US used ISIL to separate oil-rich Kirkuk, Basra from Iraq: Analyst
The United States used the ISIL terrorist group to “destabilize” the Middle East region and separate oil-rich Kirkuk and Basra from Iraq, a political commentator says.
Dean Henderson, author of “Big Oil and their Bankers,” said Thursday the creation of ISIL (or ISIS) was “by design,” because the United States and its regional allies “wanted to lop off Kurdistan as a separate country, using ISIS to destabilize the area.”
“They want Kurdistan to be a separate nation because Kirkuk oil field is in that area and it’s a very large oil field and they also want Basra lopped off from Iraq eventually because of the south Ramallah oil field in that area,” Henderson told Press TV in a phone interview.
“It’s not going to happen,” he said. “Because the Iraqis had the sense to get this government in place quickly and they have aligned themselves with the Kurds and I don’t think they are going to allow for that to happen.”
US Secretary of State John Kerry travelled to Iraq and met with new Iraqi authorities in Baghdad just after Iraqi lawmakers approved a new government headed by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi.
Kerry’s visit comes as the Iraqi army, backed by Kurdish Peshmarga forces, local tribesmen and volunteer forces, is fighting the ISIL terrorist group which has seized large swaths of land in both Iraq and Syria.
“ISIS, in a nutshell, is another failed foreign policy of the Obama administration,” Henderson said. “It is a sign of a dying desperate empire trying to hang on to control over the world.”
The United States and some of its regional allies, chief among them Saudi Arabia and Qatar, have been supporting militant groups in Syria to fight the government of President Bashar al-Assad.
Last year, ISIL exploited the chaos of the Syrian conflict to capture a vast expanse of territory there before sweeping into neighboring Iraq.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2014/09/11/378418/us-made-isil-to-separate-kirkuk-basra/
AN/HRJ
dimanche 14 septembre 2014
Shiite Turkmens in Iraq alienated by Turkey
Shiite Turkmens in Iraq alienated by Turkey
Iraqi security forces and Shiite militiamen patrol in the Shiite Turkmen town of Amirli on Sunday.(Photo: AP)
September 13, 2014, Saturday/ 17:00:00/ AYDIN ALBAYRAK / ANKARA
Turkey's “indifference” to the plight of Turkmens in Iraq seriously risks pushing Shiite Turkmens away from Turkey, as Turkey did not move to protect them against the terrorist Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).
“All Turkmens are angry at Turkey, but the Shiite ones are even more so, as Turkey did not offer them protection from ISIL,” said Serhat Erkmen, head of the Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies in 21st Century Turkey, when speaking to Sunday's Zaman.
Although the terrorist ISIL, which has the backing of some Sunni groups in Iraq, has been cruel to members of all religions in their bloody campaign in the country since early June, those Sunnis who bowed to the terrorist organization managed to save their lives. The radical Islamist organization has so far been brutal to members of other sects of Islam and other religions.
When Tal Afar, a Turkmen city with a population of nearly 400,000 in northwestern Iraq, was confronted with immediate ISIL occupation in mid-June after Mosul fell into ISIL hands, Turkey did not lift a finger to offer Turkmens protection from the terrorist organization. Turkey just provided humanitarian aid to Turkmens who had to flee to the mountainous or desert area around in fear for their lives.
Hundreds of Turkmens, possibly more, were killed in the ISIL attack on Tal Afar, while most of the city's population, around half of whom were Shiite Turkmens, fled the city. Turkmen girls captured by the terrorists were reportedly raped or sold at the market by ISIL terrorists, as was also the case for Yazidi women later.
“Turkey has long somewhat kept its distance from us, but it had never ignored us as much as it does today,” said Erkmen, who is also a professor of international relations at Ahi Evran University, quoting Shiite Turkmens.
The Turkish government explains its position with the fact that 49 Turkish citizens, most of whom served in Turkey's Mosul consulate, have been held captive by ISIL since the terrorist organization invaded Mosul in June.
Despite being warned about the approaching ISIL threat ahead of the fall of the northern Iraqi city, the Turkish government reportedly instructed Consul-General Öztürk Yılmaz to remain in the consulate in Mosul.
“Shiite Turkmens feel anger and resentment toward Turkey,” Mahir Nakip, a Turkmen scholar from Kirkuk who is based in Turkey, told Sunday's Zaman.
Noting that Turkmens demand that Turkey offer them not only humanitarian aid, but also political support, he added, “A significant number of Shiite Turkmens don't feel affection for Turkey anymore.”
