Iraqi Horn Takes Ramadi (Dan 8:5)

  
ISIS takes Ramadi as reinforcements surge into city

By Hamdi Alkhshali and Catherine E. Shoichet, CNN
Updated 5:02 PM ET, Sun May 17, 2015

(CNN)The key Iraqi city of Ramadi fell to ISIS on Sunday after government security forces pulled out of a military base on the west side of the city, the mayor and a high-ranking security official said.
The ISIS advances came after militants detonated a series of morning car bomb blasts, Mayor Dalaf al-Kubaisy and a high-ranking Iraqi security official said. The explosions forced Iraqi security forces and tribal fighters to retreat to the city’s east, they said.

Clashes have raged in the beleaguered capital of Anbar province for months as Iraqi and allied forces battle ISIS militants for control of the strategically located city, which is just 110 km (70 miles) west of Baghdad.

Ramadi, the largest city in western Iraq, is just a few miles from an Iraqi army headquarters that ISIS blew up in March.

ISIS took over parts of the city in the first half of last year, placing it at the heart of a deadly tug of war ever since.

And officials said Sunday that the fight for the city is far from over.

Even as ISIS took control, pockets of resistance remain inside the city, said Muhannad Haimour, a spokesman for the Anbar governor.

While ISIS declared victory and claimed full control of the city, the Iraqi Federal Police vowed to stamp out ISIS in the region. In a statement, police said Brig. Gen. Raid Shakir Joudat was on the way “commanding a huge force consisting of various weapons to cleanse Anbar province from terrorist gangs.”

State TV: Iraqi forces on the way

Iraq’s Prime Minister, Haider al-Abadi, is also preparing to send in reinforcements, according to a statement read on Iraq’s state-run Iraqiya TV Sunday.

He’s ordered the al-Hashd al-Shaabi paramilitary force to prepare for deployment against ISIS militants in Anbar province. It will be joined by Iraqi security forces and Sunni tribal volunteers. The decision to mobilize the paramiltary force, which is Iranian-backed and predominantly Shiite, follows a request for help from the Anbar provincial governor, provincial council, tribal leaders and religious clerics.

On Thursday, ISIS pushed into Ramadi, using armored bulldozers and at least 10 suicide bombings to burst through gates and blast through walls, according to a security source who has since left the city.

Dozens of militants followed them into the city center and ISIS raised its trademark black flag over the provincial government building.

On Friday, the United States announced that it was “expediting” weapon shipments to Iraq because of the current fighting in Ramadi.

What are the implications of an ISIS takeover?

Whether or not Ramadi will stay in the hands of ISIS remains to be seen, analysts said Sunday.

Some U.S. officials have tried recently to downplay the significance of Ramadi, saying they are not focused on the city.

But retired Lt. Col. Anthony Shaffer, a senior fellow at the London Center for Policy Research, said the situation in Ramadi is a significant sign that forces fighting ISIS need to take a different tack.

“Ramadi’s a bad news story, period,” he said. “It’s not going well. The military units we’ve trained in the Iraqi army are basically laying down their guns and running.”

But the significance of the city falling may have less to do with the militant group, and more to do with the strength of Iraqi forces, CNN counterterrorism analyst Philip Mudd said.

“This is not about ISIS. This is about whether the Iraqi military has the capability, and more importantly, the will to face up with ISIS,” he said. “They’ve had some successes, the military has. This is a setback. It’s going to take years to figure out who will prevail.”

CNN’s Jomana Karadsheh, Jim Sciutto, Fredricka Whitfield, Barbara Starr, Ralph Ellis, Pat St. Claire and Jason Hanna contributed to this report.

Sadrists Free Amreli from ISIS

Iraq breaks months-long jihadist siege on Shiite town

The Times of Israel

 

Mahdi Sadrist Frees Amerli From ISIS

BAGHDAD (AFP) — Iraqi forces broke through to the jihadist-besieged Shiite town of Amerli Sunday, where thousands of people have been trapped for more than two months with dwindling food and water supplies.

