New US intelligence report says DAESH weaker

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BAGHDAD, Feb 5, (RTRS): Islamic State has as many as 25,000 fighters in Syria and Iraq, down from a previous estimate of up to 31,000, according to a US intelligence report revealed by the White House on Thursday. US officials cited factors such as battlefield casualties and desertions to explain the roughly 20 percent decrease in fighters, and said the report showed a US-led campaign to crush Islamic State was making progress. The new intelligence estimate “means they continue to be a substantial threat, but the potential numbers have declined,” said White House spokesman Josh Earnest.

“ISIS has sustained significant casualties,” Earnest said. Ground fighting efforts by coalition partners of the United States are having an effect in the conflict against Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, he said. US-backed Iraqi security forces and tribal militias and moderate opposition groups in Syria have contributed. So too has a US-led air campaign that has launched more than 10,000 strikes against the Islamist extremists, Earnest said. Finally, international efforts are beginning to stem the flow of foreigners seeking to join the movement. “ISIL is having more difficulty than they’ve had before in replenishing their ranks, and we have long been aware of the need of the international community to cooperate to stop the flow of foreign fighters to the region,” said Earnest.

The new intelligence report of 19,000- 25,000 Islamic State fighters in Iraq and Syria compares to 2014 estimates of 20,000-31,000 fighters. “The decrease reflects the combined effects of battlefield deaths, desertions, internal disciplinary actions, recruiting shortfalls, and difficulties that foreign fighters face traveling to Syria,” said Emily Horne, a spokeswoman for the National Security Council. Some North African jihadists who might otherwise have traveled to Syria to join Islamic State may instead have heeded calls by the movement’s leadership to head to Libya, where the Islamists are fighting to expand their grip on territory on the Mediterranean coast. The intelligence report did not account for the Islamic State’s affiliates in South Asia, other parts of the Middle East and North Africa, where its Libyan branch is expanding.

There appear to be conflicting US estimates of the strength of the movement’s Libyan affiliate. Defense officials put the number at some 3,000, while other US officials put it at 5,000-6,000. Iraq’s top Shi’ite cleric said on Friday he would no longer deliver regular weekly sermons about political affairs, which for years have been a source of guidance for Iraqi politicians and his millions of followers. Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani did not give a reason for suspending the sermons, which have lately focused on the government’s battle against Islamic State militants and anti-corruption efforts. “It has been decided not to continue this on a weekly basis at the present time, but only as demanded by events”, Sistani’s aide Ahmed al-Safi, who delivered the message, said in a televised speech from the southern shrine city of Kerbala before reciting a prayer. Sistani, a reclusive octogenarian, enjoys almost mythical status among millions of Shi’ite followers and wields authority that few Iraqi politicians would openly challenge. His political sermons have ranged over issues such as security, elections and the economy. He called in June 2014 for Iraqis to take up arms against the Sunni ultrahardline insurgents of Islamic State after they seized nearly a third of the country’s north and west.

Tens of thousands of Shi’ites heeded the call. Sistani then endorsed the sidelining of former Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. Last summer, he called for an overhaul of Iraq’s corrupt political system, emboldening Prime Minister Haider al- Abadi to launch a reform campaign which Sistani later criticised as slow and ineffective. A spokesman for Sistani’s office was not immediately available to comment on the decision. A sermon two weeks ago expressed frustration at inaction in solving Iraq’s myriad security, political and economic challenges. “All these issues have been repeated endlessly until our voices became sore,” Sistani said at the time

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