Kurdistan Regional Government’s restrictions on the entry of Arabs into Iraqi Kurdistan since ISIS seized large swaths of Iraq.

The witnesses’ descriptions of the mass shooting were consistent with the findings of the United Nations Assistance Mission for Iraq, which concluded that ISIS had killed up to 670 Shia inmates of Badoush near the prison on June 10.

Guards Flee, ISIS Enters
The day before the attack, guards at Badoush Prison gave inmates almost no food, then fled in the middle of the night, said the survivors and the three other men who had been imprisoned in Badoush at that time.

At the time of the attack, the prison was holding more than 3,000 prisoners in two large cell blocks, one for major crimes and the other for lesser crimes, according to the witnesses, as well as prison and intelligence authorities in Iraqi Kurdistan who spoke with Human Rights Watch. The prison had a separate section for Yezidis, Christians, and other religious and ethnic minorities.

On June 9, most prisoners received only one piece of bread and no bottled water, the inmates said. One prisoner, H.O., said a guard told him the prison ran out of food because fighting had blocked the arrival of supply trucks from Mosul. As the sound of fighting grew louder that night, some witnesses said, the guards triple-locked the prisoners’ cell doors. H.O. described the inmates’ panic:

We couldn’t even go to the toilet. Those of us who needed medicine, we started shouting and screaming because we were not getting our pills. There were about 50 of us in our cell, screaming. We were also shouting for water. We had only dirty tap water to drink. No one responded.

“We stopped seeing the guards after midnight – they ran,” said another prisoner, A.J. He slid one hand against the other in a gesture of flight.

Before dawn, guards came to the Yezidis’ cell, containing 90 inmates, and said they were leaving, said the Yezidi prisoner, R.K.

The guards had changed into civilian clothes. They told us, “Mosul has fallen to ISIS. Escape if you can.” But the cell door was locked. It was chaos inside. We thought if ISIS enters they would behead us all, because in that section we were Christians, Kurds, Yezidis.

The former prisoners said they heard intense shelling overnight. Between about 6 and 8 a.m., they said, ISIS fighters broke into the prison and, assisted by ISIS members who were inmates, broke open the cell doors. Many prisoners who fled immediately, including R.K., managed to escape. But those who left around 10 a.m. found the prison surrounded by scores of ISIS gunmen, both on foot and in dozens of Iraqi police cars, Humvees and other military vehicles, which they assumed the fighters had captured from Iraqi government soldiers and police.

Human Rights Watch interviewed dozens of Mosul residents and law enforcement officials between June and September who said that Iraq’s security forces had fled Mosul before ISIS entered the city.

ISIS Rounds Up Inmates
ISIS gunmen immediately began rounding up prison inmates who tried to leave and cordoned them inside the prison courtyard, 14 witnesses told Human Rights Watch. The gunmen also retrieved prisoners who were trying to flee on Route 1, the main road from the prison, the witnesses said.

“Anyone who tried to stop a car, ISIS would shoot at their feet,” witness S.S. said. “If anyone had already gotten into a car, they stopped the driver and made the prisoner get out.”

The ISIS forces were wearing clothes that ranged from track suits and dishdashas to all black or camouflage uniforms, the survivors said. Most of the gunmen were Arabs from Iraq, but some spoke Arabic with foreign accents, they said.

The fighters gathered as many as 1,500 inmates in the prison courtyard, the witnesses estimated. Two survivors said they saw the fighters summarily shoot and kill three or four prisoners in the courtyard who identified themselves as Shia.

The fighters also searched unsuccessfully for three prisoners, whose names they called out on a loudspeaker, three witnesses said. The gunmen then commandeered several trucks passing by on Route 1, witnesses said, including 18-wheel container trucks.

Some witnesses said they saw five or six trucks; others said they saw as many as nine. In late morning, they said – three prisoners interviewed separately estimated the time as around 11 a.m. – the fighters loaded the prisoners onto the backs of the trucks. “They said, ‘We will take you home.’ Then they forced us onto the trucks,” witness F.S. told Human Rights Watch.

The fighters drove the prisoners along Route 1 to the Sham Gate, about 4 kilometers southeast of Badoush Prison, the survivors said. “They were showing us to the people passing by, pretending they had freed us from the Iraqi government,” said survivor N.H. “The people were praising them for saving us.”

But then the trucks turned back toward the prison, the survivors said, and after about a kilometer turned left into the desert on a road that was just tracks through the sand.

Two other inmates who had managed to escape when ISIS first took control of Badoush Prison told Human Rights Watch that ISIS gunmen had rounded them up with others on the roadside or in nearby Badoush village, and loaded them into trucks that also turned off Route 1 and into the desert.

After a short drive of what some survivors estimated as 800 meters to a kilometer from Route 1, the trucks stopped and gunmen ordered all the prisoners to gather by the side of the dirt track.

The prisoners were not certain of the exact route and distances to the killing site, and some gave slightly different accounts of how they got there. All said they were not from the area and were in shock during the drive. One Iraqi human rights investigator said other Badoush inmates who escaped on June 10 told him that ISIS also killed Shia prisoners in two other nearby locations that day.

Sunnis Separated from Shia
Once in the desert, a group of 20 to 40 gunmen then separated the Sunni Arabs from the prisoners of other sects or ethnicities, according to 12 Shia survivors and one Sunni witness.

A bearded man in a dishdasha appeared to be in command, several witnesses said. Six said they believed the man was Afghan because of his accent and the cut of his robe. They said the gunmen called the man Hajji, a title of respect. Witness M.R. described the “Afghan man’s” orders:

He was sitting in a police car and calling out to us on a loudspeaker. He said, “the Sunnis must stand on one side. The Shia, Kurds and Yezidis must stand on the other. If I find out that a Shia is among the Sunnis, I’m going to cut off his head with a sheet of metal.”

During quick interrogations by the gunmen about their beliefs, names, hometowns and other details, about half of the men identified themselves as Sunni. The gunmen loaded these men onto four or five trucks and drove them away, the witnesses said. Three witnesses said those driven away included up to 100 Shia prisoners posing as Sunnis.

H.K. said the fighters placed about 15 to 20 Kurds and Yezidis with the group of Shia men, including two Yezidi boys who had been held in the juvenile section of Badoush Prison. Another prisoner said a Christian man was also among those segregated from the Sunnis.

About half the fighters stayed and guarded the several hundred prisoners who remained, the survivors said. “Brothers, don’t worry. You’ll have a reunion with your family,” witness S.S. remembered one of the captors saying. The gunmen told the prisoners that they were in discussions with the Iraqi authorities about exchanging them for Sunni prisoners held by government forces, three survivors told Human Rights Watch.

Insulted and Robbed
ISIS fighters insulted the remaining prisoners, using religious slurs and accusing the Shia of subservience to then-Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, the survivors said. Then the fighters robbed them.

“They took everything from us – money, watches, rings, identity cards,” A.J. said. “The moment they made us give up all of our possessions, I knew they were going to kill us.”

By this time, the prisoners said, they felt faint, having received no food or water for almost 24 hours. The fighters had told the prisoners they were taking them to get food and water when they turned into the desert, witness S.S. said, but on arrival told them: “You’ll have water in paradise.”

At about noon, the survivors said, the gunmen ordered the Shia and other remaining captives to walk in pairs for several meters from the side of the desert track to a half-moon-shaped ravine about 2 to 4 meters deep. The gunmen made the prisoners kneel in a single line along the ravine’s curved rim.

ISIS shot dead the first inmate after he fell, said A.S., who had been next to the man:

He was so tired and weak from hunger and thirst that he started to slide down into the ravine. They ordered him to come back but he waved with his hands, refusing. One of the ISIS men said, “Kill him.” So the other ISIS members shot him in the side and then in the neck.

The gunmen, at least two of whom wore masks, made each prisoner in turn call out his number in the line, from one end to the other. Five survivors said they heard the prisoners or the gunmen call out numbers between 615 and 680. Three others said they heard the count go up to the low 500s, and one man said he heard the number 750.

Many of the gunmen were young and “some were nervous,” said survivor N.H., who said he was number 106. Others seemed pleased, he said, including one who joked at the end of the count, “It’s a nice-size herd.”

Several survivors said they saw a man filming the events with a video camera. No video of this massacre has been posted online.

“Let’s Kill Them All Together”
Three witnesses told Human Rights Watch that the gunmen appeared to be receiving orders on two-way radios and were at times uncertain about how to proceed. “First, they said they would kill us two by two,” survivor N.H. said. “Then they said, ten by ten, and then they said, ‘kill them all together.’”

Survivor S.S. said he heard the gunmen discussing whether to behead the prisoners:

One put his knife to an inmate’s neck, planning to cut his throat, but the other guy said, “There are too many and we’re not enough, so let’s kill them with bullets.” So he went to the first one and he fired several shots into his back. Then they opened fire on all of us.

N.H. said that when the gunmen started shooting, “I thought, ‘Am I already dead?’ Images of my family flooded my mind. I started reciting the shahada [the Islamic creed that begins, ‘There is no God but God…’].” Meanwhile, the survivors said, some of the gunmen were also chanting the shahada, and shouting, God is great!

“It was as if we were all the same,” N.H. said, alluding to the simultaneous prayers of both captives and captors. “But they were killing us.”

A group of about 17 prisoners who were close to the end of the line managed to flee when the shooting began, one of them, A.J., told Human Rights Watch:

They started shooting at us. Some of my friends were killed or shot. A bullet grazed my head. ISIS was surrounding us, but some were in front of us and they were afraid their bullets would shoot their own people, so they had to drop behind us. When we saw that we kept running. I fell many times.

A.J. said he lay flat on the ground as ISIS members in cars scoured the desert for survivors. “I heard two gunshots. After ISIS left I saw two of my friends’ dead bodies. I kept running until I reached a street. I saw a car and flagged it.”

As the gunmen sprayed the line of kneeling men with bullets, the dead and wounded tumbled into the ravine, the witnesses said. Most of the witnesses said they survived by rolling into the ravine along with the dead.

But after shooting at everyone in the line, the gunmen descended into the ravine as well, survivors said. Survivor A.O. said the men shot him and a friend from prison who lay next to him:

My face was down in the sand. I heard the footsteps of the ISIS guy, he was standing over me and he shot the man lying next to me in the head. He shot me too but the bullet hit my right forearm. I heard death gasps. I felt something coming under me. It was warm. It was the blood of my friend Haider. I took some of that blood and put it on my face and head so that if they came back they would think I am dead.

Survivor A.S. told Human Rights Watch that he used a small knife he had managed to conceal from the fighters to cut his own head and neck so that the blood would make it appear that he had been shot. After the gunmen left, he said, he raised his head:

I saw one body without a leg, another with his head blown apart. One man went up a nearby hill to see where ISIS was. One of their [ISIS’s] cars saw that guy so they turned around and came back. We fell back to the ground. They started to shoot at us again. Then one of the men from ISIS told the others, “Let’s leave. We’re out of ammunition.”

Burning the Massacre Site
After the killings the gunmen set fire to brush on the ground and piles of brush, the survivors told Human Rights Watch. The flames spread quickly and began engulfing several of the freshly killed men, they said.

Survivor M.A. said he saw 12 ISIS gunmen, 10 with machine-guns and 2 with AK-47 assault rifles, making the final rounds:

The ravine was in an agricultural area that had been recently harvested. The remains of the harvest was food for cattle, and it burns just like gasoline. They shot at the ground and it lit the area in front of us. The fire spread quickly. They even set fire to the harvest on the hill. We were surrounded and isolated.

M.A. said the gunmen shot and burned him when they set the fire:

They used a piece of wood to light the fire. They used it as a torch to burn the dead bodies and to see who was dead and who was alive. When they approached me, one of the Da'ish [ISIS] terrorists told someone that I was still breathing, so after I got shot in my arm, they shot two more bullets into my leg…. When it was my turn, they set my right leg on fire. But I had to withstand the pain so they wouldn’t know that I was still breathing. When they saw that I didn’t move, they told each other that I was dead. Then they burned the person next to me.

M.A. showed Human Rights Watch bullet wounds in his thigh and arm and a burn scar on his ankle that he said were from the attack. He and the authorities at the prison in Iraqi Kurdistan where Human Rights Watch interviewed him said he had undergone five rounds of surgery for the wounds.

Only 30 to 40 Survivors
Only about 30 to 40 prisoners survived the shooting, the witnesses said. They included three Yezidis and one Christian, according to survivor S.E.

The survivors described seeing prisoners die hours later from their wounds because they were too weak to escape. “The sun was so hot,” said M.A. “Those who didn’t die from the shooting or the fire, they died from thirst.”

The survivors gave harrowing accounts of their escapes, with some saying ISIS gunmen chased them in cars through the desert. F.S. said the prisoners drank urine to stay alive:

I took a few steps and fell to the ground because I was losing too much blood. I was with a group of 11 survivors. One was not shot and he helped me walk. We sat under a bridge. The man who helped me, he put his urine in a bottle. We all drank the urine. Otherwise we would have died of thirst.

Some survivors said local Sunnis risked their own lives to help them flee. Eventually, all of the survivors surrendered to or were captured by Kurdish security forces.

Sunnis Driven to Second Desert Spot
One group of fighters drove the several hundred Badoush prisoners who claimed to be Sunni, as well as a small number of Christians, to a second desert location, one Sunni who was among them told Human Rights Watch. The new location was about a four-hour drive from Badoush, he said. “We were trembling and afraid,” said the witness, who asked not to be identified. Four prisoners, including an elderly man, died from thirst and the heat during the drive, he said.

The witness said ISIS forces kept the men in a cluster of mud houses. Aided by Sunni prisoners, he said, the ISIS captors separated out those they believed to be Shia posing as Sunnis and took them away at sunset. He said he and the other captives did not see the Shia men again and feared the ISIS fighters had killed them.

The witness said he did not know the location of the mud houses, as some in the group thought ISIS had taken them to Iraq’s Anbar province, west of Baghdad, and others thought they might have been in Syria. After three days, the fighters again loaded the Sunnis and Christians onto trucks and drove them for three hours back to Mosul, where they released them, he said.

Two other prisoners told Human Rights Watch they had heard similar accounts from two other Sunni inmates from Badoush Prison who were detained with them in Iraqi Kurdistan after ISIS released them. Those two Sunni prisoners declined interview requests.

John Cantlie, el rehén forzado a presentar videos de EI
BBC
BBC Mundo hace 4 días
Cantlie fue secuestrado a fines de 2012 en Siria.

De camisa negra, pálido, el rehén británico John Cantlie apareció una vez más en un video de propaganda del grupo yihadista que se hace llamar Estado Islámico.

La grabación muestra un simulacro de reportaje televisivo en el que Cantlie es presentado como corresponsal, supuestamente desde el enclave kurdo de Kobane.
Cantlie trabajó también en Irak, Afganistán, Libia y Somalia.

Es el tercer video de EI que muestra al periodista de 43 años desde que fuera secuestrado a fines de 2012.

Esta última grabación se dio a conocer una semana después de la muerte del padre del reportero, Paul Cantlie, quien hizo un emotivo llamado desde su cama de hospital pidiendo que su hijo fuera devuelto "a los que ama y los que lo aman".

Jessica Cantlie, hermana de John, también grabó este mes un mensaje pidiendo contacto directo con los yihadistas, que ya ejecutaron a los cooperantes británicos Alan Henning y David Haines, así como a los periodistas estadounidenses James Foley y Steven Sotloff.
Periodista experimentado

Quienes conocían a Cantlie aseguran que era totalmente consciente de los múltiples riesgos que enfrentaba.

Un colega dijo al diario The Times que el reportero tenía una reputación de "coraje temerario y gran carisma".

Durante dos décadas el reportero se especializó en cubrir en primera persona noticias en situaciones poco usuales.

Entre sus trabajos se encuentran reportajes sobre motociclismo todo terreno y diversos deportes extremos.

Pero Cantlie es conocido sobre todo por informar desde algunos de los lugares más peligrosos del planeta, incluyendo Irak, Afganistán, Libia y Somalia.

En 2003, during la invasion de Irak liderada por EE.UU., Cantlie viajó como periodista freelance al país árabe.

Algunos de sus colegas allí lo describieron como un hombre "siempre de buena disposición y buen humor, que es capaz de realizar su trabajo en forma eficiente en las condiciones más difíciles".

El trabajo de Cantlie ha aparecido en numerosas publicaciones, como los dominicales británicos Sunday Times y Sunday Telegraph, así como las revistas Esquire y GQ.
Primer secuestro

El reportero fue secuestrado por primera vez en junio de 2012 en Siria, desde donde ya había informado en un viaje anterior desde el frente de guerra.

Cuando decidió regresar a Siria, cruzando la frontera con Turquía durante la noche junto a un guía sirio y un periodista holandés.

Apenas unos kilómetros dentro de territorio sirio los tres hombres encontraron lo que suponían era un campamento rebelde, pero se se trataba de un grupo de yihadistas.

Cantlie relató después a la BBC que sus captores había varios hombres que hablaban inglés con acento londinense.

Uno de ellos acusó a los periodistas de ser espías, pero otro miembro del grupo, un médico, trató a los rehenes "en forma humana".

En el segundo día de su captura, Cantlie y los otros rehenes intentaron escapar durante la madrugada, pero fueron descubiertos por sus captores, que abrieron fuego hiriendo al periodista holandés en la cadera y a Cantlie en el brazo.

Días después los rehenes fueron rescatados por rebeldes del Ejército Libre de Siria.
"Temí por mi vida"

Tras su liberación en aquella ocasión, Cantlie dio una entrevista a la BBC en la que relató haber temido por su vida.

