June
22th IRAQ SITREP by Mindfriedo
22
June, 2014
22nd
June: The Shia Khafaja tribe in Iraq is volunteering every able
bodied man to the government in Baghdad to fight Daash. Shaikh Raad
al-Khafaji has converted his tribes guesthouse into a recruitment
centre for volunteers. Many from his tribe were fighting in Syria
protecting Shia shrines there. These fighters have now returned to
fight Daash in Iraq.
22nd
June: A third militant of Daash from its recruitment video has been
identified as an Australian national Zakaryah Raad going by the nom
de guerre, Abu Yahya ash Shamsi.
22nd
June: Iraqi Kurdistan denies sending oil to Israel. The Kurdistan
Regional Government (KRG) denies selling oil either directly or
indirectly to Israel. But confirms that it has sold crude oil from
Kurdistan and will continue to sell Kurdish oil for liquidity and
financial independence from Baghdad. Baghdad has cut Kurdistan from
the Federal Budget.
22nd
June: A third shipment of black gold was expected to leave Kurdistan
via pipeline for Turkey today.
22nd
June: The Kurdish frontier against Daash and it's allies now
stretched 600 miles.
22nd
June: Sadr's peace brigades are waiting for his signal to fan out to
different provinces. They are looking to work closely with the
Security Services to confront Daash.
22nd
June: Security Forces deployed in Tal Afar made a sudden withdrawal
towards Sinjar. Only elite forces were left behind to guard the
airfield. The rest of the troops and tribal forces left for Sinjar.
This could indicate a response to intelligence concerning Daash.
22nd
June: Security Forces are claiming that a senior Daash commander was
killed in clashes in Taf Afar.
22nd
June: Some Christians Iraqis from Mosul are seeking protection in
Iraqi Kurdistan. Others have decided to resist and are holed up in
the Christian town of Bartella on the outskirts of Mosul. The
Christian community of Iraq has slowly migrated Westward to North
America and Europe.
22nd
June: The Iraqi Airforce has carried out bombing raids on Fallujah.
The neighbourhoods of Shuhada, Nazal, Al-Shurta, and Aljughaifi were
targeted with shops and homes destroyed. Five caustics are being
reported, one dead, four injured. The casualties were from the
central market of Al-Naziza.
22nd
June: Militants have captured two border crossings between Iraq and
Syria and Iraq and Jordan. The crossing on the Jordanian border was
the primary crossing between the two countries. Only be border
crossing Syria and Iraq is now with the government. The Kurds control
another ne, the rest are with the rebels.
22nd
June: After taking the Al-Qaim on Saturday, rebels have consolidated
their position by taking the nearby towns of Rawa and Ana.
22nd
June: Nechervan Barzani, the Prime Minister of Iraqi Kurdistan says
that he warned the US about Daash months in advance. He also states
that he had told Nouri Al-Maliki about the threat of Daash 6 months
earlier and proposed joint operations to fight the threat, but was
declined by Baghdad. Nouri Al-Maliki, according to him said,
"everything is fine."
22nd
June: Abu Khabib al-Jazaeeri, who was a Saudi national and a senior
commander of Daash, has been killed in Baiji. Two other Saudi
nationals, both brothers, Yahya and Ebrahim were reported killed in
Samarra earlier in the week.
22nd
June: Iraqi airforce struck at militants in Tikrit. The government
claims that 42 militants were killed.
22nd
June:clashes between the Iraqi army and Daash militants in Tikrit
have killed a number of militants and an advisor to Tikrit's
governor, Amaya al-Jbara, she was killed by militants. The clashes
took place in the east of Tikrit at Al-Alam. Security forces were
being aided by tribal fighters.
22nd
June: Security Forces and members of the Awakening Council in
Haditha
are cooperating against Daash and have called a curfew to maintain
law and order.
22nd
June: the Iraqi Government releases videos of airstrikes it carried
out in Mosul.
22nd
June: A 15 year old settle boy is killed in firing from Syria. He is
the first Israeli casualty of the Arab Spring.
ISIS
militants seize 4 Iraqi towns in just 2 days
RT,
22
June, 2014
The
militants of the Al-Qaeda splinter group ISIS, also known as ISIL,
managed to capture three new towns and two border crossings on
Sunday, according to eyewitnesses, officials, and security sources.
"Army
troops withdrew from Rawah, Anah and Rutba this morning and ISIS
moved quickly to completely control these towns," an
unnamed military intelligence official told Reuters after the three
had fallen.
The
militants captured the three towns in Iraq’s western province of
Anbar, Reuters reported. Later in the day, militants seized two
border crossings – one with Jordan and one with Syria, Iraqi
officials told AP.
Officials
stationed at the Syrian border post of al-Waleed bolted after a group
of militants spread out over two cars fired their guns into the air.
An anonymous government official blamed "terrorists",
reported Reuters.
Iraqi
troops have ceded control of four towns in the last two days.
On
Saturday, the town of Qaim was captured by insurgents.
Staff
in Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s office has held a press
conference later Sunday commenting on the confused retreat of the
country’s army.
The
Iraqi government’s security spokesman, Lieutenant General Qassem
Atta, said that the withdrawal from the three cities was “tactical.”
“The
military units' withdrawal (from Al-Qaim, Rawa and Ana) was for the
purpose of redeployment,” he
said.
One
of the captured towns, Rutba, with a population of about 55,000, is
situated in a strategic location about 150 kilometers east of the
Jordanian border, with the Amman-Baghdad road and the Mosul–Haifa
oil pipeline passing nearby.
