“The people of the residential compound are now under ISIS control. They are urging the government to help them. There are more than a thousand families there. All phone and Internet communication have been cut. Al-Baghdadi is totally isolated from the rest of the world now,” sheikh al-Obaidi added.
Communication is the least that the people of al-Baghdadi worry about. With ISIS in charge, all kinds of human supply into the town have been stopped as a means to break the city resistance. Food, medicine, water, electricity and fuel have been withheld by ISIS.
“The people of al-Baghdadi are living in a true tragedy. They are facing death in every way: hunger, thirst, diseases and the extreme cold,” said sheikh al-Obaidi. Three children died today after drinking unclean water. Dozens of others were hospitalized.
“The Iraqi government is responsible for the lives of those executed by ISIS or still prisoners.... It has never answered our requests carried by formal and tribal delegations to Baghdad to act and save 50,000 people under ISIS siege in al-Baghdadi. As if we are all sentenced to genocide,” said sheikh Qatari al-Semermed, another tribal leader of al-Obaid tribe in the town.