"Mi experiencia parece muy lejana ahora que hablo del tema en un ambiente familiar y muy cómodo en un estudio de grabación", afirmó Cantlie.
Paul Cantlie falleció poco después de hacer una llamado por la liberación de su hijo.

"Pero cuando uno está cautivo, con una venda en los ojos y una pistola apuntando a la cabeza, es algo extremadamente real".

"Pensaba que estaba listo para enfrentar a Dios. La imaginación en esos momentos se dispara. Tuve muchos pensamientos como ése", dijo el reportero a la BBC.

A pesar de su experiencia traumática, Cantlie decidió regresar a Siria ese mismo año, en noviembre.

Algunas de las fotos que llegó a enviar al Sunday Telegraph muestran bombardeos de las fuerzas sirias en el poblado de Maraat al-Numan. Otras registran edificios totalmente devastados for los enfrentamientos.

Fue durante este viaje que Cantlie volvió a ser secuestrado y no se supo nada de él hasta la divulgación del primer video en septiembre de este año.

Nadie sabe si John Cantlie llegó a ver o escuchar el mensaje de su padre:

"No puedo pensar en una alegría más inmensa que ver a mi hijo querido liberado".

"Quiero que John sepa que estoy orgulloso de él".

The Ultimate Fatal Attraction: 5 Reasons People Join ISIS

"Five distinct trends—not including theology or technology—explain the fatal attraction to the Islamic State. And understanding these trends is vital for winning the war against extremist ideologies."
Maha Yahya

November 7, 2014
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The appeal of the Islamic State to Arab and Muslim youth is hard to understand. Many assume religion or social media is the main draw for the increasing numbers who are uprooting their lives to join the militants in Iraq and Syria. But this is not the full story.

Five distinct trends—not including theology or technology—explain the fatal attraction to the Islamic State. And understanding these trends is vital for winning the war against extremist ideologies.

First, Arab education systems have failed. Instead of vital analytical skills or civic values, schools emphasized rote learning and the uncritical acceptance of authority.

History curricula and religious education fostered an us-versus-them mentality along ethnic, ideological, and sectarian lines, making youth vulnerable to external influence. This helped transform the cultural landscape of Arab countries, facilitating the spread of militant ideologies and the early indoctrination of younger populations.

Second, a lack of economic opportunities and weakened welfare systems forced citizens to turn to others. As Arab states liberalized economically, they undermined existing welfare systems and removed guarantees of public employment without providing alternatives.

Arab governments did not promote investments in productive sectors and their economies did not generate the number or quality of jobs that were needed. In fact, the highest levels of unemployment today are found among those with higher-education degrees.

Consequently, informal economies grew exponentially. For example, 33 percent of economic activity in Morocco and 40 percent of GDP in Egypt are informal, leaving many without access to any form of social security.

This is catastrophic for a region where one in five people are between the ages of fifteen and twenty-four. Twenty-nine percent of Arab youth are currently unemployed, many with high levels of education. Recent estimates indicate that 105 million jobs are needed by 2020 to absorb new entrants into the labor market.

This grim reality forced Arab citizens to turn to other entities—often Islamist—for survival and a larger sense of being. Governments even encouraged ultraconservative groups to step up and provide social assistance, because they were perceived as nonpolitical and therefore unthreatening to their own rule. And now, some of these groups are actively recruiting Arab youth on behalf of the Islamic State.

Third, bad governance has created an entrenched feeling of injustice. The systematic maltreatment of Arab citizens at the hands of their governments fueled this process. For decades, Arab governments treated their citizens as threats to national security, subjecting them to significant levels of brutality.

According to a recent poll, around 55 percent of Arab citizens do not trust national governments or political elite. More than 91 percent view administrative and financial corruption as widespread and only 21 percent feel that the law treats citizens equally.

Fourth, the response to the Arab Awakening has made matters worse. The brutal clampdown on the uprisings, sometimes with an ideological or sectarian tinge, only exacerbated societal discord even further. It fueled social polarization and sectarian tensions.

State-led violence against civilians has included the use of barrel bombs and chemical weapons in Syria, and arbitrary deaths, disappearances and prejudiced judicial proceedings against opposition parties in various Arab countries. These actions are opening rifts in Arab societies and further disenfranchising youth who feel empowered by the uprisings and are searching for a greater sense of purpose and identity.

Many Arab governments have long used sectarianism as a tool to consolidate political power by repeatedly marginalizing ethnic or religious groups from political processes. Now both Saudi Arabia and Iran are using sectarian fear mongering in their regional political rivalry.

This is readily apparent in conflicts in Syria, Iraq and Yemen. Iran’s increasing military involvement in Arab countries is billed as the latest manifestation of a 1,400-year-old conflict between the Sunnis and Shias. For millions of Sunnis across the region, the message translates as, “the Shias have come to get you.”

For disaffected Sunni youth, a turn to militant groups with spectacular power in the field is a stand for one’s community. And the Islamic State is aptly manipulating sectarian sentiments and exploiting the increasing sense of victimization of Sunni youth.

Finally, there is no trust in the West. The Islamic State is propagating narratives of the perceived double standards of the international community and Western powers. The continued occupation of Palestinian land and the seeming impunity of Israel despite repeated aggressions against Arabs is a festering wound for many—77 percent of Arabs feel this is an Arab cause, not just a Palestinian one.

While the West and its militaries intervened in Iraq, Libya and Yemen, they failed to support the civil uprising in Syria, state building in Libya and democracy in Egypt. This is seen as further proof of the West’s insincerity. This leaves the Islamic Caliphate, with its proven strength in the field, looking like a viable alternative to achieve Arab and Muslim rights.

In the end, limiting the appeal of the Islamic State and similar groups, and ultimately dismantling their dangerous ideologies, will require long-term action to reverse these trends. It will take much more than the important denouncement by Muslim scholars and religious leaders, or the military operation currently underway. Arab governments have a critical role to play in this process.

Winning the war against this fatal attraction to the Islamic State lies in different battlefields—it depends on transforming how the youth make sense of the world and providing real alternatives for change and advancement.

Maha Yahya is a senior associate at the Carnegie Middle East Center.

Cómo un niño de 13 años se prepara para unirse a Estado Islámico
BBC
Hace 3 horas

Mohammed no fue escuchado por sus dos hermanos menores, que se unieron a al Nusra. © bbc Mohammed no fue escuchado por sus dos hermanos menores, que se unieron a al Nusra. En una estrecha sala en el sur de Turquía, un niño de 13 años entrena para unirse a Estado Islámico.

Al invitarnos a entrar parece un niño común y corriente, feliz: pelo ondulado, sonrisa radiante y un suéter gris con capucha.

Pero cuando antes de sentarnos a hablar, se cambia de ropa y vuelve con la cara cubierta en un pasamontañas, vestido de camuflaje.

Quiere que lo llamen "Abu Hattab".

Nacido en Siria, se radicalizó el año pasado, al unirse al grupo yihadista Sham al Islam.
"Decapítenlos"

Tuvo lecciones de Sharía (ley islámica) y aprendió cómo usar armas. Nos muestra, orgulloso, fotos junto a armas automáticas.

Actualmente pasa su tiempo conectado a internet, viendo videos yihadistas y hablando por el chat de Facebook con militantes del grupo autodenominado Estado Islámico, que controla partes de Irak y Siria.
Algunos niños yihadistas son enviados a campos de entrenamiento por sus padres.

En algunos días, nos cuenta, irá a una de las posiciones fuertes del grupo en Raqqa, Siria, para convertirse en un joven soldado de la yihad.

"Me gusta Estado Islámico porque siguen la Sharía y matan a los infieles, a los no sunitas y a quienes dejaron el islam", dice.

"La gente matada por Estado Islámico son agentes estadounidenses. Debemos decapitarlos, como dice Alá en el Corán".

Le pregunto si les dijo a sus interlocutores de Facebook la edad que tiene.
© BBC "Fátima" promueve que su hijo se sume a la lucha armada por la yihad.

"Al principio, no", cuenta.

"Pero recientemente les dije, y ahora me contactan incluso más, me mandan fotos y noticias".

Pero por qué no disfrutar de su niñez, le pregunto.

"No quiero salir con amigos o pasarlo bien. Alá nos ordenó trabajar y pelear por la vida que sigue, por el paraíso".

"Antes iba al parque o a la playa, pero me di cuenta de que estaba mal y ahora tomé el camino correcto".
"Poderes malignos"

Su familia ahora vive en Turquía. ¿Podría el niño preparar un ataque acá o en Reino Unido, por ejemplo?

"Reino Unido debería ser atacado, porque pertenece a la OTAN y está contra Estado Islámico", dice. "Pero sólo mataríamos a quienes se lo merezcan. Si me piden atacar Turquía y me dan una orden sagrada, lo haría. Pronto será el fin de Occidente".

En casa, él y su madre, quien se hace llamar Fátima, llevan una vida devota.

Ella pasa bastante tiempo estudiando el Corán y admite que simpatiza fuertemente con los militantes de EI.

El año pasado envió a su hijo a un entrenamiento con Sham al Islam. Sin embargo niega que le esté lavando el cerebro.

"Nunca lo impulsé a unirse a Estado Islámico", insiste.

"Apoyo algunas de sus creencias, pero otras no. Igual pienso que vinieron a ayudar al pueblo sirio, a diferencia de los poderes malignos que hay en el mundo".
"Futuro líder"

Algunos niños yihadistas son enviados a campos de entrenamiento por sus padres. © bbc Algunos niños yihadistas son enviados a campos de entrenamiento por sus padres. Si no lo está impulsando, ¿qué está haciendo para evitar que su hijo pierda su infancia en manos de la extrema violencia?, le pregunto.

"No puedo evitar que quiera pelear", asegura. "La guerra hace que los niños crezcan rápido. Quiero que se convierta en un futuro líder, en un emir".

Su voz crece en intensidad, sus ojos se achican de rabia debajo del pañuelo que utiliza para cubrir su cara.

"No me daría pena que matara occidentales. Me da vergüenza que mis otros hijos estén trabajando pacíficamente para grupos de la sociedad civil, deberían alzarse en armas".

¿Cómo se sentiría si muere por Estado Islámico?

Hace una pausa. "Estaría tan feliz", me responde. Y se pone a llorar.
US$100 mensuales

Estado Islámico está ampliamente reclutando niños, según un reporte de Naciones Unidas dado a conocer el mes pasado. Bastante seguido, por la fuerza

Un video subido a internet, llamado "cachorros de Estado Islámico", parece mostrar un batallón de niños vestidos en uniformes militares, con armas y junto a una bandera de EI.

Otros grupos yihadistas también están usando niños soldados. La organización Human Rights Watch reportó recientemente que los niños son utilizados como francotiradores y en ataques suicidas.

En Gaziantep, ciudad del sur de Turquía, nos encontramos con un activista social cuyos dos hermanos menores –de 13 y 15 años– cayeron en el reclutamiento realizado por Jabat al Nusra, el brazo de al Qaeda en Siria.
Mohammed no fue escuchado por sus dos hermanos menores, que se unieron a al Nusra.

Mohamed, 21, me muestra un video de su hermano menor disparando artillería pesada con un grupo de combatientes.

"Fátima" promueve que su hijo se sume a la lucha armada por la yihad. © bbc "Fátima" promueve que su hijo se sume a la lucha armada por la yihad. En otras fotos, posa para la cámara con un arma automática.

"Traté de detener a mis hermanos para que no se unieran a al Nusra, pero no les importó lo que yo sentía", dice.

"Deberían estar en la escuela. Al Nusra les ofrece US$100 mensuales por pelear con ellos. Y los llevan a un campo de entrenamiento en armas. Les arrebatan su niñez".

Ambos hermanos fueron recientemente capturados por Estado Islámico. Mohamed teme que pronto se pasen de al Nusra a Estado Islámico.

"Solía pasarlo muy bien con el menor en casa. Pero entonces cambié. Cuando le dije que al Nusra terminaría por destruir nuestro país me dijo: 'Cállate o te mato'".

"Me despedí de ambos cuando se unieron a al Nusra. Pensé: 'No los veré nunca más. Estoy seguro de que lo próximo que sepa de ellos es que están muertos".

La guerra civil en Siria está afectando los años formativos de toda una generación.

Y los militantes están aprovechando la oportunidad para utilizar a los niños como armas de guerra.

Dejo la casa de "Abu Hattab" y le pregunto a su madre qué quería que fuera su hijo de 13 años cuando era pequeño.

Sonríe. "Piloto", responde.

Las tácticas brutales de los extremistas en Irak
Alejandra Martins
BBC Mundo
21 agosto 2014
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Militantes de EI en Irak
Amnistía Internacional verificó asesinatos en masa y el secuestro de miles de personas, incluyendo mujeres y niños, a manos de militantes de EI.
Asesinatos colectivos, decapitaciones, hombres enterrados vivos y mujeres vendidas como esclavas.
Estas son algunas de las acciones brutales atribuidas en las últimas semanas a los militantes del Estado Islámico, EI, según testimonios de civiles que lograron huir ante el avance del grupo yihadista en el norte de Irak.
La organización extremista combate contra los gobiernos en Irak y Siria, controlando regiones de ambos países.
Se estima que en todo Irak casi 1,2 millones de personas han abandonado sus hogares en lo que va de año, 600.000 por el conflicto tras la toma de Mosul por el grupo extremista en junio.
Los yihadistas pregonan una interpretación extrema del Islam y han atacado comunidades de yazidíes, cristianos, turcomanos y chiítas.
Muchos logramos huir. Alguien me dijo que cerca de 80 hombres fueron colocados en fila y se les obligó a gritar shahada, anunciando su conversión. Se negaron y todos fueron asesinados
Ivan Mrat, refugiado en Dohuk
"Naciones Unidas recibió informes verificados de que EI está persiguiendo sistemáticamente miembros de las minorías atrapadas en zonas bajo su control que reciben un ultimátum, convertirse o morir", dijo Christof Heyns, relator especial de la ONU sobre ejecuciones extrajudiciales, sumarias y arbitrarias.
Ivan Mrat, un refugiado yazidí que huyó de la región montañosa de Sinyar a la ciudad kurda de Dohuk, relató al servicio árabe de la BBC cómo su poblado fue rodeado por militantes de EI. "Muchos logramos huir. Alguien me dijo que cerca de 80 hombres fueron colocados en fila y se les obligó a gritar shahada, anunciando su conversión. Se negaron y todos fueron asesinados".
BBC Mundo habló con Donatella Rovera, investigadora de Aministía Internacional, quien se encuentra actualmente en el norte de Irak recogiendo testimonios de civiles yazidíes.
"Las dos grandes realidades que estamos encontrando son la matanza deliberada de gran número de personas y el secuestro de miles de mujeres, hombres, niños y ancianos", afirmó Rovera.
A sangre fría
"Puedo hablar de los casos específicos que estoy investigando", señaló a BBC Mundo Rovera mientras se desplazaba desde Dohuk a otra localidad cercana.
"Le pegaban más por ser de EE.UU.", rehén que estuvo con Foley

