Islamic State Launch Pre-Dawn Assault on Iraq’s ‘Sacred City’
An early-morning assault by the Islamic State on Iraqi security forces has killed three people and injured 41 more in the contested city of Samarra, just some 80 miles from Baghdad, officials said.
Two policemen and a civilian were killed when water trucks carrying explosives were detonated at Iraqi forces roadblocks in a series of five suicide bombs on a motorway to the west of the city. The pre-dawn attacks were followed-up by a barrage of mortar fire and an assault by militant gunmen. After several hours of battle the Islamic State fighters retreated, the BBC reported.
The Islamic State surrounded Samarra in June 2014 but so far Iraqi government forces and allied Shia militias have managed to hold the city. Their grip, however, is tenuous.
In December, Iraq’s powerful Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr told his “Peace Brigade” militia to be on high alert in Samarra as an assault by Islamic State was expected. In statement to the fighters dated December 11, al-Sadr said there was “imminent danger to the sacred city” and ordered his men to be “fully prepared to answer the call of jihad within 48 hours.”
That assault never came, however, and in recent weeks US-led coalition airstrikes in the area to the south of the city have reportedly helped government-backed forces wrest back control of towns and villages to the south of the city.
Samarra, a predominantly Sunni city, is home to al-Askari shrine, a place of worship and pilgrimage for Shia Muslims; making it a historical flashpoint for violence.
In a pre-cursor to the recent fighting, in 2006 and 2007 two bomb attacks at al-Askari — also known as the “Tomb of the Two Imams” — destroyed the shrine’s minarets and golden dome. The destruction of al-Askari is widely considered a pivotal moment in Iraq, tipping the country into years of bloody sectarian violence which has killed tens of thousands of people.
In 2007, UNESCO added Samarra to both the World Heritage List and the List of World Heritage in Danger, and years of reconstruction work to restore al-Askari is now nearly complete. But with mortar shells landing within 50 feet of the shrine the latest assault has ignited speculation that the Islamic State is seeking to destroy it again.
According to the puritanical reading of Sunni Islam adopted by the Islamic State, tombs are sacrilegious and the group has repeatedly targeted Shia places of worship — both in Iraq and neighboring Syria.
Al Nusra Front militants — a group linked to al Qaeda — blew up the 13th century tomb of a revered Islamic scholar in Syria’s Deraa province near the Jordanian border, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported on Wednesday. Al Nusra, like the Islamic State, also sees tombs as sacrilegious.
In October, UNESCO called the recent destruction of cultural heritage in the region as “intentional” and “systematic.”
Follow Harriet Salem on Twitter: @HarrietSalem
An early-morning assault by the Islamic State on Iraqi security forces has killed three people and injured 41 more in the contested city of Samarra, just some 80 miles from Baghdad, officials said.
Two policemen and a civilian were killed when water trucks carrying explosives were detonated at Iraqi forces roadblocks in a series of five suicide bombs on a motorway to the west of the city. The pre-dawn attacks were followed-up by a barrage of mortar fire and an assault by militant gunmen. After several hours of battle the Islamic State fighters retreated, the BBC reported.
The Islamic State surrounded Samarra in June 2014 but so far Iraqi government forces and allied Shia militias have managed to hold the city. Their grip, however, is tenuous.
In December, Iraq’s powerful Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr told his “Peace Brigade” militia to be on high alert in Samarra as an assault by Islamic State was expected. In statement to the fighters dated December 11, al-Sadr said there was “imminent danger to the sacred city” and ordered his men to be “fully prepared to answer the call of jihad within 48 hours.”
That assault never came, however, and in recent weeks US-led coalition airstrikes in the area to the south of the city have reportedly helped government-backed forces wrest back control of towns and villages to the south of the city.
Samarra, a predominantly Sunni city, is home to al-Askari shrine, a place of worship and pilgrimage for Shia Muslims; making it a historical flashpoint for violence.
In a pre-cursor to the recent fighting, in 2006 and 2007 two bomb attacks at al-Askari — also known as the “Tomb of the Two Imams” — destroyed the shrine’s minarets and golden dome. The destruction of al-Askari is widely considered a pivotal moment in Iraq, tipping the country into years of bloody sectarian violence which has killed tens of thousands of people.
In 2007, UNESCO added Samarra to both the World Heritage List and the List of World Heritage in Danger, and years of reconstruction work to restore al-Askari is now nearly complete. But with mortar shells landing within 50 feet of the shrine the latest assault has ignited speculation that the Islamic State is seeking to destroy it again.
According to the puritanical reading of Sunni Islam adopted by the Islamic State, tombs are sacrilegious and the group has repeatedly targeted Shia places of worship — both in Iraq and neighboring Syria.
Al Nusra Front militants — a group linked to al Qaeda — blew up the 13th century tomb of a revered Islamic scholar in Syria’s Deraa province near the Jordanian border, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported on Wednesday. Al Nusra, like the Islamic State, also sees tombs as sacrilegious.
In October, UNESCO called the recent destruction of cultural heritage in the region as “intentional” and “systematic.”
Follow Harriet Salem on Twitter: @HarrietSalem
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