Possibly nearly half a million Turkmens are displaced in Iraq because of the ISIL threat. As Turkey did not allow Turkmens to seek shelter in Turkey, in contrast to Yazidis, most Shiite Turkmens migrated to the Shia-dominated south of the war-torn country. They reportedly struggle to live in very difficult conditions.
Turkey, a secular country, has a Sunni-dominated population and the Turkish government has also been criticized for adopting a sectarian policy in Iraq. ISIL's advance in Turkey's southern neighbor was even described by some leading government officials, who have thus far avoided calling ISIL a terrorist organization, as Iraqi Sunnis' reaction to being excluded from the administration of the country, as if to legitimize ISIL.
ISIL activity is seen as an attempt to carve out a Sunni region of Iraq while driving away Turkmens and other religious minorities in the region stretching from Mosul province in the north to Bagdad.
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu once claimed in August, when he was minister of foreign affairs, that the clashes in Tal Afar were not just fighting between ISIL and Turkmens, but that Sunni and Shiite Turkmens were also clashing among themselves. Davutoğlu was possibly referring to a few radical Sunni Turkmens in Tal Afar who joined ISIL.
“Most Shiite Turkmens have adopted an anti-Turkey attitude, as they believe Turkey is behind ISIL,” Riyaz Sarıkahya, a Kirkuk-based leader of the Turkmeneli Party, told Sunday's Zaman.
Then-Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said when Tal Afar was under ISIL siege that there were Sunnis and Shiites there, implicitly bringing to the fore the sectarian issue in the ISIL attacks.
Shiite Turkmens have also been deeply frustrated by the Turkish government's “sectarian” discourse. “They [Shiite Turkmens] perceived that [Erdoğan's remark] as a reference to their sectarian identity. They will never forget that,” Erkmen commented.
Turkmens are in a particularly vulnerable position in the face of ISIL attacks, as the towns they live in stretch from northern Iraq toward Bagdad, precisely the area in which ISIL is active in the country.
“Turkey has not backed us politically. This is what saddens us most,” Sarıkahya added.
Until recently, Amirli, a Shiite Turkmen town with a population of around 15,000 that is near Bagdad, remained under siege by ISIL for around a month-and-a-half. The townspeople defended themselves, under very tough conditions, against the ISIL terrorists until, at long last, the Iraqi central army, supported by US air forces, Kurdish peshmerga forces and military units from some other countries such as Iran broke the ISIL siege.
Until recently, Amirli, a Shiite Turkmen town with a population of around 15,000 that is near Bagdad, remained under siege by ISIL for around a month-and-a-half. The townspeople defended themselves, under very tough conditions, against the ISIL terrorists until, at long last, the Iraqi central army, supported by US air forces, Kurdish peshmerga forces and military units from some other countries such as Iran broke the ISIL siege.
Reportedly, Turkey just sent humanitarian aid to the town after the siege was broken. Turkmens were once again deeply frustrated at not seeing Turkey at their side when they were struggling for their lives.
“Shiite Turkmens now feel closer to the central Iraqi government, which is dominated by Shiites, and to Iran, as it was those two who rushed to help them,” Erkmen said.
It has been three months since Turkmens were driven from their homes by ISIL forces, but the Turkish government has not even managed to establish a campsite to provide shelter for Turkmens in Iraq, let alone in Turkey. The Cumhuriyet daily reported in mid August that there was no trace as yet of a refugee camp having been established by Turkey in the Kurdish region, despite an earlier report by the state-run Anatolia news agency that Turkey was building a camp near the town of Dohuk in the Kurdish region.
http://www.todayszaman.com/_shiite-turkmens-in-iraq-alienated-by-turkey_358596.html
Iraqi Turkmen Dissatisfied With New Central Gov't
Iraqi Turkmen Dissatisfied With New Central Gov't
2014-09-10 19:28:48
Turkmen Front leader says they are under represented in Abadi cabinet, with only one ministerial seat.
Iraqi Turkmen Front leader and Kirkuk deputy Arshad al-Salihi is disatisfied with the newly-formed Iraqi government claiming they are under-represented with only one ministerial seat.
His remarks came after the new government, led by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, was officially established on Monday after receiving a vote of confidence from the Iraqi parliament.
"Only one seat was allowed for a Turkmen minister in the new cabinet. The Turkmen people of Iraq were once again disregarded during the formation of the government," claimed Salihi.