null
"Tengo confianza de que estos informes son verídicos porque hablé con diferentes personas que sobrevivieron esas matanzas".
"El último caso es el de Qojo, una de las poblaciones al sur de Sinyar, que fue rodeada por militantes de EI. Yo me había comunicado con ellos y luego perdí el contacto. El viernes llegaron informes de que algo terrible había sucedido".
"Las personas con quien hablé dijeron que los militantes reunieron a todos los residentes del pueblo en la escuela de la localidad y les dijeron que entregaran su dinero, celulares y objetos de oro. Luego colocaron a los hombres en vehículos y se los llevaron a diferentes lugares donde los militantes abrieron fuego indiscriminado. Yo pude hablar con dos hombres que sobrevivieron".
Rovera dijo tener conocimiento de que EI ha matado a gran cantidad de civiles en incidentes similares en diferentes poblaciones, aunque Aministía Internacional desconoce el número específico de víctimas. Las redadas y matanzas deliberadas se han dado "especialmente en lugares donde hubo enfrentamientos entre los combatientes de EI y la población yasidí local. Allí los civiles fueron muertos a sangre fría, en forma deliberada".
Refugiada en Irak
Al menos 600.000 personas debieron abandonar sus hogares debido al avance de EI en el norte de Irak.
Secuestros de mujeres
La relatora especial sobre violencia contra la mujer, Rashida Manjoo, dijo recientemente haber recibido reportes no sólo de secuestros masivos sino de la venta de mujeres y niñas.
"Hemos recibido informes de la ejecución de mujeres y otros informes no verificados que indican que cientos de mujeres y niñas han sido secuestradas. Muchas de las adolescentes han sido asaltadas sexualmente y las mujeres han sido entregadas o vendidas a combatienets de EI como malak yamiin o esclavas".
Amnistía Internacional asegura haber verificado informes de secuestros masivos.
Hemos recibido informes de la ejecución de mujeres y otros informes no verificados que indican que cientos de mujeres y niñas han sido secuestradas. Muchas de las adolescentes han sido asaltadas sexualmente y las mujeres han sido entregadas o vendidas a combatienets de EI como malak yamiin o esclavas
Rashida Manjoo, relatora de la ONU
"Sabemos que algunas personas secuestradas están detenidas en escuelas o casas en Mosul y otros lugares controlados por EI, no podemos decir cómo lo sabemos por la seguridad de las mujeres. Otras han desparecido, no sabemos si están vivas o muertas".
Rovera no ha podido confirmar que las mujeres secuestradas hayan sido vendidas como esclavas, aunque afirmó que "hay suficientes razones para generar preocupación, porque muchas mujeres han sido detenidas y están desaparecidas, así que la población teme lo peor".
Por su parte, Ivan Mrat dijo al Servicio Árabe de la BBC, que "EI tomó más de 2.000 mujeres de diferentes poblados. Nadie sabe que pasó con ellas pero es claro para nosotros que estos militantes despiadados las tomaron como esclavas sexuales, despojos de guerra que les pertenecen según su entendimiento erróneo del Islam. Una jovencita llamó con su celular a su primo y dijo que los militantes reunieron a sus compañeras en la escuela y cada tanto venían a sacar a dos o tres menores".
Entierros y decapitaciones
Otros testimonios hablan de personas enterradas vivas. El refugiado Samo Ilyas Ali, quien huyó de sus tierras ancestrales en Sinyar, dijo a la agencia Reuters que su aldea fue rodeada en medio de la noche por militantes de EI armados con ametralladoras.
Refugiada en Irak
AI desconoce qué sucedió con cientos de mujeres secuestradas por los militantes de EI.
"Tenían barbas, algunos llevaban máscaras con inscripciones en árabe. No entendimos cuando comenzaron a cavar zanjas. Entonces empezaron a poner a la gente en aquellos agujeros. Esas personas estaban vivas y después de un rato oímos disparos. No puedo olvidar esa escena, mujeres, niños pidiendo ayuda. Nosotros corrimos por nuestras vidas, no podíamos hacer nada por ellos", dijo Ilyas Ali, cuyo relato no pudo ser verificado en forma independiente.
"Hay muchos informes que hablan de entierros en vida, pero hasta ahora no hemos podido verificarlos", dijo Rovera.
Insurgentes del Estado Islámico divulgaron el martes un video que muestra la decapitación del periodista estadounidense James Foley, quien desapareció en Siria hace dos años.
AI no ha documentado hasta ahora ni entierros en vida ni decapitaciones de civiles yazidíes.
"Hemos visto a los militantes realizar estos ataques brutales en Siria y hemos visto como publicitan decapitaciones de soldados iraquíes capturados. Sabemos que es algo que han hecho, pero en las masacres que he documentado hasta ahora en el norte de Irak com miembros de la comunidad yazidí las matanzas fueron por disparos", señaló Rovera.
Estrategia
El uso de la brutalidad es parte de una estrategia bien delineada, según Sami Ramadami, analista iraquí y profesor de sociología de la London Metropolitan University en la capital británica.
Hay cuatro escuelas de Islam sunita y no pertenecen a ninguna de ellas. Sus líderes son todos graduados de la secta wahabi de interpretación, que es muy antimujer, represiva y busca imponer la ley sharia en su versión más extrema, con interpretaciones no aceptadas por el 99% de los musulmanes
Sami Ramadami, London Metropolitan University
"Básicamente usan el terror para lograr la expansión, sembrando miedo y usando las redes sociales para mostrar actos terribles antes de llegar a una nueva zona que quieren controlar. Justifican ese terror usando algún texto religioso poco conocido que es usualmente tomado totalmente fuera de contexto", dijo Ramadami a BBC Mundo.
El académico afirmó que "EI incluye combatientes profesionales que han venido de todo el mundo, principalmente a traves de la frontera con Turquía."
"No son reconocidos por el Islam sunita como una secta legítima. Hay cuatro escuelas de Islam sunita y no pertenecen a ninguna de ellas. Sus líderes son todos graduados de la secta wahabi de interpretación, que es muy antimujer, represiva y busca imponer la ley sharia en su versión más extrema, con interpretaciones no aceptadas por el 99% de los musulmanes".
Los ataques contra minorías son parte de otra táctica, según Ramadami: "inflamar los odios sectarios, dividiendo a diferentes grupos, lo que debilita las sociedades de la region".
El analista dijo a BBC Mundo que el "objetivo oficial" de EI es crear "un estado que llaman islámico". "Ya controlan gran parte de Siria e Irak y su lider religioso ha hablado de eliminar las fronteras en Medio Oriente, algo que debilitaría a los estados árabes. Comenzaron con la frontera entre Siria e Irak".
"Sus medios son brutales y hay muchas teorías sobre cómo logran producir films de extrema calidad con técnicas tan avanzadas. ¿Donde los producen?, ¿quien los financia?, ¿de dónde obtienen su apoyo? Hay muchas preguntas por responder".

This One Document Tells How A Teenage Girl From The Colorado Suburbs Got Involved With ISIS

BEN WINSOR

SEP. 16, 2014, 11:42 AM 9,326 17
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Shannon Conley
KUSA-TV via USA Today
Shannon Conley

On Wednesday Shannon Conley, a 19-year-old from Colorado, pleaded guilty to attempting to support ISIS, the terrorist group which has seized control over significant parts of Syria and Iraq.

The story of how Conley became involved with the group, and why she wanted to join the conflict in Syria, is told in the FBI’s official criminal complaint filed in the U.S. District Court of Colorado.

Singed by Christian Byrne, a Special Deputy U.S. Marshal with the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force, the document follows Conley from when she first raised suspicions until her arrest 5 months later while attempting to board a plane from the Denver International Airport.

Here’s what the document tells us:

A Pastor Reported She May Have Been Planning A Shooting
The pastor and security director of the Faith Bible Chapel in Arvada reported to police that Conley was behaving suspiciously in October 2013. The Chapel was the site of a fatal shooting in 2007.

Staff reported that Conley was wandering around the church campus wearing a hijab and writing in a notebook, which they suspected may have been an attempt to map out the campus.

Staff said Conley refused to show her notes. She later told police they were following her and treating her like a terrorist, so she decided to diagram the church to alarm them, according to the complaint.

“If they think I’m a terrorist, I’ll give them something to think I am,” Conley allegedly told police.

Faith Bible Chapel
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Faith Bible Chapel in Arvada, Colorado, where Conley was seen suspiciously wandering the campus.
Not Interested In Secrecy
Conley spoke openly with local police and FBI on a consistent basis. According to the complaint, “Conley stated she wanted to wage jihad and would like to go overseas to fight. She further stated that if she is not allowed to fight because she is a woman, she will use her medical training to aid jihadi fighters.”

“Conley stated that legitimate targets of attack include military facilities and personnel, government facilities and personnel, and public officials,” the complaint states.

“When asked if this includes law enforcement, Conley replied that it does. According to Conley, law enforcement is included because police enforce man-made laws that are not grounded in God’s law. Conley stated targets to be avoided include women, children, and the elderly.”

Conley
Facebook
On this Facebook account, apparently belonging to Conley, she posted frequently about Islam. Conley was not secretive about her religion or her plans, she spoke openly with FBI investigators.
Training From The US Army
In an interview with two overt FBI agents, Conley allegedly said she joined the US Army Explorers so she could gain training in US military tactics and firearms.

“She said she intended to use that training to go overseas to wage jihad. She also intended to train Islamic jihadi fighters in US military tactics,” the complaint says.

The complaint says she originally wanted to join the US military, but chose the Explorers because it sounded fun and “because she will never be deployed and they will let her wear a hijab.”

Over a weekend in February 2014 she allegedly attended the camp, telling agents “she enjoyed it and benefitted from it.” Conley also showed investigators a book she was reading about practical Al Qaida guerrilla warfare.

us army best photos 2012, training
U.S. Army / Timothy L. Hale
Conley decided against joining the army, instead taking a weekend course with the US Army Explorers.
There Was A (Rough) Plan
According to the complaint, Conley was at one point planning to go to Morocco with friends from Colorado in February. The document reports, “Conley said she planned to tell her family about her jihad plans once she was out of the US as there was nothing they would be able to do about it then.”

From there, she planned to travel to Iraq and make contact with a “friend of a friend” who would help her find a jihadist training camp. She didn’t know the person’s name, where they lived, or what exactly they would do for her.

However, her plans changed when she spoke to agents three months later. She said she knew an ISIS fighter in Syria who would be her suitor. Her contacts had bought her a flight to Turkey so she could join them at the border with Syria, she said.

According to the complaint, she told investigators she had been asked to send money but declined because it would be illegal. She also said she had no intention of returning to the US. She had resolved to aid ISIS fighters as a nurse and housewife, stating she would be reluctant to join the actual fighting, the complaint said.

isis militants islamic state tank
via VICE News
Conley planned to travel to the Turkish/Syrian border where she would aid ISIS in the fight against the Assad regime and other groups in Syria.
Authorities Tried To Get Her To Back Out
What is perhaps most striking about the document is the lengths the FBI say they went to in order to dissuade Conley from her chosen path. FBI agents, who identified themselves as such, brought up the option of humanitarian organizations, suggesting she could aid fellow Muslims by volunteering with the Red Crescent, an organization similar to the Red Cross.

In late March a Muslim Special Agent, Gamal Abdel-Hafiz, met with Conley in “an overt attempt to dissuade Conley from violent criminal activity.” According to the report, he repeatedly warned her plan may be illegal. Accodding to the report, she had not changed her mind, although would look into the issues he brought up.

The FBI also contacted Conley’s parents, Ana and John Conley, and told them of their daughter's plans. Agents encouraged the couple to speak with Conley further about her religious views and to expose her to moderate Muslims.

Conley’s father allegedly told officers he had followed their instructions, and was surprised by just how radical his daughter’s views had become.

Days later, John Conley told officers his daughter had met a 32-year-old Tunisian man over Skype, and that she had asked his permission to marry the man in Syria. According to the complaint she was surprised when he refused. He later found an airline ticket from Denver to Turkey on his desk.

ana john shannon conley denver torrorism isis
AP / Brennan Linsley
Shannon Conley's parents, Ana and John Conley, exit the U.S. Federal courthouse following their daughter's guilty plea last Wednesday.
Airport Arrest
On April 8, Conley went to Denver International Airport and checked in baggage for the first leg of her flight, from Denver to Frankfurt, Germany. FBI Agents arrested Conley as she walked down the sky-way to board the plane. The 19-year-old waived her right to remain silent and gave a statement to agents.

“Conley told agents that she planned to fly to Turkey and wait there until associates of her suitor contacted her. These associates would then take Conley into Syria to meet up with her suitor,” the complaint states.

Denver airport
ASCE via Airports Council International
Conley was arrested in Denver International Airport as she walked down the skyway towards her plane to Frankfurt, Germany.

Conley pleaded guilty last week to conspiring to provide material support to Islamic State militants who have seized large parts of Syria and Iraq. She faces up to five years in prison, according to CNN. The judge ordered a psychiatric evaluation for her.

Her public defender, Robert Pepin, released the following statement reprinted by CNN. Shannon now goes by the name Halima:

"She's also a 19-year-old woman of faith who was pursuing her faith and, unfortunately, as she pursued it she was led terribly astray," the statement said. "That, in turn, led her to make some poor choices and she is now paying the price of those choices."

Since her arrest, Pepin said, "the news out of the part of the world to which she was headed has been just awful."

"Like all of us, Halima has been horrified to learn of the slaughter and oppression at the hands of the people controlling ISIS," Pepin said in the statement.

"It was never her vision to have any role in any of that. She would like everyone to know that her heart ... and her prayers go out to ... the families of those who have been killed, and to anyone who has been oppressed by those forces. Finally, Halima is fully aware that the fact that she was arrested may have very well saved her.



Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/how-a-teenage-girl-fell-in-with-isis-2014-9#ixzz3JVJlni7i

Foreign Fighters Are Flooding Into Iraq and Syria to Join the Islamic State
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By Samuel Oakford

October 31, 2014 |
An "unprecedented" number of foreign fighters — some 15,000 from more than 80 countries — have made their way to Syria and Iraq, and their numbers continue to grow, according to a UN Security Council report.

The findings, disseminated on Thursday by the Australian mission to the UN, which chairs the Security Council's al Qaeda Sanctions Committee, warn that "the horizontal reach of the fighters is far broader than seen before," and "includes a tail of countries that have not previously faced challenges related to Al-Qaida."

Most of the fighters in Syria hail from the Middle East, North Africa, and Europe, but the report observed that others have also come from the United States and other parts of Asia. Though it does not detail what nations compose the group of 80, the Security Council says that the presence of fighters from "small and medium-sized states" is "important, given that some of the future frontier of risk relating to Al-Qaida may lie with some of these individuals."

The committee was established in 1999 to monitor the activities of al Qaeda and what it considers splinter groups — a category now dominated by the Islamic State, which is also referred to as ISIS or ISIL.

The Islamic State. Watch the full-length documentary here.

While the capabilities of al Qaeda's central leadership are not as strong as they once were, the report notes that extremist ideology has become diffuse, spreading via the internet and social media.

The Islamic State has blown past its predecessors in reaching potential recruits through its propaganda arm, the Al Hayat Media Center.

"While ISIL social media feeds include material designed to reach a general audience alongside ghastly imagery of torture and murder, Al-Qaida core continues to produce long and turgid messaging from Al-Zawahiri," says the report, which is reproduced below. "His latest video message was 55 minutes long. Tweeting terrorists with ISIL use 140 characters or less."

"One example of this includes idealized and normalized representations of life under ISIL control, as when extremists post kitten photographs," the committee said in a footnote.

Despite a formal split in February between al Qaeda and its former affiliate, the committee warned against misinterpreting the formal divorce "as a signal that ISIL repudiates the ideology of Al-Qaida."

"Al-Qaida core and ISIL pursue similar strategic goals, albeit with tactical differences regarding sequencing and substantive differences about personal leadership," the committee wrote.

The report cites the al Qaeda cell operating in Syria known among US intelligence authorities as the Khorasan Group as "an example of the organization's continued interest in planning fresh attacks."

Khorasan is the terror outfit giving al Qaeda a new name in Syria. Read more here.

US-led airstrikes in Syria in September targeted the cell. The coalition's wider campaign, described as targeting Islamic State locations in Syria and Iraq, has done little to dampen the tide of foreigners joining the group — and might in fact be drawing more to its cause.

The Security Council has in recent months held several sessions on the "foreign fighter phenomenon," including one chaired by President Barack Obama during the September General Assembly that saw passage of a binding resolution requiring that countries take steps to prevent potential fighters from traveling through or from their territory. Rights groups raised questions about the resolution's broad definition, which they worried could potentially allow countries to ignore due process when arresting people who cross their borders.

The report's estimate of 15,000 fighters is similar to assessments by US and British intelligence. Randy Blake, a senior strategic adviser in the US Office of the Director of National Intelligence, noted at a security panel earlier this week that "the rate of travel into Syria [by foreign fighters] is greater than we saw into Afghanistan prior to 9/11."

American officials believe that roughly 2,000 fighters from Western countries are currently in Syria, among them more than 700 from France, 500 from the United Kingdom, and 400 from Germany.

Follow Samuel Oakford on Twitter: @samueloakford

Report: The ISIS Governor Of Iraq's 2nd-Largest City Has Been Killed
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NOV. 20, 2014, 8:40 AM 10,148 9
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ISIS Parade Mosul June 2014
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Militants from the Islamic State parade down a main street in Mosul, Iraq.

An Islamic State leader has been killed in an airstrike in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, residents and a local medical source said Thursday.

They said Radwan Taleb al-Hamdouni, whom they described as the radical militant group's leader in Mosul, was killed with his driver when their car was hit in a western district of the city on Wednesday afternoon.

The ultra-hardline Islamic State (aka ISIS or ISIL) swept through northern Iraq in June almost unopposed by Iraq's army, consolidating on gains made in the country's Sunni heartland region of Anbar.

Hamdouni was buried later Wednesday. Large numbers of supporters, some carrying black ISIS flags, attended the funeral, one source said.

He had been the ISIS "wali," or governor, of Mosul, which was captured by the group in June and remains the largest city in a self-declared Islamic State caliphate straddling the border between northern Iraq and eastern Syria.

The US, backed by some Western and Arab allies, launched airstrikes against the group in Iraq in August, later expanding operations to targets in Syria.

The air campaign, which Washington says aims to degrade ISIS' military capability, helped Kurdish forces retake territory from the group in Iraq and defend the Syrian border town of Kobane from an ongoing ISIS offensive.

ISIS fighters faced another setback this week when Iraqi officials said they had broken a five-month siege of the Baiji oil refinery — Iraq's largest — on Tuesday.

(Reporting by Dominic Evans and Saif Hamid; Editing by Michael Georgy/John Stonestreet/Susan Fenton)



Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/report-the-isis-leader-in-iraqs-second-largest-city-has-been-killed-2014-11#ixzz3JhWUhNU3

Kurds: We are Ready for Both War and Peace!

Author: Nurcan Baysal, Diyarbakır Institute of Political and Social Studies Date: Dec 02, 2014 New Post, Op-Eds and Commentaries
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Kurds: We are Ready for Both War and Peace!

No one knew yet that the incidents which started with ISIS’s attacks to the Yazidis’ holy city Sinjar on August 3 would be the beginning of lots of things in Turkey and would upset the balance in the Middle East.

As a result of ISIS’s attacks, Yazidis[1] escaped to the Sinjar Mountains and began a long journey harrowed by famine and drought. Tens of thousands of Yazidis were killed, thousands of Yazidi women were raped and thousands of them were sold as slaves in Arab bazaars. The Federation of Yazidis indicate that 5000 Yazidi women are still lost. The People’s Protection Units (YPG),[2] which came to Sinjar to rescue Yazidis who were stuck in the mountain from the massacre, attempted to rescue them through a human corridor they have built on the one hand, while fighting against ISIS on the other hand.

Hundreds of thousands of Yazidis who escaped massacre with the aid of the YPG arrived to Zakho and Dohuk, and tens of thousands of them arrived to Turkey. Due to the pressure of public opinion, Yazidis who were waiting at the Turkish border in famine and drought conditions started to be taken into Turkey after a while. The border gate has been opened and closed occasionally during this process. Yazidis who were not able to cross the border legally arrived Turkey in illegal ways, such as crossing the mountains over Roboski.

