ISIS executes 8 in Kirkuk
Kirkuk (IraqiNews.com) Islamic State militants killed a police officer and his family members after invading his home in northwestern Kirkuk, according to a security source.
Alsumaria News quoted the source saying that Islamic State members sneaked on the dawn of Friday into al-Maleh village in al-Dabas region (50 Km northwest of Kirkuk), attacked a police officer’s house and killed him and seven of his family members.
Islamic State militants have held areas in southwestern Kirkuk since 2014, when they declared a “caliphate” rule on a third of Iraq and Syria. Since then, militants have executed hundreds of security agents and civilians collaborating with security troops, besides executing civilians attempting to flee the enclave.
Local tribal leaders and politicians from Kirkuk have mounted pressure on the Iraqi government to hasten with invading Hawija, the group’s largest stronghold in the southwest of the province, suggesting that its people were experiencing a humanitarian crisis under the group’s rule as the group continues to massacre civilians attempting to flee the town. The Iraqi government and military commanders have set Nineveh’s town of Tal Afar as the next target for operations against Islamic State holdouts.
ISIS militants get some payback in Diyala
Baqubah (IraqiNews.com) Three Islamic State militants died in a surprise police operation backed by civilians in Diyala, the police command said Friday.
Ghaleb al-Attiya, spokesperson of the province’s police service, told Alsumaria News that civilians at al-Islah village (70 Km northeast of Baqubah waged a surprise attack, backed by police forces, on an Islamic State “sleeper cell” that was hiding at a rest house near a farmland in the area.
According to al-Attiya, the targeted cell was preparing for an attack on local residents and was believed to have been behind the kidnapping of two civilians three days earlier.
Violence and armed conflicts killed and wounded more than 500 Iraqis throughout July, according to a monthly count by the United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq (UNAMI).
Islamic State militants have launched occasional attacks against security forces and civilians in Diyala over the past few months, coinciding with government operations that managed to recapture the city of Mosul, Islamic State’s largest bastion in Iraq.
Done with Mosul, the government and military commanders intend to wage further offensives at other IS havens across the country, including Diyala, seeking to mark an end to the sel-proclaimed “caliphate” declared by the group back in 2014.