He said Turkmen Muhammad Mahdi al-Bayati from a Shiite group, the Badr Organization, won the seat of the Human Rights Ministry in the government only after the Iraqi Turkmen Front put pressure on the the Shiite-dominated Iraqi National Alliance, an electoral bloc of politicians from Iraq's leading Shiite parties.
The Turkmen leader called upon al-Abadi to allocate one more ministerial seat to the Turkmen Front.
He further argued that the demand from Iraq's Muttahidun Coalition leader and former Sunni Parliamentary Speaker Osama al-Nujaifi, to have a Turkmen vice presidential seat was ignored.
Salihi said the Sunni Arab coalition, which gained 77 MP seats in April 30 elections, "regret" that Turkmen have only one minister in the new government.
"After this phase, Turkmen politics in Iraq must reform and reconsider the coalitions it allies with," he added.
The Iraqi Turkmen leader stressed that Turkmen won 12 seats in the 2010 general elections in Iraq. "Only nine seats in the April 30 elections is a political loss for the Turkmen people," he concluded.
In the new central government of Iraq, 17 ministries were given to Shiites, seven to Sunnis, and four to Kurds, while one ministry was given to minorities during Monday's long debate at parliament.
The new Prime Minister, Haider Al-Abadi, was named as prime minister by President Fuad Masum on August 11 and was assigned to form the new government of Iraq, ending former PM Nouri al-Maliki's eight-year rule.
www.aa.com.tr/en - Irak
http://www.viewstimes.com/iraqi-turkmen-dissatisfied-with-new-central-govt-4242
Turkmen Front leader says they are under represented in Abadi cabinet, with only one ministerial seat.
Iraqi Turkmen Front leader and Kirkuk deputy Arshad al-Salihi is disatisfied with the newly-formed Iraqi government claiming they are under-represented with only one ministerial seat.
His remarks came after the new government, led by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, was officially established on Monday after receiving a vote of confidence from the Iraqi parliament.
"Only one seat was allowed for a Turkmen minister in the new cabinet. The Turkmen people of Iraq were once again disregarded during the formation of the government," claimed Salihi.
He said Turkmen Muhammad Mahdi al-Bayati from a Shiite group, the Badr Organization, won the seat of the Human Rights Ministry in the government only after the Iraqi Turkmen Front put pressure on the the Shiite-dominated Iraqi National Alliance, an electoral bloc of politicians from Iraq's leading Shiite parties.
The Turkmen leader called upon al-Abadi to allocate one more ministerial seat to the Turkmen Front.
He further argued that the demand from Iraq's Muttahidun Coalition leader and former Sunni Parliamentary Speaker Osama al-Nujaifi, to have a Turkmen vice presidential seat was ignored.
Salihi said the Sunni Arab coalition, which gained 77 MP seats in April 30 elections, "regret" that Turkmen have only one minister in the new government.
"After this phase, Turkmen politics in Iraq must reform and reconsider the coalitions it allies with," he added.
The Iraqi Turkmen leader stressed that Turkmen won 12 seats in the 2010 general elections in Iraq. "Only nine seats in the April 30 elections is a political loss for the Turkmen people," he concluded.
In the new central government of Iraq, 17 ministries were given to Shiites, seven to Sunnis, and four to Kurds, while one ministry was given to minorities during Monday's long debate at parliament.
The new Prime Minister, Haider Al-Abadi, was named as prime minister by President Fuad Masum on August 11 and was assigned to form the new government of Iraq, ending former PM Nouri al-Maliki's eight-year rule.
www.aa.com.tr/en - Irak
http://www.viewstimes.com/iraqi-turkmen-dissatisfied-with-new-central-govt-4242
samedi 6 septembre 2014
Iraqi Shiite forces reinvigorated after Amerli victory
Iraqi Shiite militia fighters fire their weapons as they celebrate breaking the siege of Amerli by Islamic State militants, Sept. 1, 2014. (photo by REUTERS/Youssef Boudlal)
Iraqi Shiite forces reinvigorated after Amerli victory
AMERLI, Iraq – Thick black smoke rose from some of the houses in the distance. The rocket and bullet casings lying by the side of the highway attested to the fight for control over the area. Young Shiite men armed with a variety of weapons, including rocket-propelled grenades, manned makeshift checkpoints along the road to the “liberated” town of Amerli. Such was the scene that greeted visitors arriving in the vicinity of Amerli and Sulaiman Bag, in the northern part of Saladin province, some 180 kilometers (112 miles) north of Baghdad.
.
After successfully breaking the Islamic State’s siege on the Shiite Turkmen town of Amerli, Iraqi forces are looking to make further advances.