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Yazidi Camp – Zakho Dohuk Camp

Thirty thousand of the Yazidis who came to Turkey have stayed in the camps pitched by Kurdish municipalities and in local people’s houses and they still stay there. Except for 2000 Yazidis placed in available places at the camp which was pitched by the AFAD[3] three years ago for Syrian refugees in Midyat, the Turkish government gave support neither to incoming Yazidis nor to the camps. Today, the pitched camps in some centres such as Şırnak, Silopi, Mardin, Viranşehir, Van, Batman, Diyarbakır, and Cizre are trying to survive with the support of the regional municipalities and the society.

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Yazidi Camps

The Kobanê Resistance is in Its Second Month

The local community who strives to supply aid and backup to Yazidis who ran away from massacre was shocked this time by ISIS’s attacks to Kobanê in September.

Kobanê, which is in the middle of three cantons that Kurds constituted in Western Kurdistan(Rojava), is very important for Kurds. Approximately 200 km west, and east of Kobanê, are Efrîn and Cizîrê. There are Arab predominant regions held by ISIS in the midst of these three cantons. If Kobanê falls, other PYD[4] cantons will weaken, and ISIS will be dominating a considerably larger area.

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The egalitarian society established in Rojava, in one sense, symbolizes the ideal society that Kurds have been struggling for many years. As a matter of fact, it is included in the Social Contract of Rojava. The first article of the Social Contract of Rojava states:

“As the people of democratic autonomous regions; Kurds, Arabs, Assyrians (Assyrian and Aramaic), Turkmens and Chechens, for the establishment of justice, freedom and democracy in an equal and ecological society in which there is no discrimination based on religion, language, race, belief, sect or gender; for components of democratic society to attain pluralist, unique and common life values together with the political-moral structure; respectful to women rights and for the rights of children and women to take root; for respect to defence, self-defence, freedom and respect for beliefs; we accept this contract.”

A social structure which is grounded on gender equality and equality of communities resembles an oasis in the Middle Eastern desert. Perhaps being a target of ISIS was inevitable for Kurds who aim to create a society in which women and men are equal in the darkness of the Middle East.

However, Turkey being in the first place, no one could predict that this small town would resist ISIS’s attacks for several days.

It was the second month of Kobanê’s resistance when I wrote down these lines. A small unarmed town is resisting against ISIS killers, who have all kinds of heavy weapons, for two months in front of the whole world![5]

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As Turkey’s support to sanguinary ISIS terrorists, when images of the ISIS members who were being treated in Turkish hospitals[6] as well as their intimate images with Turkish soldiers on the borderline started to appear in the press, Turkey once more lost its credibility in the eyes of Kurdish people. Since mid-September, Kurdish people crowded together on the border in Suruç[7] by aiming at preventing Turkey’s support to ISIS and observing the borderline. Thousands of people are still waiting on the Mürşitpınar border gate to prevent and take control of the support that their own country gives to ISIS terrorists.

On the one hand, waiting on the borderline continues; on the other hand, tens of thousands of Kobanêl Kurds who escaped from the ISIS massacre gained refuge within Turkey’s border. Officials say today the numbers of Kobanêl Kurds in Turkey constitute approximately 170 thousand.[8] Both the AFAD and the Suruç City Hall set up camps for incoming Kobanêls. 5000 of them are staying in the City Hall camps whilst 5000 of them are staying in the AFAD camps. The rest of them are being lodged in the villages and homes of the local community.
Kurds’ Unhearable Voice

To support their brothers in Kobanê, many people from Turkish Kurdistan went to Kobanê to go to war against ISIS. Some of these people arrived in Kobanê through the border gate, while some crossed the Tigris River over Cizîrê and reached Rojava and then the Kobanê canton. Turkey’s Kurds started hot on the possibility of Kobanê’s fall at any moment. And yet, in Turkey, there was nothing about Kobanê in the news, except in several alternative channels’ news about the struggle in Kobanê against ISIS, which was not appearing in the Turkish press. Thereupon, cacerolazos started in the Region, in the first days of September, to draw attention to attacks that taking place in Kobanê. The purpose was to announce what was happening in Kobanê to Western Turkey via making noise with pots and pans, but Turkey did not hear the Kurds’ voice.

The cacerolazos, beginning on the 1st of September, performed every evening at 20:00, by the participation of all Kurdish people, including the rich and poor, was not taken into consideration by the Turkish government as well. Two statements that President Erdoğan made in just the same day were: “ISIS and PKK are the same, both are terrorist organizations;”[9] and then with a slight smile which was not hiding the happiness on his face, said, “Kobanê is about to fall”[10], causing indignation among Kurds. Putting people who resist to protect their folk, homeland, soil, and honour in the same equation with ISIS, who mercilessly slaughter people, by the President of Turkey created a huge breaking in the Region. Kurds who were aware of the concrete situation in Kobanê due to the incoming funerals to the Region every day, had already begun to march on the streets. The public demonstrations that began slowly each passing day led larger masses to pour into streets with the calls for Kobanê from the KCK[11] and Kurdish political movement. The streets witnessed uncontrollable incidents because of the anger felt for Erdoğan’s “Kobanê is about to fall” statement and the lack of government support to the Kurds who were being massacred by ISIS hundred meters away, and, even worse, the reflection of support given to ISIS, who had slaughtered Kurds, in the government officials’ discourses.

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The incidents, called Kobanê protests, spread all over Turkey in a short time. The government declared a curfew in some parts of the region for the first time after the last 34 years, following the deaths of 43 people, 34 of them were killed by the state’s security forces, village guards, and groups close to the state such as HÜDA-PAR[12]. The exhibited images were look-alikes of the 12th September military coup when the military stored up to the Region and many civilians, most of them young people, were massacred.[13]

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Zakho Dohuk Camp – Yazidi Camp
Peace Process?

Today it is possible to say that there is chaos in the Region. The perception that it is possible to return to the 90’s has been created there. Tanks, riot control vehicles (TOMA), and security officers with kalashnikovs in their hands have returned to the streets of Diyarbakır and other provinces of the Region. Even the traffic cops are armed.

Every day at least 5-10 martyr funerals come to the Region. These are Turkey Kurds’ funerals who were killed in the fight against ISIS in Kobanê. The Turkish media does not find most of these funerals newsworthy.

On the other hand, the situation at the camps for both Yazidis and Kobanêls in the Region is worsening with each passing day. Since the winter has come, the need for winter tents, heating and food has still been great at the camps covered in mud. Most of these people who came here after witnessing a massacre are in need of psychological support. However, one cannot argue that they received support from the non-governmental organizations in Europe or in Western Turkey; the camps still survive only by the aids of poor Regional municipalities and of poor local people. The Turkish government and Europe closed their eyes to the humanitarian crisis happening in the Region.

In parallel with these events, there is a Peace Process which some are trying to carry on. Although the government says the Peace Process is continuing, everyone is aware that the process will fail and Turkey will rapidly slide into a civil war if Kobanê falls. On the other hand, the local community thinks that the government does not actually want to carry out a peace process, but it attempts to make the Kurdish side disrupt the process in order to avoid becoming the disruptive side.

In short, Kurds do not believe that Turkey is sincere about this peace process. As a matter of fact, after 21st of March 2013, when the process began, developments like newly employed village-guards[14], built new police stations and prisons and also did not pursue the arrest of people who were involved in massacres against Kurds, promote the opinion that Turkey is insincere regarding the peace process.

Kurds are angry! The Kurdish children who represent the 1990’s, the most death-filled period of the war, are in the streets. These lost children, whose villages have been burned, whose mothers and fathers were killed, have nothing more to lose.

The words of a Kurdish teenager I talked to yesterday, in the shadow of all these events, is just like a summary of today’s mood:

“As Kurds, we are ready for both war and peace!”

Nurcan Baysal, Diyarbakır Institute of Political and Social Studies

Editor’s Note: As Centre for Policy and Research on Turkey (Research Turkey), we are thankful to Nurcan Baysal for sharing all the photos she took in the region with us, and for letting us use the selected ones in this article.

Please cite this publication as follows:

Baysal N. (December, 2014), “Kurds: We are Ready for Both War and Peace!”, Vol. III, Issue 12, pp.6-13, Centre for Policy and Research on Turkey (ResearchTurkey), London, ResearchTurkey. (http://researchturkey.org/?p=7391)
Endnotes

[1] Yazidis: Yazidis are ethno-religious community who mostly live in Southern Kurdistan. Yazidis who speak Kurdish and named as “Kurdên Resen” (original Kurd) among Kurds, had been slaughtered throughout the history since they were regarded as “worshiped satan” as a result of the wrong belief. Yazidi population around the world is estimated to be 800,000 and 650.000 of them live in Sinjar Region of Southern Kurdistan. Until Anfal Campaigns which was actualized in Saddam Hussein’s government term in Iraqi Kurdistan, Yazidis slaughtered 73 times, most of them were happened in the Ottoman Empire era. For more detailed information; see: Fehim Işık, Who are Yazidis, What did they experience?, http://www.diken.com.tr/9-sorudaezidiler-kimdir-ve-ne-yasadilar/

[2] YPG, People’s Protection Unit, is the army of the Kurdish political party, PYD, who controls Syrian Kurdistan, also known as Rojava.

[3] AFAD: Disaster and Emergency Management Authority of Turkey, is an disaster preparation, disaster struggle, control and coordination related institution of Turkish government. Its authorization depends on the Prime Ministry.

[4] PYD: Democratic Union Party, is the political organization of Kurds in Syria. It has been established in 2003. Their leader is Salih Muslim. Their army is People’s Protection Unit (YPG) which includes 5000 guerrillas. They rule 3 Kurdish cantons (Kobanê, Efrîn, Cizîrê) in Western Kurdistan known as Rojava.

[5] The resistance in Kobanê is on its 79th Day as of the 2nd of December 2014 (Editor’s Note).

[6] For ISIS members who were being treated in Turkish hospitals; see:
“Pretense of ISIS commander was treated in Hatay” http://www.milliyet.com.tr/isid-komutani-hatay-da-tedavi-gundem-1896545/

Amberin Zaman: “Turkey should come with its army” http://www.taraf.com.tr/yazilar/amberin-zaman/turkiye-ordusuyla-

gelsin/27207/

Amberin Zaman: “Turkey’s Syrian Border on Edge” http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/09/turkey-danger-syria-border-rebels-kurds.html

[7] Şanlıurfa, which is a province in Turkey’s border with Syria, has the longest border with Rojava. Along this long borderline, there are 3 border gates between Turkey-Rojava. Among these gates Akçakale and Ceylanpınar border gates are under the domination of ISIS, therefore Mürşitpınar border gate which is in front of Kobanê, is the only passageway to Kobanê. Mürşitpınar border crossing is located in the Suruç district of Şanlıurfa. The only region left in Kobanê whose all 3 sides are surrounded by ISIS, is Suruç region, namely Mürşitpınar border crossing. Therefore, Kurds in Turkey are keeping guard at Mürşitpınar gate and struggling to avoid Turkey’s support to ISIS via this gate to prevent the opening of 4th battlefront for Kobanê.

[8] The number of Kobanêl people in Turkey changes every day. But according to Suruç District Governor, interviewed on 11th October , it is 170 thousand.

[9] http://www.hurriyet.com.tr/gundem/27291625.asp

[10] http://www.haberturk.com/gundem/haber/997321-erdogan-kobani-dustu-dusecek

[11] KCK (Koma Civakên Kurdistan) means the Union of Kurdistan Communities. It is the structural organization which controls all parties and organizations including the PKK in Kurdistan.

[12] HÜDA-PAR is a Kurdish-based Sunni Islamic fundamentalist political party in Turkey established in 2013.

[13] To see who killed people in Kobanê incidents, how they were killed, how old they were and who their perpetrators were: Zan Institute:

http://zanenstitu.org/kobaneye-destek-eylemleri-sirasinda-oldurulen-direnisciler/

[14] Village guards are Kurdish paramilitary groups set up by the Turkish state in the mid-1980s. Their stated purpose was “to act as local militia in towns and villages, protecting against attacks and reprisals from the insurgents, terrorists and militants of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK)”. The rationale behind the establishment of this system was that it would be helpful for the Turkish Army to have additional forces, consisting of people who knew the region and the language, and who would assist the military in its operations against the PKK, and divide the Kurdish community into two; either ‘ally of the state’ or ‘enemy of the state.’ 65.000 village guards are still present.

Military & Defense More: Islamic State
ISIS Commander Reveals How The 'Caliph' Radicalized Under American Detention In Iraq

Pamela Engel and Michael B Kelley

Dec. 11, 2014, 10:55 AM
8,396
11



ISIS Iraq BaghdadiScreenshot/www.pbs.orgAbu Bakr al-Baghdadi.
See Also
Obama's Middle East Dilemma Is Now Clear
As The US Strikes At ISIS, Here's A Look At What The Jihadists Have In Their Arsenal
The Obama Administration's Biggest Problem In Iraq Is Painfully Ironic

Very little is known about the Islamic State leader who is often compared to Osama bin Laden and has been called "the world's most dangerous man."

But an interview with a jihadist who was reportedly jailed with Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi a decade ago sheds more light on the mysterious figure and how the Islamic State was born from a US-run prison in southern Iraq. Martin Chulov wrote an in-depth article for The Guardian that explores how al-Baghdadi and others used Camp Bucca as a planning ground for terrorism.

Abu Ahmed, who is now reportedly a senior official within the Islamic State (aka IS, ISIS, ISIL, or Daesh), said he was taken to Camp Bucca in summer 2004. He told The Guardian that he had feared the prison before he arrived.

"But when I got there," he said, "it was much better than I thought. In every way."

Camp Bucca has previously been credited with providing the perfect environment for a terrorist group to form, but Ahmed's comments describe in more detail just how integral the prison was in allowing jihadists to organize.

Bucca held jihadists from all corners of Iraq, and it seems they were all given enough freedom within the prison to collude with one another.

"We could never have all got together like this in Baghdad, or anywhere else," Ahmed told The Guardian. "It would have been impossibly dangerous. Here, we were not only safe, but we were only a few hundred meters away from the entire Al Qaeda leadership."

Ahmed quickly realized that others in Camp Bucca deferred to al-Baghdadi.

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baghdadi_iraqi_ministryIraq Interior Ministry | Getty ImagesA reported picture of al-Baghdadi.

Al-Baghdadi was detained by US forces in Fallujah in 2004 during the insurgency against US forces in Iraq. He was eventually taken to Camp Bucca.

The Americans who ran Camp Bucca apparently respected al-Baghdadi, according to Ahmed and other prison sources The Guardian spoke to.

"He was respected very much by the US Army," Ahmed told The Guardian. "If he wanted to visit people in another camp [within Bucca] he could, but we couldn’t."

Americans at Bucca reportedly saw al-Baghdadi as a "fixer" who could help keep peace at the prison. But other prisoners realized that he was chasing status and seeking out a position of power.

While al-Baghdadi was charming his captors, prisoners within Camp Bucca were formulating ideas that would eventually become the worldview of the Islamic State.

"If there was no American prison in Iraq, there would be no IS now," Ahmed said. "Bucca was a factory. It made us all. It built our ideology."

Over the past year, ISIS has risen from the vacuum created by the Syrian civil war to become may be one of the most heavily armed and well-funded terrorist organizations of all time. Since August, a US-led coalition against ISIS has launched more than 660 airstrikes against ISIS in Iraq and Syria.

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A look at US-led airstrikes as of Oct. 19.

In December 2004, when the US determined that al-Baghdadi was no longer a threat and authorized his release from Camp Bucca, he rose to power in Iraq. Many others released from American prisons in the country also went on to join ISIS.

"We had so much time to sit and plan," Ahmed said. "It was the perfect environment. We all agreed to get together when we got out. The way to reconnect was easy. We wrote each other's details on the elastic of our boxer shorts. When we got out, we called."

He continued: "By 2009, many of us were back doing what we did before we were caught. But this time we were doing it better."

US officials have wondered whether Camp Bucca helped further radicalize al-Baghdadi and turn him into the ruthless leader he is today. One former Air Force officer who was a commander at Camp Bucca noted in July, when al-Baghdadi declared himself the "caliph" of ISIS, that many at the prison wondered whether they had created a "pressure cooker" for extremism.

Once released from Camp Bucca, al-Baghdadi rose through the ranks of ISIS to become a trusted aide to the then-leader of the group, Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, according to The Guardian.

In 2010, Abu Omar was killed in a raid led by US forces. At the time, Abu Bakr was one of only three people responsible for carrying important messages in and out of Abu Omar's hideout.

Abu Bakr "became the closest aide" to Abu Omar, Ahmed told The Guardian. "The messages that got to Osama bin Laden were sometimes drafted by him and their journey always started with him. When Abu Omar was killed, Abu Bakr was made leader. That time we all had in Bucca became very important again."

Here's how Islamic State's leadership structure looks right now:

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The US Military Just Released Videos Of A Strike Against An ISIS Electronic Warfare Unit

Jeremy Bender

Dec. 10, 2014, 2:06 PM
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Airstrike ISIS TankU.S. Central CommandA screenshot of an airstrike against an ISIS tank near Ar Raqqah, Syria

The US military released videos on Wednesday of recent airstrikes against ISIS.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) released a total of 4 videos of US airstrikes against ISIS targets clustered around their de facto capital in Raqqa, Syria.

The strikes took place against a group of vehicles that included an ISIS truck, a tank, and an electronic warfare garrison.

"The strikes were conducted as part of Inherent Resolve, the operation to eliminate the terrorist group ISIL and the threat they pose to Iraq, the region and the wider international community," CENTCOM stated in a press release. "The destruction of ISIL targets in Syria and Iraq further limits the terrorist group's ability to project power and conduct operations."