The Iraq-ISIS Conflict in Maps, Photos and Video
Anonymous
sources told AP that the army intends to fight back to recapture
Rutba and threatened to start shelling. This prompted the town’s
residents, among whom there could be up to 20,000 refugees from
Fallujah and Ramadi, to negotiate with the invading militants to
leave the city peacefully.
Two
other captured cities, Rawah and Anah, stand on the banks of the
Euphrates River. The militants appear likely to head for the city of
Haditha, where an important dam is positioned. The Iraqi military has
reportedly dispatched 2,000 additional troops to protect this dam,
but whether the army will be capable of fulfilling the task remains
to be seen.
The
Sunni militants control vast areas not only of Iraq but of Syria as
well. Control over border crossings, such as the city of Qaim, allows
the insurgents to easily transport ammunition and supplies between
the two countries.
In
the meantime, thousands of pro-government Shiite
militiamen marched through
Baghdad, Kirkuk and other Iraqi cities in a show of force.
The
march demonstrated that the Shiite militia is armed not only with
handguns, but with heavy weaponry as well, such as multiple rocket
launchers, artillery and heavy machine-guns.
The
Sunni insurgents, many of whom have been fighting against the Syrian
government of President Bashar Assad for the last three years, are
also very well armed. In the current conditions of sectarian conflict
between Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq, a civil war in the country could
be particularly bloody and ruthless.
Judge
Who Sentenced
Saddam Hussein To Death
Has Been Executed By ISIS,
Local Media Reports
22
June, 2014
Back
in 2006, after the second US invasion of Iraq culminated if not with
the discovery of the WMDs (which were the pretext for the invasion in
the first place), but the unearthing (literally) and kangaroo court
trial of Saddam Hussein, the US was quick to announce "mission
accomplished." Recent events have made a mockery of that claim,
however what is truly the straw that broke the back of poetic
justice, to mix metaphors, are reports from local media that as part
of its blitz-campaign to take over northern Iraq, ISIS
found and the promptly executed Rauf Rashid Abd al-Rahman, the judge
who sentenced Saddam to death:
a death which to many was the crowning moment of the second US
invasion of Iraq, and the confirmation of successful US foreign
policy.
It
goes without saying that if true, the murder of the man who
indirectly did the US bidding in slamming the book shut on the Saddam
regime (and with it US claims of Iraqi "liberation") and
was responsible for Saddam's death, means the last "Mission
Accomplished" posted can now be safely taken down.
As LiveLeak
first reported,
Rauf Rashid Abd al-Rahman was the replacement chief judge of the
Supreme Iraqi Criminal Tribunal's Al-Dujail trial of Saddam Hussein
in 2006. His background, from Wikipedia:
Abd al-Rahman was an ethnic Kurd from Halabja, the site of the 1988 Halabja poison gas attack. He replaced Rizgar Mohammed Amin as chief judge on 23 January 2006. Amin had resigned after being criticised in the Iraqi media for appearing "too soft" on the defendants by allowing them to speak aloud in court without being recognized.
After Amin's resignation, Abd al-Rahman headed the Supreme Iraqi Criminal Tribunal during the rest of the trial of Saddam Hussein for genocide, and when it sentenced him to death. He also sentenced to death some of his top aides.
In December 2006, Abd al-Rahman took his family to Britain on a travel visa, and three months later applied for asylum. He later cancelled his application.
In 16 June 2014, Abd al-Rahman was arrested by ISIS rebels during 2014 Northern Iraq offensive. Two days later, it was reported that ISIS captured and executed him.
There
were reports the execution of Iraqi judge, Raouf Abdel-Rahman, who
spent the same judgment on Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, according
to confirmed the pages on the social networking site, without
official confirmation from the Iraqi government.
The
pages on social networking sites, including Page MP Jordanian Khalil
Attieh on the site "Facebook" to "revolutionaries
Iraqis arrested him and sentenced him to death in retaliation for the
death of the martyr Saddam Hussein," he said, adding that Rauf
tried to escape from Baghdad after wearing uniforms dancers.
She
page Izzat al-Douri, vice-president Saddam Hussein, the "Facebook"
to the rebels Iraqis were able to arrest the Kurdish judge Rauf
Rashid, who issued a death sentence against the former Iraqi leader,
which is currently in the "grip of the soldiers of the Islamic
State and the men of the Baath Party."
She
page address, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, "Judge Rauf
Rashid in the grip of Mujahideen equipped Aahalki neck", in
reference to al-Maliki, also falling in the hands of insurgents.
Judge
Raouf Abdel Rahman presided over the trial of former Iraqi President
Saddam Hussein, the successor to the judge Rizgar Amin, following the
latter's resignation in protest against foreign interference in the
work of the court. Following the verdict on Saddam hanging out in the
October 5, 2006, and was appointed justice minister in the Kurdistan
Regional Government.
Although
he was seen as an advocate of human rights, but he faced charges
because of the way his administration for sessions trial of Saddam
and the symbols of his regime, because Thamlh defendants, for being a
city of Halabja, which came to the bombing of a chemical at the end
of the eighties.
Over
the past week, fell several cities in northern Iraq, in the forefront
of Mosul, and Tikrit, Salahuddin province, in the hands of groups of
armed Sunni, led by the organization "Daash", after the
withdrawal of army troops, in moves considered leaders tribal Sunni
"popular revolution Sunni against injustice and sectarian
government (Prime Minister outgoing Nuri) al-Maliki, the Shiite,
"while the frequency of the authorities as" attacks from
terrorist groups."
Marcus Papadopoulos
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