Iraqi tribes ready to join anti-ISIS volunteer forces, says PMU official
By Dina al-Shibeeb | Al Arabiya News
Monday, 28 September 2015
Haitham al-Mayahi, the U.S.-based director of the international relations office of the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), told Al Arabiya News recently that 20 tribal sheikhs from the western Iraqi province of Anbar, who fought al-Qaeda in the last decade, are ready to join forces to defeat Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militants.
The Iran-backed PMU was formed from Shiite armed groups and volunteers after a fatwa (an Islamic religious edict) by the influential spiritual leader of Iraq’s Shiite majority, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, calling Iraqis to fight ISIS.
Since then, the PMU’s reputation for its hard-hitting and “willing to die” fighters emerged after Iraq’s army abandoned the country’s second largest city of Mosul last June. Their power intensified after the Iraqi army then lost Anbar’s Ramadi in May.
While some PMU members were criticized for human rights violations after they took back the late President Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit in April, they continue to be considered by observers as a necessary component for ISIS’s defeat in the city.
In an interview, the Washington-based Mayahi, who recently returned from two months in Iraq, discussed the future formation for a whole new PMU and a new vision to create an all-inclusive unit to defeat ISIS, pleading for U.S. arms.
Mayahi also warned that ISIS were eyeing an attack on the capital Baghdad, citing inside intelligence.
After outreaching to the tribal sheikhs, who expressed their wish to join the PMU, they and Mayahi sent a letter in early September to the PMU’s leader, as well as Prime Minister Haider Abadi.
The tribal leaders had fought in a period starting from 2006 in a coalition known as the Awakening. Together, they managed to defeat al-Qaeda in 2008.
While PMU includes other four brigades which are not Shiites – one Sunni, two Christian groups and a Yazidi – the members of the Awakening have insufficient weapons nor have the governmental approval to be part of the fight, as fears still linger on whether they should be included.
Former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki mistrusted the Awakening, fearing that the armed Sunnis could become a problem for his Shiite-dominated government after the defeat of al-Qaeda, leaving them marginalized.
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