The statement did not immediately clarify whether the strikes were carried out by the US or its coalition partners.

You can view the four videos of the airstrikes below.

China Signaled It May Join Operations Against ISIS In Iraq

Jeremy Bender

Dec. 15, 2014, 11:32 AM
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Chengdu J-10Peng Chen/www.flickr.comChina's J-10 aircraft.
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As the US-led campaign against the Islamic State grinds on, China has unexpectedly offered to help in the war effort, Najmeh Bozorgmehr and Lucy Hornby report for the Financial Times.

Wang Yi, China's foreign minister, has offered to help the Iraqi military defeat the militant group by providing support for ongoing air strikes. However, Chinese assistance would come unilaterally and outside of the framework of the US-led coalition against the Islamic State.

“[Mr Wang] said, our policy does not allow us to get involved in the international coalition,” Ibrahim Jafari, Iraq's foreign minister who was in talks with Yi, told the Financial Times.

China's unwillingness to join the coalition may make its military contributions to the war effort similar to Iran's. Iran has started conducting airstrikes against the Islamic State along the Iraq-Iran border without membership in or even clear coordination with the US-led coalition.

China's interest in Iraq is largely driven by Beijing's investment in the Iraqi oil industry. According to the Financial Times, China is the largest foreign investor in Iraq's oil sector. Beijing draws one-fifth of its oil from the country and about 10,000 Chinese nationals were working in Iraqi oil fields before the Islamic State's blitz across the country this past summer.

Chinese intervention in Iraq would further demonstrate Beijing's willingness to flex its military muscle in order to shield its economic interests abroad. In September, China announced it would deploy 700 infantry soldiers to aid the United Nations mission in war-torn South Sudan. It is suspected that China has sent the soldiers to protect oil interests, as China receives 5% of its crude oil from South Sudan.

China is also becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the Islamic State's existence and may view the group as a national-security treat. An estimated 300 Chinese nationals, largely from the country's Uighur minority, are believed to be fighting alongside the militants.

The 300 extremists are thought to have been members of the East Turkestan Islamic Movement, a group based in China's Xinjiang province that has carried out attacks throughout China.

Irán participa de manera más abierta en la ofensiva antiyihadista en Irak
El Pentágono sostiene que aviones de Teherán han atacado a los integristas

La red yihadista de Ikassrien captaba adeptos en la mezquita de la M-30

Ángeles Espinosa Dubái 3 DIC 2014 - 16:52 CET

Un convoy de miembros de Al Qaeda del Frente Nusra. / reuters
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Irán mantiene la ambigüedad sobre si ha bombardeado posiciones del Estado Islámico (EI) en Irak como se le atribuye. La portavoz de Exteriores, Marzieh Afkham, esquivó en la mañana de este miércoles las preguntas al respecto y reitero que su Gobierno “no ha cambiado de política” hacia el país vecino. Todo indica que Teherán quiere evitar una reacción negativa de los árabes suníes, entre los que despierta un gran recelo tanto en Irak como en el resto de la región. No obstante, desde la irrupción del EI el pasado verano, los iraníes se muestran más seguros y abiertos sobre sus actividades al otro lado de la frontera.

“Quiero subrayar que no ha habido cambio en las políticas de la República Islámica de Irán respecto a la ayuda al Gobierno iraquí y el asesoramiento en la lucha contra el terrorismo”, declaró Afkham durante su conferencia de prensa semanal, eludiendo la pregunta sobre si aviones iraníes habían bombardeado posiciones del EI en Irak, tal como lleva especulándose varios días y el martes respaldó el Pentágono. “Las informaciones sobre que Irán coopera con grupos militares de otros países en la lucha contra el EI no son correctas”, añadió la portavoz.

Desde que en 2003 EEUU derribara a Saddam Husein, Irán se ha convertido en un actor clave en Irak. La historia, la afinidad cultural y la mera geografía hacían inevitable el acercamiento. Además de compartir 1.500 kilómetros de frontera, el 90% de los iraníes y dos tercios de los iraquíes siguen la rama chií del islam. Practicantes o no, todos crecen oyendo las historias del martirio de Husein en Kerbala y la ocultación del Mahdi, el duodécimo de sus imames. Los iraníes sueñan con visitar Nayaf, el Vaticano chií; los iraquíes, el santuario de Reza, el octavo imam, en Mashhad.

Con la desaparición del tirano, que en 1980 invadió Irán y desató una guerra de ocho años y un millón de víctimas, Irak se llenó de productos de consumo y de peregrinos iraníes. Con ellos también llegaron los exiliados de aquella contienda, muchos de ellos integrados en grupos políticos, como la Asamblea Suprema de la Revolución, o milicias, como la Organización Al Badr, que aspiraban a participar en el nuevo Gobierno. Sus miembros se convirtieron en una vía de información e influencia que EEUU nunca iba a poder alcanzar.

Teherán no objetó a los planes democratizadores de Washington porque sabía que daban el triunfo a una comunidad afín. A la vez quiso evitar su éxito y apoyó a las milicias que atacaban a los ocupantes. Pero cuando la insurgencia suní amenazó con sumir el país en el caos, también respaldó que el entonces primer ministro, Nuri al Maliki, un hombre cuya elección contó con el visto bueno de los dos enemigos, metiera en cintura a los milicianos chiíes. Al margen de alguna reunión secreta, Irak sufrió por la ausencia de relaciones entre Irán y EEUU.

Ahora ambos niegan que estén cooperando frente al EI en Irak. Pero sobre el terreno, a nadie le cabía duda este verano de que había un reparto tácito de responsabilidades. “EEUU se ocupa del EI en el noroeste de Irak y deja el flanco Este en manos de los iraníes”, aseguraron a esta enviada varios analistas y responsables kurdos. Otros observadores apuntaban a que no era necesario que se vieran las caras para coordinarse. “Los dos tienen buenas relaciones con los kurdos y con el Gobierno de Bagdad; los americanos saben que si informan a éstos de un bombardeo, el mensaje va a llegar a Teherán, y viceversa”, señalaban.

El autodenominado EI ha supuesto para Irán tanto una amenaza como una oportunidad. Teherán recela sin duda del avance de ese grupo extremista suní a apenas unas decenas de kilómetros de su frontera. Por otra parte, siente que su irrupción refuerza su argumento de que Occidente, y en especial EEUU, se equivocaba de enemigo al tachar a los iraníes de asociarle con el radicalismo islámico.

Prueba de ello ha sido la inusitada transparencia que ha exhibido desde agosto en sus acciones al otro lado de la frontera. El relevo de Al Maliki no hubiera sido posible sin su aquiescencia. Fue el primer país en responder a la petición de armas tanto de Bagdad como de los kurdos. Y aunque asegura que no interviene en operaciones militares dentro de Irak y que se limita a asesorar al Gobierno iraquí en la lucha contra los terroristas, resulta elocuente que haya difundido imágenes del general Qasem Soleimani en las trincheras a través de las redes sociales. El hasta ahora oscuro jefe de la Brigada Al Qods, encargada de las operaciones exteriores de los Pasdarán, se ha convertido en un héroe en Irán.

“Somos nosotros los que estamos venciendo al EI en Irak”, aseguraba un diplomático iraní a esta corresponsal la semana pasada en Teherán. Muchos iraquíes están de acuerdo.

EE UU afirma que Irán bombardeó al Estado Islámico en Irak
Unos 60 países de la coalición contra los yihadistas acuden a su primera cita ministerial

'Washington y el Estado Islámico', por IGNACIO SOTELO

Lucía Abellán Bruselas 3 DIC 2014 - 14:43 CET


En la foto (Efe), soldados iraquíes tras la recuperación de Al Saadiya, al noreste de Irak, el 24 de noviembre | En el vídeo (Reuters), declaraciones del portavoz del Pentágono
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La convulsión que plantea el Estado Islámico (EI) es capaz de alterar ciertas enemistades históricas. El portavoz del Pentágono, John Kirby, ha confirmado por primera vez que Irán llevó a cabo recientemente bombardeos aéreos contra posiciones del Estado Islámico en el este de Irak. En declaraciones a la cadena británica BBC, Kirby ha negado cualquier coordinación en las operaciones con Teherán.
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El pacto petrolero de Bagdad y los kurdos ayuda a luchar contra el EI
'Washington y el Estado Islámico', por I. SOTELO
El Papa considera lícita la lucha al yihadismo y reclama otras medidas
El Estado Islámico ya ha tomado y aterroriza la ciudad libia de Derna
Una telenovela contra el califato

"Tenemos indicaciones de que llevaron a cabo bombardeos con aviones F-4 Phantom en los últimos días", ha dicho, antes de recalcar que es tarea de Irak supervisar y coordinar los vuelos en su espacio aéreo.

Por su parte, el subjefe del Estado Mayor iraní, Masud Jazayeri, ha negado cualquier colaboración con Estados Unidos, recalcando que Washington es responsable de los "problemas" en Irak, y que el país norteamericano "no tendrá un lugar en el futuro del país". Irán y Estados Unidos cortaron sus relaciones diplomáticas a raíz de la crisis de los rehenes tras la Revolución Islámica en 1979.

EE UU ordenó a principios de agosto los ataques en Irak para frenar los avances del EI hacia Kirkuk, una ciudad del Kurdistán iraquí, y alegando un posible genocidio de minorías religiosas por parte del EI. En septiembre, Obama amplió la operación a Siria y forjó una alianza, en principio de 10 países de la OTAN, para combatir a los yihadistas. La alianza cuenta ya con 59 países miembros y tres organizaciones (la OTAN, la UE y la Liga Árabe), que brindan distintos tipos de apoyo.

Arabia Saudí, Emiratos Árabes Unidos, Jordania y Baréin participan en los bombardeos aéreos en Siria mientras que Australia, Bélgica, Reino Unido, Canadá, Dinamarca, Francia y los Países Bajos intervienen en Irak. Docenas de países ofrecen otro tipo de apoyo, como el intercambio de información e inteligencia.
La coalición contra el Estado Islámico, en su primera cita ministerial



Esa coalición internacional de países que combaten al grupo yihadista Estado Islámico en Siria e Irak ha celebrado hoy su primera reunión de ministros de Asuntos Exteriores en Bruselas, convocada por el secretario de Estado estadounidense, John Kerry. "Esta rápida unión de esfuerzos no es algo cosmético, es el reflejo de las acciones emprendidas por más de 62 entidades y países para acabar con el Estado Islámico", destacó Kerry antes de entrar a la reunión. El jefe de la diplomacia estadounidense considera que los 1.000 bombardeos que ha realizado la coalición sobre bastiones del Estado Islámico "ha reducido el liderazgo de ese grupo y ha dañado sus capacidades logísticas y operativas".
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El encuentro obedecía a la necesidad de dar una coherencia y un mensaje político a una coalición con actores muy diversos unidos por un objetivo coyuntural. La cita se ha celebrado en la sede de la OTAN en Bruselas, aunque todos los participantes han insistido en desvincular el papel de la Alianza, que puede despertar ciertos recelos en el mundo árabe, de esta iniciativa. Los ministros de Exteriores de los países aliados habían celebrado allí mismo una reunión el día anterior y por eso se decidió mantener la cita en la misma sede, alegan fuentes diplomáticas.

El general John Allen, nombrado por Estados Unidos como enviado especial para la coalición, ha informado a los participantes -la mayoría ministros- de la situación en Irak y Siria. El primer ministro iraquí, Haider Al Abadi, también ha participado en la discusión.

El titular español de Exteriores, José Manuel García-Margallo, ha subrayado que los miembros de esta coalición contemplan una solución política para un conflicto que arrancó en Siria y ahora se ha amplificado con la irrupción del Estado Islámico. Pese a todo, la vía militar resulta esencial, a juicio de Margallo, contra la organización integrista. "No hay duda de que esto requiere botas sobre el terreno. Sin tropas no habrá solución al conflicto", ha explicado a la prensa. Sobre la posibilidad de que otros países envíen esas tropas, Margallo ha asegurado que sólo se contempla la presencia de "tropas locales", iraquíes y kurdos.

Los representantes de la coalición han discutido también sobre cómo detener el flujo de combatientes extranjeros a Irak y Siria y deslegitimar la poderosa “marca” del EI. También sobre las maneras de interrumpir las vías de financiación de los yihadistas: ventas de crudo, extorsiones, saqueos, secuestros, trata de personas y el tráfico de antigüedades sirias.

El secretario general de la OTAN, Jens Stoltenberg, indicó el lunes en una rueda de prensa que la Alianza está dispuesta a ayudar a Irak si el Gobierno de ese país requiere de su apoyo, tal y como convinieron los líderes aliados en su cumbre del pasado mes de septiembre en Gales (Reino Unido). Stoltenberg dejó claro que, por el momento, no ha recibido ninguna petición por parte de Bagdad.

La alta representante para la Política Exterior de la UE, Federica Mogherini, limitó el papel de la UE como institución al asegurar que el bloque comunitario “puede contribuir desde el lado humanitario” a la crisis abierta por el EI en Siria e Irak.

Para Mogherini, que también ha participado en la cita convocada por Kerry, el “mensaje es que hay posibilidad de vivir juntos en esa región, algo que está en riesgo hoy”. “El Islam no puede y no debe identificarse con el EI, que es una organización terrorista y no tiene nada que ver con la religión”, consideró.

Thinking the Unthinkable: Rise of ISIS
By Anant Mishra
Issue Net Edition | Date : 10 Jan , 2015

The United Nations Security Council has given a top priority to eliminate the threat of Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL popularly known as IS or ISIS) that posses a grave danger to the international community and global peace. However adequate steps are already taken in the past but further action is required. Severe human rights violations, mass killings and executions have been reported ever since the ISIL took control over parts of Syria and Iraq; in the previous weeks alone, numerous reports on mass executions, beheadings, rapes, torture, sexual enslavement and kidnappings were submitted to the UNHCR.

During its course of operation ISIL has been responsible for countless human rights violations and atrocities against civilians. Force religious conversions and physical torture are normal operations of ISIL.

However air raids and aerial bombings from US and allied nations have assisted them in recovering some territories from ISIL; a more extensive and coordinated military strategy is required to eliminate the militants from their territories and stop human rights violations. With the increase in returning fighters from militant occupied regions throughout the world to the western civilization only creates a need of more urgency to address this situation. This concern of international community has to be addressed through the Security Council’s resolution.

Background

In October 2004, United Nations officially designated the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) as terrorist organization. Right after seizing significant territories of Iraq and Syria with approximately eight million civilians residing, ISIL proclaimed its world leader, Caliph Abu Bakr al- Baghdadi as the leader of worldwide Muslim populations and successor to the Prophet. They crowned him the king slayer of infidels. ISIL is probably the only militant organization that uses social media applications like twitter and YouTube for military propaganda, beheadings and mass execution. During its course of operation ISIL has been responsible for countless human rights violations and atrocities against civilians. Force religious conversions and physical torture are normal operations of ISIL.

Although most of the Islamic communities have condemned the “actions in the name of religion” by ISIL; recently the Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia declared ISIL as “enemy number one” of Islam.

Organizational Structure

The Islamist group of ISIL is commanded by the caliph Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi, along with his deputy commander Abu Ali al Anbari and Abu Muslim al Turkmani, which are currently commanding the regions of Iraq and Syria respectively. The working structure comprise of Twelve governors who are responsible for the administrative working within the regions along with working councils on finance, leadership, military matters, legal matters, fighters’ assistance, security, intelligence, and media, completes the regime. A Shura Council has been established that takes care of all the matters within the Sharia law. ISIL’s main source of income comes from exporting oils form the captured oil fields, selling sacred archaeological findings in the black market, illegal collection of taxes and ransom.

ISIL’s main source of income comes from exporting oils form the captured oil fields, selling sacred archaeological findings in the black market, illegal collection of taxes and ransom.

Huge donations from Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates add to the ISIL’s financial aid. If we talk about the arms and weaponry under its disposal, ISIL has military equipment from the Syrian military depots in region acquired under its rule and the ones from lost Syrian rebels and Iraqi soldiers along with some US military equipments. In a report submitted by the Senate Defence Committee to the White House, CIA estimated around 20,000 to 30,000 militants in ISIL by October 2014, and a huge amount of jihadists joining the organization worldwide. The intelligence agency also predicted around 1000 fighters entering the conflict zone from worldwide. However the number of fighters entering the conflict zones hail from the neighbouring nations but the fighters coming from the west is a major concern. CIA estimates these fighters within the range of 2000-5000.

History and Military actions (2013/2014)

ISIL started as a front of operations for AL Qaeda and by 2003, it started working as a sub group for carrying out militant operations in Middle East. It carried out numerous bombings, mass executions, suicide attacks and murders, captured their insanity on videos and publishing on jihadists website. By the end of 2007, ISIL started carrying out its operations in the entire Iraqi territory, killing 520 civilians and dozen soldiers. In May 2010 Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi rose to power, further increasing the attacks. After entering Syrian Civil war of 2011, they began their fight against the Assad’s regime simultaneously with Free Syrian Army. In January 2012, they called fighters from the Al Nusra front to push back the regime soldiers and FSA rebels and opened an Al Qaeda branch along the borders of Syria and Lebanon. In April 2013, these militant groups got involved in the political struggle. By the second half of 2013, ISIL had successfully captured cities within Syria and established its headquarters in the city of Mosul (Iraq) and continued their attacks on cities of both Iraq and Syria targeting mostly Christian and Alawite communities.

In a report submitted by Human Rights Watch to UNHCR, ISIL was responsible for killing at least 190 civilians and taking 200 POW’s, mostly women and children. By August 2013, the casualties increased with a record higher than ever.