Author Mohammed A. Salih
Author Mohammed A. Salih
Posted September 5, 2014
At the entrance to Amerli, children waved Shiite flags at the vehicles entering their dilapidated town. It was a genuine expression of joy at having survived what would have surely been a brutal fate if the fighters of the Islamic State (IS) had succeeded in setting foot in this town populated by Shiite Turkmen.
Armed men affiliated with a number of Shiite groups — some wearing camouflaged military uniforms and others black fatigues — roamed the streets hoisting the flags of their respective organizations on their vehicles, many of which did not have license plates. Among the groups that helped take Amerli were the Badr Brigades, the League of the Righteous, Hezbollah Battalions and Peace Brigades. It was at times difficult to tell who was who. Military humvees provided by the US government to the Iraqi army carried Iraqi and armed groups’ flags.
Fighters from the Hezbollah Battalions set up base at a building formerly used by the government's office of agriculture. The group, whose flag bears striking similarities to Lebanese Hezbollah's banner, once fought both the US military and Iraqi security forces, but has joined forces with the army and other Shiite armed factions to fight their common enemy: Sunni extremists. The men, visibly tired by the fight, rejoiced in their victory over IS, a rare occurrence in the bloody conflict between the Sunni jihadists and the Iraqi army and allied Shiite forces.
“The people of Amerli have implanted fear in the heart of IS,” said Abu Abdullah, a tall, thin man with a blonde beard wearing military fatigues. “Amerli and its surroundings are now free of terrorists.”
Some of the men here were involved in the successful Aug. 31 assault on Amerli by Shiite armed groups, Iraqi army and Kurdish peshmerga forces that broke the IS siege of some 80 days. Others were part of the resistance inside Amerli. Less than 48 hours after the siege was lifted, no traces were left of peshmerga inside the town. The closest peshmerga post was a checkpoint on the road connecting Touz Khormatu to Sulaiman Bag, several miles away.
The residents of Amerli still appear traumatized from the siege, which was intended to break their resolve and force them into surrendering or starving to death. They call what unfolded a “heroic resistance” and are proud of not having blinked in the face of what they described as a 360-degree siege.
“We were badly short of food and medicine, drank dirty water from the wells and were shelled all the time,” said Sheikh Abbas al-Amerli, a local tribal chief who, like many residents, took up arms to defend his town. “But we did not surrender. We defended our honor.” The fighters denied that aid delivered by the Iraqi military to the town during the siege included military supplies.
Exact figures are not available, but staff at a rundown health center said that several pregnant women and their babies died because of a lack of doctors, medicine and supplies to ease their deliveries. Those who died during the siege were laid to rest in unmarked graves, no more than a pile of earth, in a cemetery on the edge of town.
Truck after truck have been entering the town of nearly 15,000 people to deliver assistance, including much-needed flour for bread, bottled water, which one resident described as a “luxury,” and packaged food. Many of the trucks had flags from Shiite armed groups, and their contents were distributed by armed men. At least four trucks from the Turkish Red Crescent were idle at the entrance of the town shortly before sunset, waiting to be allowed in to distribute their cargo.
Shiite armed men openly boasted of burning the houses of those who cooperated with IS in the nearby village of al-Habash and the district of Sulaiman Bag, both of which have a significant number of Sunni residents. The locals who worked with IS apparently left with the retreating jihadists. At the entrance to Sulaiman Bag and Habash, men at the checkpoints warned visitors to be careful because of possible roadside bombs and warned them not to veer off onto unpaved roads.
The fight in Amerli might be over, but the Shiite groups here plan to march farther. “We cleansed three villages of IS terrorists today,” said Adnan, a militiaman from the nearby town of Touz Khormatu who came to Amerli with the Peace Brigades, which are affiliated with the cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. “We will not stop until we have cleaned up all surrounding villages and will then go to Mosul.”
The battle for Mosul might not happen anytime soon, for IS has proven capable of slowing if not bogging down its enemies on different fronts. Regardless, armed Shiite groups, reinvigorated by their most dramatic success in the conflict thus far, are yearning to charge ahead.
At least one person, however, had reason to be unenthusiastic about events that transpired in Amerli, although not for the obvious reason. One pale-looking boy wearing an FC Barcelona jersey said he was saddened because he had been unable to watch the Catalan team's matches. “We didn’t have electricity,” said 11-year old Salam in a feeble voice. The boy then rushed away to collect some ice after spotting a truck pulling over to deliver aid to residents.
