Battle for Tikrit - Day 4

Various | March 6, 2015 | keat

[keat]

Day 4 News and Events:

Global outrage over IS group attack on ancient Iraqi site

BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraq's most revered Shiite cleric joined UNESCO Friday in decrying the Islamic State group's attack on the renowned archaeological site of Nimrud, a nearly-3,000 year-old city in present-day Iraq whose treasures were one of the 20th century's most significant discoveries.

The destruction is part of the Sunni extremist group's campaign to enforce its violent interpretation of Islamic law by purging ancient relics they say promote idolatry. Last week, the group released video of its fighters smashing artifacts in the Mosul museum, and many fear that Hatra, another ancient site near Mosul, could be next.

Iraq's Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani said in his Friday sermon that such destruction "demonstrates their barbarism and savageness and antagonism against the Iraqi people, not only in the present but also to its history and ancient civilizations."

In Paris, the head of the U.N.'s cultural agency called it a war crime.

Why the US is sitting out Iraq’s most important assault on ISIL

Iraq’s military this week launched its most ambitious offensive yet to roll back the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), moving to recapture the city of Tikrit in an operation seen as a dry run for its planned march on Mosul, Iraq’s second city and the most important holding in ISIL’s self-declared caliphate. The offensive is backed in the field by forces from the Iraqi government’s most important ally, Iran, leaving the United States in the awkward position of taking a backseat to its longtime antagonist.

The Tikrit campaign lays bare the layered dilemmas facing the U.S. in Iraq. For months, Washington has sought to paint its war against ISIL as separate from, if parallel to, that of Iran and its Shia proxies — a line is growing harder to maintain. As Tikrit shows, the U.S. is uneasy about the leading role Iran has taken against ISIL, an effort that is spearheaded on many fronts, including in Tikrit, by hard-line Shia militias that many say are liable to exacerbate the alienation of Iraq’s Sunni minority. Sectarian resentments were part of what made ISIL's surge across Sunni lands in Iraq last June possible, with Sunnis in many areas allowing ISIL forces to move in unchallenged or even providing local conscripts. With Iraq’s fight against ISIL taking an increasingly sectarian cast, the U.S. is staying behind the scenes, limiting its role to airstrikes or military advisers.

“We’re seeing far more open, direct Iranian involvement in Iraq than even in Syria,” Smyth said. Taken with the recent Shia Houthi takeover in Yemen, “from a big-picture perspective, the Iranians are projecting themselves regionally, while the U.S. is looking quite impotent.”

Advancing Iraq troops enter strategic town on edge of Tikrit

(Reuters) - Iraqi government forces and Iran-backed militiamen entered a town on the southern outskirts of Saddam Hussein's home city Tikrit on Friday, pressing on with the biggest offensive yet against Islamic State militants that seized the north last year.

Military commanders said the army and mostly Shi'ite militia forces had retaken the town of al-Dour on Tikrit's outskirts, known outside Iraq as the area where executed former dictator Saddam was found hiding in a pit near a farm house in 2003.

It was not immediately clear if the town had entirely fallen. Some officials said the troops were still only in the south and east of the town, which had been rigged with bombs by retreating Islamic State fighters.

But Hadi al-Amiri, leader of the largest Shi'ite militia group taking part in the operation, said al-Dour had been "totally liberated" and that the advance on another key town north of Tikrit, al-Alam, would take place on Saturday.

The army, joined by thousands of Shi'ite militiamen backed and advised by Iran, is five days into an advance on Saddam's home city of Tikrit, by far the biggest target yet in a campaign to roll back last year's advance by Islamic State fighters.

Tikrit igniting sectarian war in Iraq

Fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in Iraq is inevitable because there is only one conclusion: you chase them or they chase you. There is no border demarcation, and no one recognizes the authority of the other. Iraqi forces are taking the lead in the city of Tikrit, one of the two most important Iraqi cities seized by ISIS.

They are also progressing in most of Saladin province and will most probably free it from terrorist groups, but just for a short period, because there are Iranian forces and sectarian militias fighting alongside the Iraqi army. Photos and information arising from there depict sectarian crimes.

The liberation of Tikrit and every inch of Iraqi territory is a national duty that expresses the integrity of the state’s authority. The city and its suburbs will remain within the boundaries of the Iraqi state.

[Billthedrill]

Interesting stuff, and thanks for posting. Given who lives there, the Iranians are going to be faced with the choice of attempting to hold Tikrit in the face of very hostile Sunni tribes or wiping them out and repopulating with a more tractable set of inhabitants. Same choice we faced: take it and hold it are two different things.

[ScottinVA]

Never thought I’d find myself ever cheering for the Iranians, but considering who they’re facing, I’ll make an exception.