In a video recorded by Al Baghdadi, ISIL opened a training camp for underage soldiers, particularly for those under 10. In a report issued by Amnesty International, the organization used tactics such as torture, lashings and targeted killings within their prisons. On January 2014, FSA launched a large scale ground attack on ISIL bases throughout Syria. With the end of February 2014, ISIL witnessed the end of all its allies within the Syrian boundaries including the Al Nusra front.

UNHCR estimates that there are over 1 million Iraqi populations on the run.

Shocked with this defeat, ISIL claimed itself an Islamic Nation on June 29th 2014. Undoubtedly ISIL has extended its territory throughout the year, along with its most important victory over the town of Mosul (Iraq), and capturing money, military equipment and oil fields worth 1.5 Million USD. By July 2014 Christian communities within the occupied regions were asked either to convert to Islam or pay a religion tax “jizya” or leave the city. The Iraqi army failed to contain the situation and did little to assist the people in the conflict. In the city of Tikrit alone 3000 Iraqi soldiers surrendered to ISIL; then the Islamist group subsequently divided the soldiers in Shiite and Sunni, later killing the Shiites.

August, September and October brought shocking reality of ISIL in the media. Journalists James Foley, Steven Footloff and David Haines along with international aid worker Alan Henning were executed and their execution videos were published on internet to avenge the American air strike of 8th August and UK’s transfer of weapons to Kurdish fighters of Peshmerga. In September 2014, ISIL captured the Syrian city of Kobani near the Turkish borders that too attracted international attention. After a huge pressure from the International Community’s Turkey opened its borders for refugees. With the help of US air support, Kurdish fighters are giving a tough fight in the region.

Human Rights violations and Ideology

Taking about the ideology of ISIL, it is entirely based on ultraconservative Sunni Wahhabism with more focus on importance of Sharia. They are strictly prohibited to consume alcohol, carry their weapons and hold meetings. Women are forced to wear burqa’s and cover their face; they are also banned from leaving the house. Muslims and particularly those believing in other dominations and dialect are considered a threat to Islam are shot to death, if found in the area. These so called “religious practices” are heavily criticised by Muslim communities’ throughout the world.

Muslims and particularly those believing in other dominations and dialect are considered a threat to Islam are shot to death, if found in the area.

In August 2014, United Nations accused ISIL for committing mass execution and atrocities against the civilian population. ISIL is responsible for conducting mass execution against ethnic minorities such as Christians, Alawits, Yazidi communities and Shiite Muslims. During the siege of cities in northern Iraq, a large number of Yazidi populations were captured. In a video issued by Al Baghdadi, he stated that the ultimate goal of ISIL is to eliminate the existence of Yazidi community from the world. As a result, more than 300 male captives were killed and women and children were kept as slaves.

Almost 200,000 escaped from the ISIL compounds, to shelter themselves in the Sindschar Mountains. However only 10% of the escapees could be saved by the Peshmerga forces. The rest are still held captive in the ISIL occupied region. ISIL trade women as young as of the age of 9 and rape of non Muslim women are encouraged. They use physically disabled persons to carry out suicide bombings. Mass execution of men, women and children, frequent rapes, murders, beheadings has become their daily routine. UNHCR estimates that there are over 1 million Iraqi populations on the run. The United Nations Human Rights Council considers ISIL as “an organization that seeks to subjugate civilians under its control and dominate every aspect of their lives through terror, indoctrination, and the provision of services to those who obey”.

International Responses

International Military Response

After Mossul fell into the hands of ISIL, Iraqi government approached United States for help. On 8th August 2014, US started aerial bombardment upon many ISIL known locations. Following the air strike Iraqi and Kurdish forces were able to recapture many cities that were previously held under ISIL rule. Additionally a large number of military advisors from the US and the UK were sent to coordinate and strategise military attacks on the front.

China although agrees on the fact that ISIL pose a grave threat to the international peace and eliminating this threat is the only active solution but it also argues on the fact that US should accept the bitter truth of supporting ISIL by invading Iraq in 2003.

On 5th September an “International response against ISIL” was formed. This international response team comprised of military personnel from US, Germany, UK, France, Italy, Poland, Denmark, Australia, and Turkey. However on 12th September 2014, Middle East nations Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Oman, Qatar, and UAE too joined the international response team. During the heavy fighting in September, Australia announced the transfer of over 600 military teams and 39 combat aircrafts to fight against Islamists groups. Shocked and angered by the international cooperation, a French nationalist Hervé Gourdel was abducted by ISIL supporters in Algeria and later beheaded on 24 September. As the fighting intensified in October, additional airstrikes were conducted by Australia, Canada, Saudi Arabia, UAE and the UK. Nations like Belgium, Netherlands, and Denmark sent soldiers and officers to train Iraqi and Kurdish forces, along with caches of ammunitions.

Some EU nations like Germany and Italy provided trainings of military equipment to Kurdish fighters.

Humanitarian Responses

A large Humanitarian Operation was conducted by US, UK, and Australia, along with its international partners, and focussed on refugees in the North Iraq, by air dropping water and survival aid. Till now EU has distributed around €17 million aid for humanitarian assistance.

International Stand

US led coalition

The US led coalition comprises of over 40 nations providing assistance at various levels. As per the United Nations Security Council nations such as France, the United Kingdom the United States, Jordan, and Australia have directly engaged the Islamists on various fronts. The EU has provided intensive rehabilitation facilities and air dropped aids. According to the President Obama, the ultimate goal of the coalition is to “degrade and ultimately destroy” ISIL through combined and coordinative military strategy from Iraq and Syria. However looking at the ongoing situation there is absolutely no need to deploy more boots on the ground.

Russia and China

Russia and China are the only two permanent members of the Security Council that has not joined the fight against ISIL, yet. However Russia has expressed deep concerns about the ongoing situation but remains on the stand of strengthening ties with the two conflict nations. Russia has attempted to block the resolutions passed in the Security Council, while China has made a stand not to interfere in internal matters of sovereign nations. China although agrees on the fact that ISIL pose a grave threat to the international peace and eliminating this threat is the only active solution but it also argues on the fact that US should accept the bitter truth of supporting ISIL by invading Iraq in 2003. Both the nations have vetoed for the interference of ICC in the conflict.
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Fight against ISIS and possible fallout on IndiaFight against ISIS and possible fallout on India

The views expressed are of the author and do not necessarily represent the opinions or policies of the Indian Defence Review.
About the Author
Anant Mishra

Anant Mishra is a former youth representative United Nations. His expertise lies in crisis management, middle east issues and economy.

Francia desafía al Estado Islámico y decide extender su intervención militar en Irak

lainformacion.com

martes, 13/01/15 - 19:47
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Los diputados franceses lo han autorizado casi por unanimidad, con 488 votos a favor, uno en contra y 13 abstenciones, la mayoría del radical Frente de Izquierda.
La decisión llega una semana después del atentado contra la revista satírica 'Charlie Hebdo', que se saldó con 12 muertos y 11 heridos y cuyos autores, vinculados a Al Qaeda y Estado Islámico.

Hollande afirma en el funeral de los tres policías asesinados que Francia nunca se rendirá al terrorismo

La Asamblea Nacional de Francia ha dado su consentimiento para extender la operación militar del país en Irak, en el marco de la coalición internacional liderada por Estados Unidos contra el Estado Islámico.

Los diputados franceses lo han autorizado casi por unanimidad, con 488 votos a favor, uno en contra y 13 abstenciones, la mayoría del radical Frente de Izquierda, según ha informado el diario francés 'Le Figaro'.

La decisión llega una semana después del atentado contra la revista satírica 'Charlie Hebdo', que se saldó con 12 muertos y 11 heridos y cuyos autores, vinculados a Al Qaeda y Estado Islámico, citaron los bombardeos de Francia en Irak como una de las razones del ataque.

Francia es uno de los países que forman parte de la 'Operación Resolución Inherente'. París participa, junto a Estados Unidos, Reino Unido, Australia, Canadá, Países Bajos, Dinamarca, Bélgica y Francia en los bombardeos contra el Estado Islámico en Irak, pero no en los efectuados sobre Siria, donde hasta ahora solo intervienen las fuerzas estadounidenses, jordanas, saudíes, emiratíes y bahreiníes.
Emoción al cantar la Marsellesa

Tras la masacre cometida la semana pasada por un grupo de yihadistas en suelo francés, primero atacando la sede del semanario satírico 'Charlie Hebdo' y después secuestrando un supermercado judío, esta semana es tiempo de reflexión, análisis y sobre todo de homenajes.

"El domingo, Francia demostró su fuerza, demostró su unidad ante aquellos que pretenden dividir y demostró solidaridad a todas las víctimas del terrorismo", ha asegurado el presidente francés, François Hollande, que ha dejado claro que Francia "nunca se plegará" aunque se vea agredida y atacada.

Por su parte, Manuel Valls ha destacado que "Francia está en guerra contra el islamismo radical",ha asegurado el primer ministro francés, Manuel Valls, en sede parlamentaria este martes a propósito de los ataques de París.

Valls ha aprovechado su comparecencia para anunciar que las transferencias de datos de los pasajeros europeos entrarán en vigor en septiembre de 2015 y que, en Francia, los yihadistas encarcelados serán agrupados y aislados del resto de presos en un mismo ala de la prisión en áreas específicas a finales de año.

Shia armed groups gain strength in Iraq
Government support and a merger of several groups mean militias are growing stronger in the country.
Last updated: 14 Jan 2015 23:46
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Shia militias in Iraq have been given backing by the government and as a result are growing bigger and stronger by the day.

Many of them recently merged under the banner of the 'Popular Mobilisation Forces', but their growing popularity is creating controversy.

Al Jazeera's Mohammed Adow reports from northern Iraq.

The Prime Minister Of Australia Is Calling ISIS By A New Name That It Absolutely Hates

Peter Terlato, Business Insider Australia

Jan. 12, 2015, 12:00 PM


Tony AbbottREUTERS/Rick Stevens
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In recent weeks, Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott has started referring to the Islamic State terrorist organization by a name it reportedly despises — "Daesh."

Australia’s allies in the Middle East have suggested the Western world not use monikers such as ISIL (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant), ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and Syria), or IS (Islamic State) as they legitimize the group’s aspirations.

“Daesh hates being referred to by this term, and what they don’t like has an instinctive ­appeal to me,” Abbott said.

“I absolutely refuse to refer to it by the title that it claims for itself [Islamic State], because I think this is a perversion of religion and a travesty of governance.”

US Secretary of State John Kerry has also started referring to the group by the name, as have US military leaders.

Daesh comes from the acronym formed by the Arabic spelling of the terror group’s name — al-Dawla al-Islamiya fi Iraq wa al-Sham.

Joseph Bahout, a visiting scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, told The Huffington Post that the word Daesh in Arabic “sounds like something monstrous” and is a way of “stigmatizing” the group.

One theory suggests the group hates the name as it was reportedly first used by supporters of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, the Herald Sun reported.

The terrorist organisation’s leaders have threatened to “cut out the tongues” of those who refer to them as Daesh, or DAIISH, according to international media reports.

The news follows Abbott’s first visit to Baghdad and Iraq to meet with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to discuss military collaboration between the two nations.

Iranian Commanders Keep Dying In Iraq
Musings On Iraq

Joel Wing, Musings On Iraq

Jan. 13, 2015, 11:16 AM
3,360


Revolutionary Guard IRGC BasijReutersMembers of Iran's Basij militia march during a parade to commemorate the anniversary of the Iran-Iraq war (1980-88), in Tehran on September 22, 2010.
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Another Iranian national was reported killed in Iraq in January 2015.

Mehdi Norouzi was part of the Basij militia, which often fills manpower needs for the Iranian Revolutionary Guards Corps Quds Force (IRGC-QF). This would be the sixth member of that force to die in Iraq since June.

On January 11, 2015 the Iranian press reported that Norouzi was killed in Iraq. He died in a firefight with the Islamic State on January 10. The media claimed he was defending the Askari shrine in Samarra, Salahaddin. But this is part of the propaganda line being pushed by Tehran to justify its presence in Iraq so he could’ve been killed anywhere in the province.

Trend and Shafaq News said that he was a commander in the Basij, a militia formed in 1979 to help protect the new revolutionary regime of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. It is under the command of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and was used to put down the Green Movement in Iran in 2009. It has also been deployed to fight in Syria to defend the Assad government. The Quds Force often calls on the Basij for manpower when it has large foreign deployments like in Syria and Iraq.

This was the sixth Iranian to officially die in Iraq. On December 28 General Hamid Taqavi of the IRGC was killed by an IS sniper in Balad, Salahaddin. IRGC member Ali Reza Moshajari died in Karbala in June, along with another unidentified operative that month. In July IRGC Colonel Kamal Shirkhani died in a mortar attack in Samarra, along with Colonel Shojaat Almdari Mourjani who was an IRGC-QF pilot.

All of these deaths show that the Iranians have deployed their men right at the frontlines where they are advising the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) and allied militias as well as calling in air strikes.

They entered Iraq as part of a security agreement signed between Premier Nouri al-Maliki and Tehran right after the fall of Mosul in June. The Quds Force is leading this assistance mission which is why all the Iranian casualties have come from that organization.

Iran has emerged as the major power in Iraq since this summer. It was the first country to fully commit to Iraq after the fall of Mosul, and has played a decisive role since then. It has forged much of Baghdad’s security strategy, has helped organize its militia allies, provided advisers and air strikes, and sold Iraq billions of dollars of much-needed military equipment.

This has officially cost Iran six lives, with more probably unreported. But it looks like a worthwhile investment, as Tehran will have a dominant role in Iraq’s institutions when everything is said and done.

El Estado Islámico amenaza en VIDEO con ejecutar a dos rehenes japoneses

Por Redacción / Sinembargo - 08:18h 1 Comentario

Beirut, 20 ene (EFE).- El grupo yihadista Estado Islámico (EI) amenazó hoy con ejecutar a dos rehenes japoneses y exigió por ellos un rescate de 200 millones de dólares, según un vídeo difundido en foros utilizados habitualmente por los extremistas.

Los secuestrados, identificados como Haruna Yukawa y Kenji Goto Jogo, aparecen arrodillados y vestidos con el mono naranja que ya es frecuente en las cintas del EI, mientras que las amenazas las efectúa un combatiente, que da un plazo de 72 horas al Gobierno japonés para responder a su demanda.

“Al Primer Ministro de Japón (Shinzo Abe): Aunque estás a más de 8 mil 500 kilómetros del Estado Islámico te has presentado dispuesto como voluntario para tomar parte en esta cruzada”, dice el yihadista, que habla en inglés y que aparentemente es el mismo que suele aparecer en los vídeos de rehenes occidentales.

El combatiente acusó al Gobierno nipón de haber donado 200 millones de dólares para combatir al EI, aludiendo al anuncio hecho por Abe hace tres días en El Cairo.

Por ese motivo, el radical dio un ultimátum de 72 horas al pueblo japonés para que presione a su Ejecutivo para que tome la decisión de pagar esa cantidad al EI, con el fin de salvar las vidas de los rehenes.

Se cree que Yukawa, de 42 años, podría haber sido secuestrado en Alepo en agosto mientras se encontraba con miembros de una facción rebelde rival del EI, según medios japoneses.

Los motivos de su estancia en el territorio sirio son confusos, aunque, de acuerdo a fuentes insurgentes citadas por la prensa japonesa, habría sido capturado cuando acompañaba a miembros del Frente Islámico en un enfrentamiento.

Por su parte, Jogo es un periodista freelance que fue capturado por el EI cuando se encontraba en Siria cubriendo el conflicto bélico y conoció a Yukawa.

La organización extremista proclamó un califato en Siria e Irak a finales de junio de 2014.

Hasta el momento, el EI ha decapitado a cinco secuestrados occidentales: los periodistas estadounidenses James Foley y Steven Sotloff, y los cooperantes británicos David Haines y Alan Henning, y el estadounidense Peter Kassig.

El Estado Islámico ordena en una fatua la mutilación genital de dos millones de niñas en Mosul

S.B.

martes, 27/01/15 - 11:27
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Abu Bakr al Baghdadi ha ordenado a todas las familias de Mosul que lleven a cabo la mutilación genital "para promover la actitud islámica entre los musulmanes".
"Esto afectaría potencialmente a cuatro millones de mujeres", afirma la coordinadora humanitaria de la ONU en Irak.

Yihadistas liberan a unos 150 yazidíes que habían sido secuestrados en Irak

Las atrocidades del Estado Islámico siguen aumentando en ciudades como Mosul, una población iraquí que primero los recibió como salvadores y ahora les teme y sufre las consecuencias de su extremismo, sobre todo las mujeres y las niñas. Y es el líder del Estado Islámico, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi, ha ordenado en una fatua la mutilación genital de dos millones de niñas iraquíes residentes en la ciudad de Mosul con el objetivo de "distanciarlas del libertinaje y la inmoralidad". De lo contrario, "se enfrentarán a duros castigos", afirma el líder de la organización terrorista, según informa la agencia AINA.

Ya cuando tomaron la segunda ciudad en importantancia de Irak ordenó que todas las mujeres entre 11 y 46 años de Mosul fuesen sometidas a la mutilación genital femenina, una práctica atroz poco común en el país árabe. "Esto afectaría potencialmente a cuatro millones de mujeres", afirma la coordinadora humanitaria de la ONU en Irak, Jacqueline Badcock, añadiendo que "esto es algo muy nuevo en Irak, particularmente en esta área". "Provoca una gran preocupación y debe ser abordado", advierte.

"Cuando el EI llegó a Mosul, la gente les recibió con una calurosa bienvenida, pero, como consecuencia de los horribles deseos de EI, especialmente la práctica de la mutilación femenina a la fuerza, está comenzando a quedar patente para la población que el EI no sabe hacer otra cosa que torturar", afirma Asil Jamal, activista de los derechos humanos.