Read more: http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/09/amerli-iraq-shiite-forces-islamic-state-lift-siege.html#ixzz3CVt0YH3u
At the entrance to Amerli, children waved Shiite flags at the vehicles entering their dilapidated town. It was a genuine expression of joy at having survived what would have surely been a brutal fate if the fighters of the Islamic State (IS) had succeeded in setting foot in this town populated by Shiite Turkmen.
Armed men affiliated with a number of Shiite groups — some wearing camouflaged military uniforms and others black fatigues — roamed the streets hoisting the flags of their respective organizations on their vehicles, many of which did not have license plates. Among the groups that helped take Amerli were the Badr Brigades, the League of the Righteous, Hezbollah Battalions and Peace Brigades. It was at times difficult to tell who was who. Military humvees provided by the US government to the Iraqi army carried Iraqi and armed groups’ flags.
Fighters from the Hezbollah Battalions set up base at a building formerly used by the government's office of agriculture. The group, whose flag bears striking similarities to Lebanese Hezbollah's banner, once fought both the US military and Iraqi security forces, but has joined forces with the army and other Shiite armed factions to fight their common enemy: Sunni extremists. The men, visibly tired by the fight, rejoiced in their victory over IS, a rare occurrence in the bloody conflict between the Sunni jihadists and the Iraqi army and allied Shiite forces.
“The people of Amerli have implanted fear in the heart of IS,” said Abu Abdullah, a tall, thin man with a blonde beard wearing military fatigues. “Amerli and its surroundings are now free of terrorists.”
Some of the men here were involved in the successful Aug. 31 assault on Amerli by Shiite armed groups, Iraqi army and Kurdish peshmerga forces that broke the IS siege of some 80 days. Others were part of the resistance inside Amerli. Less than 48 hours after the siege was lifted, no traces were left of peshmerga inside the town. The closest peshmerga post was a checkpoint on the road connecting Touz Khormatu to Sulaiman Bag, several miles away.
The residents of Amerli still appear traumatized from the siege, which was intended to break their resolve and force them into surrendering or starving to death. They call what unfolded a “heroic resistance” and are proud of not having blinked in the face of what they described as a 360-degree siege.
“We were badly short of food and medicine, drank dirty water from the wells and were shelled all the time,” said Sheikh Abbas al-Amerli, a local tribal chief who, like many residents, took up arms to defend his town. “But we did not surrender. We defended our honor.” The fighters denied that aid delivered by the Iraqi military to the town during the siege included military supplies.
Exact figures are not available, but staff at a rundown health center said that several pregnant women and their babies died because of a lack of doctors, medicine and supplies to ease their deliveries. Those who died during the siege were laid to rest in unmarked graves, no more than a pile of earth, in a cemetery on the edge of town.
Truck after truck have been entering the town of nearly 15,000 people to deliver assistance, including much-needed flour for bread, bottled water, which one resident described as a “luxury,” and packaged food. Many of the trucks had flags from Shiite armed groups, and their contents were distributed by armed men. At least four trucks from the Turkish Red Crescent were idle at the entrance of the town shortly before sunset, waiting to be allowed in to distribute their cargo.
Shiite armed men openly boasted of burning the houses of those who cooperated with IS in the nearby village of al-Habash and the district of Sulaiman Bag, both of which have a significant number of Sunni residents. The locals who worked with IS apparently left with the retreating jihadists. At the entrance to Sulaiman Bag and Habash, men at the checkpoints warned visitors to be careful because of possible roadside bombs and warned them not to veer off onto unpaved roads.
The fight in Amerli might be over, but the Shiite groups here plan to march farther. “We cleansed three villages of IS terrorists today,” said Adnan, a militiaman from the nearby town of Touz Khormatu who came to Amerli with the Peace Brigades, which are affiliated with the cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. “We will not stop until we have cleaned up all surrounding villages and will then go to Mosul.”
The battle for Mosul might not happen anytime soon, for IS has proven capable of slowing if not bogging down its enemies on different fronts. Regardless, armed Shiite groups, reinvigorated by their most dramatic success in the conflict thus far, are yearning to charge ahead.
At least one person, however, had reason to be unenthusiastic about events that transpired in Amerli, although not for the obvious reason. One pale-looking boy wearing an FC Barcelona jersey said he was saddened because he had been unable to watch the Catalan team's matches. “We didn’t have electricity,” said 11-year old Salam in a feeble voice. The boy then rushed away to collect some ice after spotting a truck pulling over to deliver aid to residents.
