Losses spark more IS attacks

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WASHINGTON, Jan 15, (Agencies): Islamic State jihadists will likely increase the tempo of attacks around the world as they come under increased pressure in Iraq and Syria, a top US general warned Thursday. General Lloyd Austin, who currently heads the military’s Central Command (CENTCOM) overseeing Middle East operations, made the argument that recent IS-claimed attacks like the ones this week in Istanbul and Jakarta are in fact evidence the group is faltering. “ISIL has assumed a defensive posture in Iraq and Syria,” Austin said at a news conference in Florida.

“Going forward, we can expect to see him rely increasingly on acts of terrorism such as we saw this week in Baghdad and in Turkey, and most recently in Jakarta,” he added. The IS group, which swept through vast rgions of Iraq and Syria in 2014 and 2015 and captured a string of cities, has seen recent setbacks across its self-proclaimed caliphate, including the loss of the key Iraqi city of Ramadi to US-supported local forces.

A US-led coalition has also been hammering the group’s oil infrastructure, including by blowing up hundreds of trucks used to ferry illicit crude oil around Syria, and this week bombed a fi nancial facility in the Iraqi city of Mosul that US offi cials said held millions of dollars in cash. Austin, who has headed CENTCOM since March 2013 and will shortly be stepping down, said the IS group is upping its overseas actions to distract from such losses. “ISIL wants to draw attention away from the growing number of setbacks” that it is experiencing,” Austin said, using an alternative name for the IS group. “It is important to understand that these terrorist acts don’t necessarily mean ISIL is getting stronger,” he added. “ISIL by its nature is a terrorist organization and by conducting these attacks, he is attempting to produce an image of invincibility in the wake of setbacks. So overall, we are making progress.” Pentagon chief Ashton Carter said he will recommend that President Barack Obama nominate General Joseph Votel to replace Austin. Votel currently heads the Special Operations Command. His nomination would reflect the increased role special operations troops are carrying out in the region as elite US commandos launch raids against IS jihadists. “General Votel has a wealth of in-depth, politico- military experience — that is working with foreign governments and militaries — and is therefore well-equipped to handle the complex challenges of CENTCOM,” Carter said. Meanwhile, Iraq’s top Shi’ite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, on Friday urged the government to prevent militant attacks and condemned bombings claimed by Islamic State and retaliatory assaults this week on Sunni mosques in the province of Diyala. Sistani has millions of followers in Iraq and elsewhere and wields authority that few Iraqi politicians would openly challenge. “We place full responsibility on the government security forces for (the attacks’) repetition and to not permit the presence of militants outside the framework of the state,” his spokesman, Sheikh Abdul Mehdi Karbala’i, said in a sermon broadcast on state television. At least seven Sunni mosques and dozens of shops in the town of Muqdadiya were firebombed on Tuesday, a day after 23 people were killed there in two blasts targeting Shi’ite militia fighters. Iraqi officials declared victory over the insurgents in Diyala, which borders Iran, nearly a year ago after security forces and Shi’ite militias drove them out of towns and villages there. But the militants have remained active and militia elements have been accused of abuses against Sunni residents.

The rise of radical Sunni group Islamic State has exacerbated a long-running sectarian conflict in Iraq, mostly between the Shi’ite majority and minority Sunnis. A surge in violence could undermine efforts by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, a moderate Shi’ite Islamist, to dislodge the group from areas in the north and west that they seized in 2014. Abadi visited Muqdadiya on Thursday to meet with security and municipal officials. When a wave of deadly ethnic violence swept through the northern Iraqi town of Tuz Khurmatu, Ahmed Hassan Majid’s house was on the wrong side of an invisible line.

The Kurdish-Turkmen violence ignited by a checkpoint dispute in November has since faded, but divisions between the communities are sharper than ever. They fight the same jihadist enemy but in areas where their frontlines meet, the autonomous Kurdish region and the Baghdad-backed Shiite paramilitary forces are vying for influence, a contest that sometimes descends into violence. After clambering over his charred belongings to reach the roof of his house, which was torched during the unre st, Majid pointed to a cinderblock wall that went up recently, dead-ending a street to mark an ethnic border. “On this side, Kurds. Over here, it’s Turkmen,” said the 36-year-old father of two. Majid is a Turkmen Shiite, but the house he spent a quarter of a million dollars on before moving in earlier this year was one of the first Turkmen homes on the edge of the Kurdish district. As he sat on a plastic chair in the darkness of his gutted home, his eyes drifted into a sorrowful haze. “It was one of the first to be torched. I have lost everything,” Majid said.

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