La práctica de la ablación femenina viola los derechos a la salud, seguridad e integridad física de las personas; el derecho a ser libre de torturas y tratos crueles inhumanos, así como el derecho a la vida, ya que en multitud de ocasiones llega a provocar la muerte.

Sunni Arabs near Kurdish lands are turning to ISIS for protection
International Business Times

Erin Banco , International Business Times

Feb. 2, 2015, 5:37 PM
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AP759236470667AP Photo/Raqqa Media Center of the Islamic State group, FileISIS fighters
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The Islamic State group launched an attack on the oil-rich Iraqi city of Kirkuk Friday but was forced to retreat from the area after the Kurdish military pushed its fighters back.

Although the Sunni militant group lost a battle against the Kurdish peshmerga army, it's actively planning the takeover of the city by recruiting local tribesmen who have pledged allegiance to the group and may provide intelligence.

If the Islamic State group succeeds in taking even part of the city, it will control an important swath of territory on the way to Erbil, an Iraqi economic powerhouse and the central hub for US and European diplomats as well as economic interests in the region.

The Islamic State group, formerly known as either ISIL or ISIS, attacked Kurdish military positions south of the center of Kirkuk Friday, launching car-bomb attacks and shooting at peshmerga soldiers.

Although it had not attacked Kirkuk in force for weeks, the militant group is now signaling it is making a new effort to capture the city. According to local Kurdish sources, the group is using its alliances with local Sunnis, ones that were first established back in June, to gain greater access to positions from where it can attack Kurds.

Officials told the Kurdish news service Rudaw that seven peshmerga soldiers were killed in the battle Friday. They included Brig. Sherko Shwani, a top commander. After the clashes, Kurdish officials ordered a curfew with no specific end time.

The attack by the Islamic State group came just two days following its beheading of a peshmerga soldier in Mosul, the second-biggest Iraqi city that it occupied last year. It posted the beheading video online.

Photographs emerged on Twitter of Kurdish residents in Kirkuk dragging the dead bodies of Islamic State fighters from cars through the city's streets. But not everyone living in the area is against the idea of rule by the militant group.

In fact, some welcome it.

Among them are Sunni tribal chiefs near Kirkuk who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State's self-described caliph, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, according to a tweet posted by an ISIS-linked account showing an assembly of tribal elders declaring their fealty to him.isis peshmergaStringer/Anadolu Agency/Getty ImagesAn armoured military tank is seen during clashes between Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants and Peshmerga in Vane 30 kilometers north of Mosul, Iraq on January 20, 2015.

"These are ... Arabs that don't think Baghdad is going to protect them," said Judith Yaphe, a lecturer at George Washington University's Elliott School of International Affairs.

At least since former Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, assumed power in 2006 and initiated anti-Sunni policies, the Sunni tribesmen around Kirkuk have felt disenfranchised and unprotected by the government.

When the Islamic State group first seized Mosul in June, it immediately began recruiting fighters and supporters in Sunni neighborhoods. Scarred by Maliki's oppressive policies, former Baathist officers and Sunni men wanting more protection for their villages aligned themself with the militant group.

"There is no other viable Sunni force," said Denise Natali, a Kurdish expert at the Institute for National Strategic Studies at the National Defense University in Washington. "The ISIS problem is being superimposed over pre-existing conflicts in the area."

The dispute over Kirkuk between Kurds and Arabs is also a problem that surfaced in advance of the emergence of the Islamic State group. Before the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, Kurds had fled the area, under pressure from Sunni Arabs. Since then, Kurds have returned to the city and now have control over the surroundings, including rich oil fields, and are currently conducting land grabs, targeting Sunnis.

The US has for months supported the Kurdish military with arms and training in an attempt to defeat the Islamic State group. But that effort is also fueling historical tensions in the region.

ISIS and the Kurds aren't the only two forces vying for power over Kirkuk, either. The central government in Baghdad also has its eyes set on the area because of the massive amount of oil there. For now, though, the Kurdish Regional Government and Baghdad have agreed to share the revenue from oil production in Iraqi Kurdistan, most of which is pumped around Kirkuk.

Fierce clashes as Iraqi forces move on ISIL-held Tikrit
Government troops and allied militias battle with ISIL fighters on the outskirts of Saddam Hussein's hometown.

09 Mar 2015 01:27 GMT | War & Conflict, Middle East, Iraq, ISIL
The recapture of Tal Ksaiba on Saturday came as fierce fighting continued on the outskirts of Tikrit [Reuters]The recapture of Tal Ksaiba on Saturday came as fierce fighting continued on the outskirts of Tikrit [Reuters]

Iraqi troops have continued fierce battles with Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) fighters on the outskirts of Tikrit, as they try wrest control of the city from the armed group, security officials said.

Army forces and Shia militia exchanged fire with ISIL fighters in clashes on Sunday in the western section of al-Dour, on the southern edge of Tikrit, officials told the Reuters news agency.

Military commanders said the army and Hashid Shaabi militia group units launched an offensive late on Saturday to break into the centre of al-Dour.

By Sunday they had succeeded in recapturing the central area of town, where government headquarters are located, but ISIL fighters were still holding positions in the west.

Al-Dour is the town where slain leader Saddam Hussein was hiding when he was found in a pit near a farmhouse in 2003 and captured by US forces.
Inside Story: Destroying human history

Government troops have also reportedly captured the village of Albu Ajil, which is also in the south of Tikrit.

Some Albu Ajil residents were accused by authorities and Shia militia groups of taking part in the killing of soldiers from the nearby Speicher army camp when ISIL overran Tikrit and northern Iraq last June.

Shia militia fighters have described the advance on Albu Ajil as revenge for the Speicher killings, although militia leaders say all civilians in the Sunni Muslim region will be well treated.

The campaign to retake Tikrit is the biggest offensive so far against ISIL. If successful, it would be the first time the army and militia have recaptured a major city from the armed group.

Sadr statement

Progress in the offensive, which was launched a week ago, could also affect the timing and strategy for a wider offensive later this year to retake Mosul, the largest city under ISIL control.

A potential Mosul operation on Sunday got backing from influential Iraqi Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr who said his militia would take part in the offensive.

His forces fought against the US military after they invaded Iraq in 2003. But the former enemies could now join forces, as the operation to recapture Iraq's second-largest city is expected to be accompanied by air support from the US-led coalition.

The offensive is expected to be a joint operation also involving the Iraqi army, Kurdish Peshmerga troops and local tribes.

Baghdad bombings

Elsewhere in Iraq, a series of bombings targeting public places and police killed 11 people around Baghdad on Sunday.

Police officials said the first of Sunday's attacks happened when a car bomb exploded in a parking lot in the town of Mahmoudiya, 30km south of Baghdad, killing three people and wounding 15 others.

Later on, a bomb blast in a commercial street killed three people in Baghdad's northern suburb of Husseiniyah. Another blast in a town just south of Baghdad killed two people and wounded nine others.

Police said a roadside bomb missed a police patrol in eastern Baghdad, killing three civilians.

Source: Al Jazeera and agencies

Kirkuk foreshadows challenges for a post-ISIL Iraq
Tensions in Kirkuk serve as warning of the instability that could wrack Mosul after its liberation.

25 Feb 2015 11:01 GMT | War & Conflict, Politics, Middle East, Iraq, Kurds
The Kirkuk area continues to represent a neuralgic point for the Iraqi Kurds, writes Knights [AFP]The Kirkuk area continues to represent a neuralgic point for the Iraqi Kurds, writes Knights [AFP]
About the Author
Michael Knights

Michael Knights is the Lafer Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He specialises in the politics and security of Iraq. He has worked in every Iraqi province and most of the country's hundred districts, including periods embedded with Iraq's security forces.

@mikeknightsiraq

All eyes are on the Iraqi city of Mosul, the capital of the self-styled Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which could be attacked by Iraqi forces as soon as April or May 2015 according to a US government briefing given to reporters in February 19. But whenever Mosul is actually attacked, the key challenge for the liberating forces will not end when ISIL fighters are expelled. Governance of multiethnic Mosul city will pose an equally significant test for the Iraqi and Kurdish leaderships, as well as their international allies.

One way to gauge the complexity of post-conflict stabilisation is to look at the Iraqi city of Kirkuk today. Kirkuk sits partway between Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) capital of Erbil. Placed at a crossover point between the Kurdish highlands, Turkmen towns and Arab farmlands bordering the Tigris, Kirkuk expanded greatly after oil production began in the province in the 1920s.
Peshmerga forces recapture Kirkuk oil fields from ISIL

The 1957 census - considered the least politicised - broke down Kirkuk's population by mother tongue, finding the province was 48.3 percent Kurd, 28.2 percent Arab, 21.4 percent Turkmen, and the rest Chaldean, Assyrian, or other. From the 1960s onwards, urban Turkmen and Kurds were targeted with increasing violence by successive Iraqi governments: In 2003, the pendulum swung again and the Kurds became the dominant force within the city.

Strategic geography of Kirkuk

Kirkuk is the point at which Iraqi Kurdistan is at its narrowest. Throughout the last century, Kirkuk was used as the jump-off point for government incursions into the Kurdish highlands. Kirkuk sits astride the most direct highway linking the two main KRG cities, Erbil and Sulaymaniyah. For a hostile force to control Kirkuk is to cut the Kurdish region in half.

Today, the Kirkuk area continues to represent a neuralgic point for the Iraqi Kurds - a potential chink in their armour. Multiethnic Kirkuk is almost unique because of the large numbers of Arabs who live within the frontline secured by the Kurdish Peshmerga forces. Kirkuk is linked to the KRG by highways and a busy flow of commercial and passenger traffic still transits between Kirkuk and the KRG cities every day.

This has made Kirkuk the single most significant entry point for ISIL car bombers and attack cells seeking to penetrate the Kurdistan Region. On January 30, ISIL launched a major localised offensive against the Peshmerga frontline southwest of Kirkuk city, simultaneously installing a team of suicide attackers on the roof of a hotel in the city. Mass sweeps and intelligence-led raids are now combing Kirkuk's Sunni Arab communities for terrorist cells.

Kurdish parties and Kirkuk

Kirkuk has attained a political symbolism over the past 50 years, much as Mosul is a political and economic centre for many of Iraq's Sunnis. The Kurdish political parties vie for influence in Kirkuk and when the city is attacked, the parties rush to defend it. In August 2014, the inflow of Kurdish Peshmerga to Kirkuk arguably stripped other fronts to the extent that the ISIL offensive penetrated almost to Erbil.

Kirkuk has attained a political symbolism over the past 50 years, much as Mosul is a political and economic centre for many of Iraq's Sunnis.



Control of Kirkuk city currently rests with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), the smaller of the two largest Kurdish political parties, but the rival Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) is gradually encroaching. In July 2014, the KDP opportunistically expanded their military control of western Kirkuk, including the Northern Oil Company's Bai Hassan and Avana oilfields.

Kirkuk Governor Najmaldin Karim, who is close to PUK leader Jalal Talabani, must balance the dual needs to maintain Kurdish unity to defend the city while at the same time restraining the further expansion of KDP influence in Kirkuk.

Kirkuk's oil: More vital than ever

Compared to southern Iraq's massive post-1950s oilfields, which are still expanding their production, the grand old Kirkuk fields have been in decline for a while. Yet, control of the western Kirkuk oilfields is more significant than ever because of the dire financial straits that Iraq is suffering from due to high government spending needs and the collapse in oil prices since November 2014.

Kirkuk oil played a central role in the passage of the 2015 budget and the Baghdad-KRG revenue-sharing deal contained within it. Under the deal, Kurdistan must provide Baghdad with 250,000 barrels per day (bpd) of Kurdish-produced crude oil, which is made possible, in part, by the KRG's takeover of the Bai Hassan and Avana fields. The KRG likewise is committed to helping Iraq export 300,000 bpd of Northern Oil Company-produced Kirkuk crude via Kurdistan's pipeline to Turkey. Every barrel of oil shipped will furthermore earn $2 for the province under the "petrodollar" scheme.

In the next year, Kirkuk oil could fill a vital gap in Iraq's budget (and provide Kirkuk province with investment) or it could become a source of disagreements between Baghdad and Erbil. The Iraqi government is already eyeing the return of Bai Hassan and Avana oil to the federal exchequer.

The Kurds meanwhile are winning over the Northern Oil Company with an effective outreach programme of technical support and pipeline-building, which could aid the full KRG annexation of Kirkuk's oil industry if the revenue-sharing deal with Baghdad breaks down.

Shia Popular Mobilisation units

Perhaps the newest challenge to emerge in Kirkuk is the tension between the predominately Shia Hashd al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilisation Units or PMUs) and the Kurdish-led administration. The PMUs have been gradually working their way up the Baghdad-Kirkuk road since September 2014, liberating Shia Turkmen towns overrun by ISIL and garrisoning Sunni settlements with a heavy hand.

Now the PMUs have reached the southern outskirt of Kirkuk city, the first federal security forces to return to Kirkuk since the 12th Iraqi army division disintegrated last June. The Kurds swore at that time that no federal forces would return to Kirkuk but the Shia militias, in part due to Iranian backing, have very effectively grown their presence, with large training camps emerging to arm local Shia Turkmen and Arab Kirkuki volunteers.

Such Shia militants are not completely novel in Kirkuk: Shia Kirkukis from the Iranian-backed Kataib Hezbollah and Asaib Ahl al-Haq (AAH) terrorist groups fired rockets at the US-occupied airbase and attacked US vehicles in Kirkuk right up until the US departure in 2011.

Now these groups are beginning to challenge Kurdish dominance: On February 8, Badr leader Hadi al-Amiri, the PMU leader in much of northern Iraq, visited the Kirkuk governor with an imposing 50-vehicle security detail. On February 17, AAH leader Qais al-Khazali said that his fighters would enter Kirkuk city to challenge the Peshmerga if Kirkuk's Shia residents called upon AAH to do so.

This emerging risk is an indication of the potential complexities that could challenge the post-ISIL governance of northern Iraq, particularly of a liberated Mosul city, an ethnic melting pot with nearly a million residents.

The ultimate significance of the ISIL offensive in Iraq may not be the movement's fleeting control of Iraqi cities but rather in the ethno-sectarian militias and decentralising forces released by the loss of government control.

Dr Michael Knights is the Lafer Fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He specialises in the politics and security of Iraq. He has worked in every Iraqi province and most of the country's hundred districts, including periods embedded with Iraq's security forces and local governments.

The views expressed in this article are the author's own and do not necessarily reflect Al Jazeera's editorial policy.

Iraqi Kurds allege chlorine gas attack by ISIL
Kurdish officials say remnants of a suicide blast on highway between Mosul and Syria showed presence of chlorine.

14 Mar 2015 20:29 GMT | War & Conflict, Middle East, Iraq, Syria

Kurdish authorities in Iraq say they have evidence that fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) used chlorine gas as a chemical weapon against their peshmerga forces.

The Kurdistan Region Security Council (KRSC) said in a statement on Saturday that EU-certified laboratory tests showed that soil and clothing samples collected from the remnants of a suicide blast in northern Iraq in January had levels of chlorine that indicated the substance was used as a weapon.

The Kurdish allegation could not be independently confirmed.

The statement said that a lorry loaded with around 20 gas canisters exploded on a highway between the Iraqi city of Mosul and Syria, as Kurdish fighters were being deployed following an offensive against ISIL fighters.
Shia militias leading charge against ISIL

The Reuters news agency, however, cited a Kurdish security source as saying that the Kurdish forces fired a rocket at the vehicle carrying the explosives, so the only casualty was the lorry's driver.

However, about a dozen peshmerga fighters experienced symptoms of nausea, vomiting, dizziness or weakness, the source said, which could be attributed to exposure to chlorine.

The KRSC also reported witnessing signs of chlorine used in recent fighting around the Iraqi city of Tikri.

"Similar attacks have been recorded on video showing plumes of orange smoke, an indicator of the presence of chlorine", it said.

Chlorine is a toxic agent whose use is banned under the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention.

Iraqi forces to recapture Tikrit 'within 72 hours'
Spokesman claims city seized by ISIL will fall within days, but local command centre says troops need reinforcements.

14 Mar 2015 12:00 GMT | War & Conflict, Middle East

Iraqi forces besieging dozens of die-hard fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Tikrit will have liberated the city within three days, a spokesman said.

Karim al-Nuri, a top leader from the Badr militia and the spokesman of the volunteer Popular Mobilisation units, said on Saturday it would take no more than "72 hours" to flush out holdout IS fighters.

The Popular Mobilisation units account for the bulk of the manpower involved in the two-week-old offensive to wrest back Tikrit, alongside army, police, militia and tribal forces.

The last IS fighters holed up in the city centre are "surrounded from all sides", Nuri said.

Speaking to the AFP news agency from the outskirts of Tikrit, near the village of Awja, he said "their number is now 60 to 70".

Nuri added that the liberation of Tikrit would only be announced once a path has been cleared through the thousands of bombs the jihadists have planted to defend the city.

Offensive halted

Nuri's comments came as the Reuters news agency reported that Iraqi forces and mainly Shia militia battling ISIL had paused their offensive for a second day on Saturday as they awaited reinforcements.

A source in the local military command centre told Reuters military commanders had "reached a decision to halt the operation until a suitable, carefully set plan is in place" to break into central Tikrit.

The source, speaking by phone from near Tikrit, said the Iraqi forces and Iranian-backed Shia militias known as Popular Mobilisation were waiting for reinforcements from "well-trained forces". He did not give a timeline for the arrival of the reinforcements.