Read more: http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2014/09/amerli-iraq-shiite-forces-islamic-state-lift-siege.html#ixzz3CVt0YH3u
jeudi 28 août 2014
Iraq forces ready bid to break jihadist siege of Turkmen town
Iraq forces ready bid to break jihadist siege of Shiite town
By Marwan Ibrahim17 hours ago
Kirkuk (Iraq) (AFP) - Iraq was massing Forces Wednesday for an operation to break a two-month jihadist siege of a Shiite Turkmen town north of Baghdad, amid growing fears for residents short of supplies.
According to a civilian volunteer commander, thousands of Shiite militiamen from groups including Asaib Ahl al-Haq and the Badr Organisation are gathering in the Tuz Khurmatu area, north of Amerli, in preparation for a battle to break the siege.The planned counter-offensive around the Salaheddin province town of Amerli comes amid reports that US President Barack Obama is weighing a decision to authorise air strikes and aid drops in the area to help thousands of trapped civilians.
And an army lieutenant general said that security forces were mobilising in the Jabal Hamreen area, south of Amerli, to launch an attack.
Iraqi aircraft have begun targeting positions of Islamic State (IS) jihadists around the town, carrying out nine strikes on Tuesday, an officer said.
Time is running out for the town's residents, who face danger both because of their Shiite faith, which jihadists consider heresy, and their resistance against the militants, which has drawn deadly retribution elsewhere.
There is "no possibility of evacuating them so far", and only limited humanitarian assistance is reaching the town, said Eliana Nabaa, spokeswoman for the UN mission in Iraq.
UN Iraq envoy Nickolay Mladenov has called for an urgent effort to help Amerli, saying residents face a "possible massacre" if the town is overrun.
mercredi 27 août 2014
ORSAM REVIEW: THE EFFECTS OF THE ISIS OPERATIONS ON THE TURKMENS
THE EFFECTS OF THE ISIS OPERATIONS ON THE TURKMENS
Bİlgay Duman
please see:
http://www.orsam.org.tr/en/enUploads/Article/Files/2014727_2014726_policybriefing7.pdf
Bİlgay Duman
please see:
http://www.orsam.org.tr/en/enUploads/Article/Files/2014727_2014726_policybriefing7.pdf
| The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS), which has dominated headlines, has been continuing its offensive, causing a crisis among the people in areas in the northern part of Iraq, where it has captured. Especially the Sunni Arabs and Turkmens are facing hard times in the cities under the ISIS, rule such as Mosul, Tel Afar, Salahaddin and Diyala, in which they constitute the majority. The Sunni Arabs, while being under risks due to the ISIS operations, are not under a direct threat. However, for the Turkmens, who live in the same region as the Sunni Arabs, the ISIS advance constitutes both direct and indirect threats to their survival. The Turkish version | |
Full text
|
jeudi 14 août 2014
Iraq: What it feels like to be on the receiving end of Isis's pickup truck killing party
Iraq: What it feels like to be on the receiving end of Isis's pickup truck killing party
A man who hid from Isis for eight hours in a stack of straw tells Richard Spencer of the horrific day when the Iraqi jihadists came to his village, murdering his son, brother, nephew and sister-in-law
Amina and husband Elias Hassan; Amina was shot in a car
By Richard Spencer, Taza, Iraq
1:57PM BST 28 Jun 2014
The Isis death squad came in the morning, and were merciless on their Shia victims. One man who survived crawled through fields of wheat for a mile on his hands and knees, with the gunmen following, looking for him.
He had left his son dying in the road behind him. He heard the shots as his brother and nephew, who had run the other way to hide in a building site, were killed with two other men.
He hid for eight hours in the middle of a stack of straw from Iraq's early summer harvest, not daring to look out.
The next day, the villagers went back for the bodies. There were 21 in all, scattered through the streets and in the looted, burning embers of their houses. The bodies of his brother, nephew and two other men in the building site had not just been shot but stabbed in the head and body, on both sides, having been turned over and over as the rampage proceeded.
His brother's finger had been cut off, to remove his ring.
"I served in the army, in the war against Iran and in Kuwait," the survivor, Fadl Moussa Hassan said. "But I never saw anything like this. Even if you captured a prisoner and killed him, you did it cleanly, with one shot."
As Isis, the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, extends its control over Sunni areas of the country, the politicians in Baghdad and the world's diplomats ponder a negotiated response. They do not trust the Iraqi army's ability to regain control of the country, nor wish to commit foreign troops in the numbers required to take on the common enemy.
