Islamic State in Hawija decry “treason” as group defenses tremble
Islamic State members in Iraq (representational photo)
Hawija (IraqiNews.com) Islamic State members are accusing people at their Kirkuk stronghold town of Hawija of treason as security and paramilitary forces come closer to retaking the region.
A local source told Alsumaria News that some Arab leaders within the militant group delivered sermons through Hawija mosques accusing the local population of “treason”, “dishonoring a pledge of allegiance” and collaborating with the Iraqi army and the allied Popular Mobilization Forces.
The source said that was the first time the group makes such an accusation against locals in the southwestern Kirkuk bastion.
Also in Kirkuk, Jabbar al-Maamouri, a senior PMF leader, told Alsumaria News that Islamic State’s internal defense lines have begun to collapse after many militants had fled their deployments at rooftops and vital intersections in the town.
A local source told the same network that militants had set fire to seven of their media centers, including the one containing the group’s archives.
The source, who asked not to be named, said those headquarters contain videos and archives that expose the identities of group members and outstanding armed operations that followed the occupation of Hawija.
On Monday, the Joint Operations Command said government and PMF forces recaptured up to 45 villages during a second phase of operations launched last Friday to retake Hawija, a town southwest of Kirkuk which the militants have held since 2014.
The first phase of operations launched on September 24th, and managed to retake eastern Shirqat, an Islamic State haven in neighboring Salahuddin province.
Parallel operations were launched late September targeting IS havens in western Anbar.
A wide-scale campaign launched with the backing of a U.S.-led coalition in 2016 to recapture areas occupied by IS since 2014, when the militants declared a self-styled “caliphate” rule in Iraq and neighboring Syria based in Iraq’s Mosul.
Iraqi government, coalition and paramilitary forces recaptured Mosul, the group’s former capital, and the neighboring town of Tal Afar early July and late August.