It is the biggest offensive success for the Iraqi government since militants led by the Sunni Islamic State (IS) jihadist group overran large areas of five provinces in June, sweeping security forces aside.
The breakthrough came as America carried out limited strikes in the area, the first time it has expanded its more than three-week air campaign against militants outside of Iraq’s north.

Aircraft from several countries also dropped humanitarian aid to Amerli.

The mainly Shiite Turkmen residents of the town in Salaheddin province were running desperately short of food and water, and endangered both because of their Shiite faith, which jihadists consider heresy, and their resistance to the militants, which has drawn harsh retribution elsewhere.
UN Iraq envoy Nickolay Mladenov had warned that they faced a “massacre” by the besieging militants.

“Our forces entered Amerli and broke the siege,” Iraqi security spokesman Lieutenant General Qassem Atta told AFP, an account confirmed by a local official and a fighter from the town.

“It is a very important success,” Atta later said on state television, adding that there was still fighting in the area.

The operation was launched on Saturday after days of preparations in which Iraqi security forces, Shiite militiamen and Kurdish fighters deployed for the assault and Iraqi aircraft carried out strikes against militants.

 

US expands air campaign

The government’s reliance on the thousands of Shiite militiamen involved in the operation poses serious dangers for Iraq, risking entrenching groups with a history of brutal sectarian killings.

The United States announced that it carried out three airstrikes in the Amerli area, expanding its air campaign outside the far north for the first time, while Australian, British, French and US aircraft dropped relief supplies for the town.

“At the request of the government of Iraq, the United States military today airdropped humanitarian aid to the town of Amerli,” said Pentagon spokesman Rear Admiral John Kirby.

“The United States Air Force delivered this aid alongside aircraft from Australia, France and the United Kingdom, which also dropped much-needed supplies.”

The aid drops came alongside “coordinated airstrikes against nearby (IS) terrorists in order to support this humanitarian assistance operation,” he added.

The American strikes were at least indirectly in support of an operation involving militia forces that previously fought against US troops in Iraq.

“The operations will be limited in their scope and duration as necessary to address this emerging humanitarian crisis and protect the civilians trapped in Amerli,” Kirby said.

US Central Command said the US supplies dropped included around 47,775 liters (10,500 gallons) of drinking water and 7,000 prepackaged meals.

Three American airstrikes near Amerli, which happened early on Sunday Iraq time, destroyed five IS vehicles and a checkpoint, bringing the total number of US strikes since August 8 to nearly 120.
Western aid for Amerli was slow in coming, however, with the burden of flying supplies and launching strikes in the area largely falling to Iraq’s fledgling air forces.

“The US military will continue to assess the effectiveness of these operations and work with the Department of State, the US Agency for International Development, as well as international partners including the government of Iraq, the United Nations, and non-government organizations to provide humanitarian assistance in Iraq as needed,” Kirby said.

The US military also launched airstrikes Saturday on IS forces near Iraq’s largest dam, north of the militant-held northern city of Mosul, the Pentagon said.

Kurdish forces retook the dam after briefly losing it to the jihadists earlier this month, securing the source of much of the power and irrigation water for the region around Iraq’s second city.

The jihadist Islamic State and its allies control swathes of both northern and western Iraq and neighboring northeastern Syria where their rule has witnessed a spate of atrocities that have shocked the world.

Washington has said that operations in Syria will be needed to defeat IS, but has so far ruled out any cooperation with the Damascus regime against the jihadists.

It has, however, attempted to enlist the support of long-time foe Tehran, a key backer of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

Writing in The New York Times, US Secretary of State John Kerry urged “a united response led by the United States and the broadest possible coalition of nations” to combat IS.

US President Barack Obama has acknowledged that Washington has no strategy yet to tackle IS, which has declared an Islamic “caliphate” in the territory under its control in Iraq and Syria.