One argument is that the Iraq crisis has a political root, in the discrimination suffered by Sunni Muslims at the hands of a Shia-led government. Many ordinary, non-jihadi Sunnis themselves say the insurgency is a popular uprising more than extremist terrorism.
That may be true, but it does not mean those with a will and a gun cannot use the crisis to promote their own strategies.
At the opposite ends of the religious sectarian spectrum, that strategy is ethnic cleansing.
An Amnesty International report on Friday made clear that murder and mayhem is not limited to the Sunni jihadists. Iraqi security forces or allied Shia militias killed scores of Sunni prisoners in the towns of Tal Afar, Baquba and Mosul in the last two weeks as they came under attack from the Isis-led alliance.
The aim appeared to be to prevent them escaping and, if sympathetic, joining up with the attackers.
But the jihadists' attacks on Tuesday, June 17, on the Shia villages of Barauchili, Karanaz and Chardaghli, near Tikrit, and Bashir, further north south of Kirkuk, have a raw, sectarian quality previously associated with the Alawite "Shabiha" militias of neighbouring Syria.
The villages' residents are not just Shia but from the Turkmen minority, a vulnerable minority within a minority.
But ethnicity seemed to be less important than religion: the attackers were shouting "God is Great" as they roared up to the village in their pickup trucks, captured American Humvees and armoured personnel carriers, waving their black flags, and Mr Hassan and other survivors said that they could even make out Turkmen voices among the attackers.
Mr Fadl, his brother, Elias, and other villagers from Barauchili gave The Telegraph a clinical description of what it feels like to be on the receiving end of a pickup truck killing party. Their accounts have yet to be assessed by independent experts, though they have been confirmed by Iraqi security forces, but the accounts of those interviewed separately matched.
The villages were attacked from either end: they came from the north, to Chadaghli first, then just as men were rushing there to defend it, they arrived at Barauchili from the south, the flag-flying jihadi column pouring up the road from a neighbouring Sunni district.
It sped through the road-hump checkpoint. Some villagers tried to fire from nearby rooftops, but they were outgunned. Najaf Kahir, 41, a local teacher, was one of them - shot and killed, his father, Abdulwahid Reza Kahir, said.
Realising there was nothing they could do, the villagers fled, but too late. When Mr Kahir's 86-year-old cousin, Kamal, and his sons Mustafa, 34, and Abbas, 28, staggered from their house, the gunmen were already there, and they killed them on the spot.
Another cousin, Abdullah Reza Kahir had a better idea. Instead of fleeing north to the other Turkmen villages, he fled south to the Sunni Arab one, Albuhassan, where he had friends.
They took him and his family in, but Isis came knocking.
The family's would-be protectors came out holding up a Koran. "For the sake of this holy book, let these men go," they said. There was some haggling, and the man's wife and daughters were allowed to remain inside.
But the father and his 15-year-old son, Hussein, were dragged out and shot in front of their hosts.
Meanwhile, the Hassan family were trying to head north. Fadl and his family were on foot, and straggling behind the rest of the villagers, which is why Isis caught up with them first.
"There were lots of other families, but we were behind them," he said.
Meanwhile his brother, Elias, was in his car with his wife Amina, heading in a different direction, west towards Karanaz. But when they reached the junction, Isis were already there - two men in a pickup, and one on the road with a sniper rifle.
As he tried to speed away, two shots rang out, and his wife's head slumped on his shoulder. When he finally made it to a hospital, she was dead.
Fadl Hassan said that while he was hiding in the field, his pursuers came close enough for him to hear their voices. Far from being the foreign fighters he had been taught to fear, some voices were local; some were even Turkmen.
The willingness of their neighbours to join the onslaught, including men from Albuhassan, whose children were their own children's classmates, shocked the villagers. But then the sectarianism of modern Iraq is not new. While some say that the dictatorship of Saddam Hussein, however brutal, kept a peace between the sects, it also fostered the resentments.
Saddam had an Arabisation policy that took land and gave it to Sunni Arabs. In the town of Jalula, to the south-east near Baghdad, The Telegraph saw Kurdish Peshmerga forces who are taking on the insurgents and have driven them back into one corner of the town.
That corner is the corner occupied by a Sunni tribe which supports Isis - a tribe that was given the land there by Saddam and has no intention of giving it up.
A similar conflict underlies another massacre. The town of Bashir was once Turkmen, and was then handed by Saddam to Sunni Arabs in the 1980s as punishment for opposition from the Shia who lived there.