"We do not need a large number, just one or two thousand. We need professional personnel and soldiers," he said, explaining they were needed to engage in street-by-street battles with ISIL fighters who have booby trapped many buildings in the city and laid improvised explosive devices and roadside bombs.

Army and militia forces pushed into Saddam Hussein's home city on Wednesday in their biggest drive yet against the fighters who seized large swathes of land in Iraq and neighbouring Syria last year in a lightning campaign halted just outside Baghdad.

More than 20,000 troops and allied militias entered the city about 160km north of the capital after retaking towns to the south and north in a campaign launched nearly two weeks ago.

Report
How to Win Friends and Influence Iraqis

The United States has taken a back seat to Shiite militias and Iranian commanders in the battle for Tikrit. Does that make Washington all but irrelevant in Baghdad going forward?

By Lara Jakes, Kate Brannen
March 16, 2015
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How to Win Friends and Influence Iraqis

Iranian special forces, backed by Iraqi Shiite militias, are poised to finish pushing the Islamic State out of Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit as soon as this week. That would be Baghdad’s first major victory over the militants — and it may be won without any direct U.S. military involvement whatsoever.

Deadly American airstrikes, including at least seven this weekend, are still vital to routing the extremists in western and northern Iraq and have cleared the way for security forces to move into other areas. But it is a truism among Middle Eastern nations that battlefield bravery wins the wasta — Arabic for “influence” — both in the military and in politics.

That has been uncomfortably evident as American and Iraqi officials watch Iran do something the Obama administration has been unwilling to: send combat soldiers into a major Iraqi city to battle the Islamic State on the ground. Iraqi security forces — made up of Shiite and Sunni troops — are fighting in Tikrit too, but in far smaller numbers. American warplanes, at least so far, haven’t flown any missions in support of the ground push in the Sunni-dominated city.

The battle of Tikrit is widely seen as a proving ground for an upcoming offensive in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, an Islamic State stronghold, and Shiite militias are already gearing up for that fight. Some Iraqi fighters and leaders also are asking for air power in Tikrit, although an American military official said Monday that there currently are no plans for the Pentagon to approve U.S. strikes, given Washington’s stated reluctance to help forces loyal to Iran.

There is, however, precedent: Last summer, U.S. airstrikes helped beat back the Islamic State in the town of Amerli, a battle that included Iraqi and Kurdish soldiers, as well as Iranian-led Shiite militias.

On Capitol Hill, lawmakers from both parties worry that the White House already is doing too much to empower Iran. “We’re making Iraq a better place for Iran,” Senate Foreign Relations Chairman Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) flatly told a hearing last week.

The outcome of the ground war will resonate in Iraqi politics — even if the Shiite-led government in Baghdad hopes to remain close to both Washington and Tehran. “The immediate dynamics will be impacted,” Lukman Faily, Iraqi ambassador to the United States, told Foreign Policy.

He added: “But we anticipate, and work on having, a strong relationship with all allied in our fight against Daesh — including USA and Iran.” (“Daesh” is roughly translated as an Arabic acronym for the Islamic State.)

In recent days, U.S. officials grudgingly have acknowledged Iran’s help in defeating the Islamic State. Washington maintains it is not coordinating or directly working with Tehran, but agrees that the tandem efforts have been effective.

Even so, U.S. officials worry about what Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey last week described as a possible what-comes-next scenario: Shiite militias taking over Sunni areas they have liberated and, in turn, setting conditions for a new civil war.

“We are all concerned about what happens after the drums stop beating and ISIL is defeated, and whether the government of Iraq will remain on a path to provide an inclusive government for all of the various groups within it,” Dempsey told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. ISIL is another acronym for the Islamic State.

On Sunday, Dempsey’s predecessor, retired Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, accused the Shiite clerical regime in Iran of stoking terrorism across the Mideast region and helping Shiite militias kill large numbers of U.S. troops in Iraq during the long war there.

“And so working together right now in a constructive way to eliminate the No. 1. threat in Iraq, I don’t think that opens the door for accepting who they are and what they’ve done in the past,” Mullen told NBC’s Meet the Press.

Baghdad does not seem to care — or, at least, is trying to placate Washington while still relying on help from Tehran.

While the Obama administration has supplied Iraq with a bounty of weapons and equipment — including rifles, ammunition, Hellfire missiles, body armor, and armored vehicles — Baghdad has complained at times that the United States is moving too slowly on both weapons deliveries and training Iraqi troops. Experts believe Shiite Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi likely is concerned that U.S. dithering to defeat the Islamic State in Syria will be mirrored in Iraq.

More recently, the Pentagon irked Iraqi leaders by telling reporters that the U.S. military expected Baghdad to launch the battle for Mosul in April or May and involve roughly 25,000 Iraqi troops and Kurdish fighters backed by American airstrikes. Caught off guard, Iraqi officials pushed back on the U.S. timeline and said it was up to the Iraqi government to decide when the offensive would begin. The U.S. disclosure of the Mosul details and the ensuing backlash may have opened the door for even greater involvement by Shiite militias and Iran.

Still, Abadi is trying to strike a balance without angering Iraq’s two most potent allies. Faily praised U.S. assistance, including an estimated 1,500 airstrikes since last summer, as a “game-changer” in the war against the Islamic State. By contrast, he said, fewer than 100 Iranians currently are fighting in Iraq, and “that should say a lot about their involvement.”

Leading the Iranian front is Maj. Gen. Qassem Suleimani, the head of Tehran’s elite Quds Force, who for months has bounced from Iraqi battlefield to battlefield, taking selfies of himself with soldiers and racking up victories as he bolsters his cult of personality.

With Suleimani in command, Iran may not need the numbers to have at least the public perception of strength. Samir Sumaidaie, the former Iraqi ambassador to the United Nations and to Washington, said that while the United States is widely viewed as wielding supremacy in the skies, the Iranians “dominate on land” — and the Obama administration will have to get more active on the ground if it wants to overcome Tehran’s growing influence.

“It depends on how far the Americans want to go to prevent or ameliorate a future Iraq dominated by Iran,” Sumaidaie told FP. He predicted few, if any, changes in the U.S. combat role: “By a process of drift, they will end up conceding Iraq, in my view,” he said.

The Obama administration is more focused on what U.S. officials describe as the long game — namely, making sure the extremists don’t return after the battle has been won. The White House seeks what Defense Secretary Ashton Carter described last month as a “lasting defeat” against the Islamic State in a justification for keeping America’s powder dry.

So far, U.S. troops have trained thousands of Iraqi forces to secure parts of Iraq — including Tikrit and parts of western Anbar province — as the war pushes north toward Mosul. The White House also is banking on Baghdad to create a regional Iraqi force akin to a national guard that would be run by local officials instead of by the central government.

That plan has stalled in the Iraqi parliament, however, as leaders focus on the battle — and whether it will either exacerbate or temper sectarian and ethnic tensions among the country’s Shiite majority and minority Sunni and Kurdish populations.

“How that shakes out is going to be vital to the discussion and in many ways, Iran will certainly have some influence on that discussion, as do we, as do others,” said a senior Obama administration official who was not authorized to discuss the strategy by name.

“I think there are limitations to what Iran’s influence is, as well as ours,” the official said. “And we’re very mindful of that.”

However, Iran’s military support to Iraq poses real problems to the coalition of more than 60 nations that the United States has corralled to help defeat the Islamic State. The coalition largely relies on the participation of Sunni Arab allies in the region — like Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and the United Arab Emirates — which have provided airstrikes, training, and domestic reforms to prevent foreign fighters and funding from reaching the extremists in Iraq and Syria.

Iran’s role also has spooked Western officials. At a small briefing last week to reporters in Washington, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said the Islamic State’s final defeat will come only if the Shiite-led government in Baghdad heeds Sunni demands for a fair share of power and jobs — and keep them from aligning with the extremists.

Though he’s had all indications that that process is underway, Steinmeier warned nonetheless that Sunnis may resist Shiite militias and Iranian forces that are “cementing the impression, the perception, of a sectarian-dominated Iraqi army which is re-stabilizing the Shiite influence.”

It is clear that the top U.S. priority in Iraq is to defeat the Islamic State — and deal later with Iran’s ever-growing influence in Baghdad. Yet that trade-off carries long-term consequences, and it’s not clear Washington has thought them through, said Jon Alterman, director of the Middle East Program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington.

He said the battle for Tikrit “sends a message to Iraqis about their abilities to succeed — with or without U.S. support.”

Sumaidaie, the former Iraqi ambassador, put it more bluntly.

“The net result if the Islamic State is defeated is the defeat will be credited to the ground forces,” he said. “They are the ones who are going to claim victory. It’s not the United States who will be doing the victory dance.”

AHMAD AL-RUBAYE/AFP/Getty Images

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U.S. Begins Airstrikes in Support of Effort to Liberate Tikrit From Islamic State

By Elias Groll
March 25, 2015 - 5:19 pm
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@eliasgroll
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U.S. Begins Airstrikes in Support of Effort to Liberate Tikrit From Islamic State

The joint offensive between the Iraqi army and Iranian-backed Shiite militias to retake the city of Tikrit from the Islamic State was supposed to demonstrate how Tehran and Baghdad were fully capable of repelling the militant group without the help of the United States. It didn’t quite work out that way. On Wednesday, after entirely sitting out the three-week offensive, U.S. forces began carrying out airstrikes against Islamic State targets in Tikrit at the request of the Iraqi government, according to Pentagon spokesman Col. Steve Warren.

Iraqi government forces and Shiite militias currently control large parts of Tikrit, which is Saddam Hussein’s hometown, but a pocket of fighters belonging to the Islamic State, which is also known as ISIS or ISIL, continue to hold out against their opponents. With the offensive stalled, the introduction of American airpower may tip the balance in favor of local forces on the ground.

“These strikes are intended to destroy ISIL strongholds with precision, thereby saving innocent Iraqi lives while minimizing collateral damage to infrastructure,” Lt. Gen. James L. Terry, the commanding general of the anti-Islamic State operation, said in a statement. “This will further enable Iraqi forces under Iraqi command to maneuver and defeat ISIL in the vicinity of Tikrit.” According to Terry, Iraqi forces have Islamic State fighters in Tikrit surrounded and are also providing aerial reconnaissance capabilities to the Iraqis.

Until Wednesday, U.S. forces had been conspicuously absent from the battlefield in Tikrit, and Baghdad’s decision to move forward with the offensive without U.S. support was seen in some quarters as an effort by Tehran to assert its role as the foremost foreign military presence in Iraq. That offensive began with grandiose promises that Tikrit would be quickly liberated from the Islamic State but has been bogged down amid intense urban combat, heavy casualties, and tenacious fighting by the Sunni extremists.

The request by the Iraqi government for U.S. air support may serve as a vindication for American commanders, who had been blindsided by the decision to launch the offensive. What Baghdad thought could be accomplished without U.S. air support could not, and that may pave the way for a larger U.S. military role as Iraqi forces try to retake other cities held by the Islamic State, most importantly Mosul.

The military campaign to oust the Islamic State from Iraq has in part emerged as a contest between Iran and the United States for influence in Baghdad. Tehran has poured men and materiel into Iraq, engendering a sense of gratitude in Baghdad. The Iranian military effort in Iraq has been directed by Qassem Suleimani, the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, the elite paramilitary branch of the Revolutionary Guard that frequently carries out operations across the Middle East. But so far he has failed to deliver the kind of decisive military victories that would make the U.S. presence there inconsequential.

The beginning of U.S. airstrikes in Tikrit marks the most significant instance during the current campaign against the Islamic State in which American planes have provided aerial cover for Iranian-backed troops on the ground. U.S. troops also provided air support for Tehran during the campaign to liberate Amerli in northeast Iraq, but those operations were on a far smaller scale than the Tikrit offensive, where some 30,000 Iraqi and Iranian fighters are estimated to have been deployed. The vast majority of them — as many as 20,000 — are believed to be Shiite militias.

Argument
The Thirst for Revenge Threatens to Destroy Iraq

For too long, the United States and its allies have turned a blind eye to abuses by Shiite militias. With the militias now in the city of Tikrit, that has to stop.

By Tirana Hassan
April 1, 2015
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The Thirst for Revenge Threatens to Destroy Iraq

In October, I met dozens of families huddled in the hillsides around Amerli, a town of some 26,000 people 110 miles north of Baghdad. They had sought shelter there, helplessly watching as their homes burned and exploded in the weeks and months after government-backed Shiite militias took control of their villages, after expelling fighters from the Islamic State.

What they told me bears striking — and disturbing — similarity to what is happening in Tikrit right now, as Iraqi security forces and Shiite militias attempt to retake the city from the Islamic State with the support of U.S. airstrikes. Iraqi forces and militia fighters captured almost the entire city by Wednesday night, as Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi arrived to cheer the conquest and Defense Minister Khaled al-Obeidi hailed the “magnificent victory” there.

While we don’t know exactly how events in Tikrit will play out, we do know how the operation last summer ended in Amerli, which had been under siege for three months. In that battle, Iraqi authorities, along with U.S. and coalition forces, turned a blind eye to the abusive conduct of Shiite militias after the Islamic State abandoned the area. The apparent indifference of the United States and coalition forces paved the way for a wave of destruction, as the militias targeted Sunni Arabs and other minorities in the surrounding area.

Our research on the operations around Amerli revealed how the operation to clear and secure a 300-mile area around the town quickly morphed into a campaign of revenge attacks. Pro-government militias and volunteer fighters, along with Iraqi security forces, purposefully burned Sunni villages to the ground, destroyed homes with explosives, and looted entire villages, leaving them virtually uninhabitable.

Under the guise of fighting the Islamic State, the marauding militiamen waged their own sectarian war with complete impunity. While Amerli is a Shiite Turkoman village, the majority of the surrounding villages were home to Sunni Arabs and several mixed Arab and Turkoman communities that the militias accuse of being Islamic State collaborators and sympathizers. The families from these surrounding villages told me that the militias drove them from their homes — and in the days after my visit, reports continued to flow in from desperate families describing how militiamen took away their brothers and sons and destroyed more of their homes. These were families caught between the horrors of the Islamic State and the vengeance of out-of-control Shiite militias.

An analysis of satellite imagery of over 300 square miles of land surrounding Amerli found that 30 out of 35 villages in the area showed indications of arson and purposeful building demolition, after these forces cleared out the Islamic State fighters. In one of the worst examples, 95 percent of the town of Hufriyah, 11 miles from Amerli, showed signs of destruction. All of the destruction took place while the town was under militia control.

In the last week, I have been struck with an overwhelming sense of déjà vu, as once again my phone rings and my inbox fills up with reports of more abuses. Only the location has changed — this time, they are from Tikrit. I read frantic emails filled with the names of Sunni family members taken away by militias who act as judge and jury, accusing Sunni men of being Islamic State sympathizers. Within the first week of the Tikrit operation, residents told me militias attacked and destroyed their homes and orchards on the eastern outskirts of the city. A satellite image of the area from the same period showed large clouds of smoke rising from the burning farmlands.

Until recently, the offensive to take Tikrit back from the Islamic State was being led by the militias and the pro-government Hashd al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilization Committees), with the support of Iranian military commanders. After the offensive stalled, U.S. and coalition warplanes on March 25 started striking Islamic State positions in and around Tikrit at the request of the Iraqi government.

The U.S. strikes to push back the Islamic State are intended to make way for Iraqi troops — and likely the militias who fight alongside them. Gen. Lloyd Austin, head of U.S. Central Command, recently told the Senate Armed Services Committee that the militias are “not a part of the clearing operation,” despite tens of thousands of militias still operating on the front lines. The question now is: Will the aftermath of Tikrit look like the aftermath of Amerli?

The thirst for revenge in Tikrit, unfortunately, runs deep. Last July, Islamic State fighters massacred more than 1,000 captured Iraqi soldiers when they took control of the city, marching them from the nearby Speicher military base to their deaths in Tikrit city. According to the Iraqi government, the soldiers were mostly Shiites, many of them relatively new recruits. With images of the massacre still fresh in people’s minds, the potential for the militias and Iraqi government forces to settle the score and engage in revenge killings is high. Hadi al-Amiri, the commander of one of the largest militia groups, the Badr Corps, which is participating in the current offensive, even referred to the Tikrit operations as “the battle for the revenge of Speicher.”

The Iraqi government has taken no concrete steps to hold accountable security forces or militia leaders who allow their fighters to run amok and commit war crimes. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has voiced his concern about the conduct of the militias. He has called for investigations, and for those committing abuses to be held responsible. However, the reality of Iraq’s deeply divided political landscape means that Abadi is not in control of the dozens of different militias that make up the backbone of the fight against the Islamic State. After more than a decade of operating with complete impunity, they have become a law unto themselves.

The potential for vengeance in Tikrit is not news to any of the parties involved in fighting the Islamic State in Iraq. The facts on the ground are that coalition members supporting the Iraqi security forces are most likely taking part in operations with a strong contingent of militias, and they risk complicity in war crimes by engaging alongside forces that commit serious abuses.

The question is whether anything will be done to stop this. The time to answer that question and take action is now.

The United States, as well as other governments participating in this operation, can help stop the vicious cycle of sectarian-fueled violence. Secretary of State John Kerry and Gen. John Allen, the U.S. special envoy to the anti-Islamic State coalition, have made notable comments in recent weeks about the need for those fighting in Iraq not to commit acts of revenge and abuse against civilians. These statements need to be backed up with concrete action.

The armed conflict in Iraq is messy, but how it is conducted will have long-term implications for the future of the country. It’s important for the United States not to allow the fighting to become a cover for Iraq to slip further into a cycle of sectarian-driven revenge violence. Looking the other way while abuses occur is not just bad for those who suffer now — it will be catastrophic for Iraq’s future.