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| Iraq | ||
| Heavy ISIS casualties in ongoing fight to liberate Kirkuk villages | ||
| 2015-08-27 | ||
| [Rudaw] A massive and ongoing Peshmerga offensive against the Islamic State ...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not reallyMoslems.... in territory south of Kirkuk has so far resulted in heavy casualties and the liberation of five villages. The total corpse count has yet to be assessed, but in one village alone, Peshmerga forces found 18 dead ISIS murderous Moslems Wednesday, officials said. The offensive was launched on the Daquq and Khurmatu frontlines with heavy artillery, including several tanks. "Our plan has been successfully completed and we have control of most of the villages we were planning to take," Mustafa Sayid Qadir, minister of Peshmerga, told Rudaw Wednesday. United States-led coalition The road connecting the villages was laced with hundreds of landmines, according to officials, which complicated the recapture of the villages. Peshmerga fighter Ahmed Aziz Mustafa was killed as the result of a landmine kaboom, confirmed Amin Karim, a Peshmerga captain, to Rudaw. Mustafa was an only son and a father of three. In addition, five Hashd al-Shaabi fighters were killed in today's fighting, said Kirkuk police Chief Sarhad Qader. The road connecting the villages was still gridlocked with tanks and other military vehicles late into the afternoon. Fires continued to smolder throughout the villages, sending smoke into the air. Around 3 pm, gunshots and mortar fire could be heard to the south. "ISIS is attacking us now," said a Peshmerga captain who asked to remain anonymous. "When the Peshmerga came to clean out villages, they didn't use deadly force because of the civilians present." At a village called Semaqa, nearby the ISIS base in Albu Najm, more than 50 women, children and young boys crowded an area patrolled by Peshmerga. Peshmerga fighters said they were all villagers affiliated with ISIS and would not allow media to speak with them. A 50-year-old woman named Amal Mahmud Saif who was part of the group said that she was in a nearby village merely for a visit. Despite the casualties and complications, the Peshmerga said they largely considered the offensive successful. "With recapturing this village, there will be no ISIS thread to Kirkuk anymore," said Kosrat Rasul Ali, the deputy commander of Peshmerga.
[Rudaw] Kurdish forces scored another victory against the Islamic State group (ISIS) on Wednesday, capturing a village that had been in ISIS hands for a year and the base for its mortar attacks on Kurdish areas. Peshmerga officials said that 10 bully boyz were killed and three maimed in the assault to recapture the village of Albu Najim in the Daquq district, which is about 40 kilometers south of Kikuk city. It was liberated after a massive military campaign launched in rural areas held by ISIS in Daquq The Peshmerga and counter-terrorism forces, together with fighters of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), launched a three-pronged assault to re-take the village, overcoming litters of landmines on the roads and outskirts. The village had been the base for ISIS mortar attacks on Kurdish areas around Kobain and Zankr, mainly populated by Kakai Kurds. The Peshmerga have vowed to recapture 10 other nearby villages.
Kurdish forces backed by U.S.-led coalition The assault began at dawn in the Daquq area, around 175 kilometres (110 miles) north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad. By evening, Kurdish forces had taken an area of around 250 square kilometres, the sources said. An aide to a top Kurdish commander taking part in the offensive said five peshmerga had been killed, most of them by improvised bombs. The frontline between Kurdish peshmerga forces and Islamic State in northern Iraq has hardly budged for months. The Kurds already control most of the territory they claim as their own, and have little incentive to push further into predominantly Sunni Moslem Arab towns and villages, except where they pose a direct threat to their region. "This area (near Daquq) posed a danger to the main road from Kirkuk to Baghdad and the Kurdish and other villages adjacent to the areas occupied by Daesh," Brigadier General Aras Abdel Rahman said, using an Arabic acronym for Islamic State. The peshmerga have emerged as an important ally for the United States in its aerial campaign against Islamic State. Together they have pushed back the Sunni turbans in northern Iraq, and the peshmerga has thus expanded the territory of its autonomous region. Last summer, the Kurds took full control of the disputed city of Kirkuk after the Iraqi army abandoned its bases there, but western parts of the province such as Hawija remain under Islamic State control. The Kurds have since carried out several offensives aimed at creating a buffer around the oil-rich city, which they say they will never relinquish. | ||
| Posted by:trailing wife |