After he fell, the Turkmen returned, and the two lived side-by-side, uneasily.
Then, Isis arrived there too, on the same Tuesday, and with such speed that Qassem Ibrahim Ali was overwhelmed. He put his son, who though only 13 could drive, in one car with his wife, two teenage daughters and their three-year-old, then followed driving his neighbours to safety.
He never saw his family again. He rang his son when he arrived at the neighbouring village of Taza without passing them, but all his son could do was sob.
Five days later, the jihadists who had seized Bashir sent trucks pulling metal sheeting on which lay the decomposing bodies of 17 people, including his two daughters, Masuma, 19, and Nerjis, 12, both of whom had been shot in the back. His wife, Zahra, 13-year-old son Mohammed, and the three-year-old, Ali, are still missing.
A resident who hid inside his house for several days before escaping to Taza said there were still bodies decomposing in Bashir. In all, 13 people are unaccounted for.
"Isis said when we rang my son's phone that they had not deliberately killed my daughters, that they had died in the crossfire," Mr Ali said. "But there were no clashes as they were driving. There is no doubt they were executed."
Human Rights Watch has begun to document the sectarian cleansing and suspected murders by Isis of Turkmen Shia from other parts of northern Iraq, including Mosul.
"Isis has embarked on a campaign of forced displacement of minority communities," Letta Taylor, a researcher, said. "There is a clear pattern."
There may be underlying political causes for the Sunni insurgency.
There may be a pragmatic alliance between Sunni tribes, ex-Baathists and Isis, which will break down as time passes.
The tribes believe they can see off the jihadists sooner or later.
But there seems little hope of stitching Iraq into a single, multi-ethnic, multi-sectarian state again. In that case, the three parts will be Sunni, Shia and Kurds, and minorities will only get in the way. Maybe, some seem to think, it is better to get rid of them now.
Iraqi Christians, already reduced by three quarters since 2003, are again on the move, heading north to Kurdistan and then, in all likelihood, to Germany, Sweden and Michigan, where many already live.
Ten per cent of Turkmen have left the country in that time too, said Hasan al-Bayati, head of the Iraqi Turkmen Front.
The head of the Kirkuk city council - made up of Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen, Sunnis and Shia - was a Turkmen Sunni until last week. Munir al-Qafili was shot dead, clinically by gunmen who were well-trained enough to pump seven bullets into his head without scratching the body of the car in which he was a passenger.
It was a warning to all the Turkmen, said a fellow council member, who understandably asked not to be named. Mr Qafili had told colleagues not long before that he had received a warning from Iraqi intelligence his name was on an Isis hitlist.
His was a death foretold, and it will not be the last.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/middleeast/iraq/10932689/Iraq-What-it-feels-like-to-be-on-the-receiving-end-of-Isiss-pickup-truck-killing-party.html
The U.S. and the E.U. should arm the Turkmens in Iraq
If the U.S. and the E.U. are sending weapons to the Kurds they should also arm the Turkmens in Iraq. The Turkmens, Iraq's third main ethnic community, have no armed militias, they continue to be easy targets.
When ISIS attacked Turkmen cities and villages, neither the Iraqi army nor the Kurdish peshmerga protected them.
The Iraqi army abandoned its positions before the arrival of ISIS mercenaries and the Kurdish peshmerga who were positioned around Turkmen inhabited towns and villages did nothing to protect the inhabitants.
Kurds who are now controlling and occupying the so-called contested territories in the north of Iraq do not protect non-Kurds.
When ISIS attacked Turkmen cities and villages, neither the Iraqi army nor the Kurdish peshmerga protected them.
The Iraqi army abandoned its positions before the arrival of ISIS mercenaries and the Kurdish peshmerga who were positioned around Turkmen inhabited towns and villages did nothing to protect the inhabitants.
Kurds who are now controlling and occupying the so-called contested territories in the north of Iraq do not protect non-Kurds.
It is like an international plot to allow the
ethnic cleansing of Turkmens in Iraq. It would suit the Arabs, the Kurds and
the oil-greedy Western powers. The international community has not reacted when
the peshmerga took over Kirkuk and now they will deal with the Kurds to export Kirkuk’s
oil. Turkmens always objected to U.S. zio-neocons definition of the Iraqi
people as 'Shia, Sunna, Kurds’ one can
understand why.
Turkmens are paying the price for always
being loyal Iraqi patriots and for not collaborating with the U.S./U.K.
invaders.
Inscription à :
Articles (Atom)
