A statement from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham posted on social media sites today detailed ISIS’ gains in the city of Mosul on Tuesday. The statement, issued by ISIS’ media office for Wilayat Ninewa, is a summary of the operation to take Mosul that the terror organization is calling the “Invasion of Asadullah [Lion of Allah] al-Bilawi Abu Abdul Rahman,” after a now deceased ISIS commander ‘Adnan Ismail Najm (AKA Abu Abdul Rahman al-Bilawi).
The statement begins by praising Allah who “brings honor to the Muslims with his victory and humiliates the polytheists with him subjugation” for the conquest of Mosul on Tuesday. The statement goes on to detail some of the planning and achievements of the ISIS invasion:
“By guidance from our leadership, the leadership of the ISIS, favored by Allah, the brothers in the ISIS camps began drawing up precise plans to conquer the entire Wilaya and purge it of apostates. This blessed battle began by intelligence jihad by the special detachments whereby the apostates’ weak areas were studied and then the military force entered the city of Mosul from several directions and by the grace of Allah took complete control of their headquarters, including the Ghazlani HQ, the operations command, the second division HQ, Badush and Tasfirat prisons, and the headquarters of the battalions and brigades. Thousands of prisoners were also released as well as some female prisoners, and the praise and grace is to Allah. And now there is complete control over all internal and external access points to the Wilaya and with Allah’s permission this series of blessed incursions that delight the eyes of the monotheists shall not cease either till Allah fulfills his promise or we shall perish….”
After taking Mosul on Tuesday, ISIS continued its southward offensive and took control of the cities of Bayji and Tikrit in Salahuddin province yesterday. Today, reports indicated that the Iraqi army had halted ISIS’ southward advance at the northern outskirts of Samarra, home to one of Shi’a Islam’s holiest shrines.
ISIS statement released today bearing the official stamp of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Sham’s Ninewa Media Office
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2 Comments
This link is an opinion piece on Iraq, that highlights well the problems with the Maliki regime. The Maliki government needed to do a number of things right to have any chance of bridging the sectarian divide in Iraq. Instead the Maliki regime moved in the opposite direction and exacerbated the already existing distrust between Shiite and Sunni communities.
http://www.cnn.com/2014/06/12/opinion/pregent-harvey-northern-iraq-collapse/
Would a more sensible policy toward the Northern Sunni population by the Maliki regime have made any difference? Maybe, but that is a highly problematic question. The current round of open antagonism between the two groups has been a long time in the making. There have been several rounds of open warfare between the groups over the last 30 years, the first an Iranian supported Shiite insurgency in southern Iraq in the late 1980’s during the Iran Iraq war, than a serious Shiite uprising immediately following the first Gulf War in 1991. All the while Saddam Hussein was increasingly brutalizing and marginalizing the Shiite population.
I can’t help but feel that after four decades of brutalization the two sides were unlikely to work with each other. Maliki could have moved the tipping point further away by attempting some sort of accommodation with the Sunnis. Than again, how compliant would the Sunni’s be even if accommodated? I am afraid the Sunni view of the God given order of things, puts them on top and Shiites on the bottom. It will be interesting to see if ISIS will even allow Shiites a place at the bottom. Mass genocide is a real possibility.
Guessing about the future, I’d change “mass genocide” to “mass cleansing”; if ISIL takes Baghdad the Shia exodus south will be massive. Who will want to take the chance of a beheading and stay? It would be a revision of Tamurlane’s visit.