Islamic State suffering setbacks in Syria, Iraq
Associated Press
Published Nov 6, 2014 at 10:51 pm
(Updated Nov 6, 2014 at 10:51 pm)
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BEIRUT – For a force that has built its
reputation on an aura of momentum and invincibility, the Islamic State
group is now dealing with a series of military setbacks in Iraq and a
prolonged stalemate in the small Syrian border town of Kobani.
Gone are the days when IS was able to seize
territory in both countries with relative ease. Its newfound problems,
including a loss of oil revenue, raise questions about the extent to
which it will be able to continue recruiting fighters who want to be
with a winner.
“ISIS has run a very effective psychological
campaign to intimidate its rivals and attract support and recruits,”
said Faysal Itani, a resident fellow at the Atlantic Council, using an
acronym for the extremists. But now, he said, the need to maintain its
reputation is limiting the group’s options.
This is particularly true in Kobani, where a
pre-emptive IS withdrawal in the face of U.S.-led bombings from the sky
and ethnic Kurdish fighters on the ground could prove too costly.
“They have invested a lot in this battle, and
people are noticing. They will soon start asking what’s going on?” said
Ayed, a Turkey-based Syrian activist who travels back and forth to the
group’s stronghold in the Syrian city of Raqqa. He declined to give his
full name.
The prolonged fighting in Kobani is also
distracting IS from more strategically important areas in Syria and Iraq
where the militant extremists are already stretched on multiple fronts.
Nearly two months after IS launched its
lightning assault on the Kurdish-dominated town near Turkish border, the
group is bogged down in an increasingly entrenched and costly battle.
Syrian and Kurdish activists estimate nearly 600
Islamic State fighters have been killed – its heaviest losses since
taking over large parts of Syria and Iraq in a summer blitz.
Kurdish residents say the group appears to be
struggling with personnel, bringing in inexperienced fighters and new
recruits to reinforce the town. These include members of the IS police
force known as Hisba, reassigned from nearby towns and cities, such as
Raqqa and Manbij, under the group’s control.
“Many Hisba members have left Raqqa in the past
two weeks, telling people they were headed to Kobani,” Ayed said. They
are not fighters.”
Kobani residents say recent U.S. airstrikes
targeting IS in Kobani have inflicted heavy damage. “Their bodies are
left for days rotting in the street without anyone picking them up,”
said Farhad Shami, a Kobani-based activist.
In a move that some observers interpreted as a
sign of weakness, the Islamic State group recently released a video
showing a captive British photojournalist “reporting” from a place
identified as Kobani. In the video, he says the battle for Kobani “is
coming to an end” and IS is “mopping up.”
But despite seven weeks of fierce fighting and
the reinforcements on both sides, fighting positions around Kobani
remain much the same as they did several weeks ago, with IS controlling
about 40 percent of the town, according to Syrian and Kurdish activists
and observers.
IS has also recently suffered losses on several
fronts in Iraq, where it is fighting government forces, peshmerga and
Shiite militias aided by Iran and the Lebanese Hezbollah group.
Last week, Iraqi forces recaptured the town of
Jurf al-Sakher. IS also lost Rabia, Mahmoudiyah and Zumar, a string of
towns near the Syrian border, last month. Besieged Iraqi troops have
also managed to maintain control of Iraq’s largest oil refinery outside
the town of Beiji north of Baghdad, despite numerous attempts by the
Islamic State group to capture it.
The group’s diminishing returns in Iraq partly
reflects the fact that it already controls so much of the territory
populated by minority Sunnis. It would have a much harder time
conquering areas populated by Shiites.
But even in Sunni areas, IS is having to contend
with dissent. Over the past few days, the group has massacred more than
200 Sunni tribesmen from the Al Bu Nimr tribe in what is likely to be
revenge for the tribe’s siding with Iraqi security forces. The killings,
in which the militants lined up and shot the men, suggest IS fighters
now view them as a threat.
The group’s difficulties are striking
considering the relative ease with which it seized other towns and
cities in Iraq and Syria this past summer. In Iraq’s second largest
city, Mosul, Iraqi security forces quickly abandoned their positions and
weapons in the face of the marauding militants, melting away quickly in
humiliating defeat.
Most other towns in northern and western Iraq
saw a widespread disintegration of the security forces, mostly because
of the Islamic State group’s reputation alone in addition to grievances
among the Sunni population that the militants were able to exploit.
In Syria, the group was able to capitalize on
the chaos of the civil war to seize towns and villages abandoned by the
government, routing out rival fighters in quick succession.
By the time it got to Kobani in mid-September,
IS was stretched on multiple fronts. Riding on the momentum, however, it
captured dozens of Kurdish villages and a third of the town in
lightning advances that sent waves of civilians fleeing across the
border into Turkey. Expectations were that the town would fall to the
militants within days.
But unlike in Iraq where the militants already
had a substantial, years-long presence, the IS fighters in Kobani found
themselves in an alien environment and unfamiliar terrain, fighting
against highly motivated and surprisingly resilient Kurdish fighters,
according to Syria observers as well as Syrian and Kurdish activists.
“The Iraqi army was a severely demoralized force
that didn’t see a purpose in fighting for a central government whose
credibility they questioned,” said Shashank Joshi, a senior research
fellow at Royal United Services Institute, a British think tank.
The Kurds, on the other hand, “are fighting a truly existential battle,” he said.
A group of 150 Iraqi Kurdish forces known as
peshmerga deployed last week to Kobani with more advanced weapons
including anti-tank missiles and artillery to help bolster their Syrian
brethren defending the town. They have provided artillery cover for
fellow Kurdish fighters, but it is too early to say whether this has
already made any difference on the ground.
Bayan Jabr, an Iraqi cabinet minister, said IS
was simply fighting too many battles. He predicted a Sunni uprising in
Anbar province following the massacres targeting the Al Bu Nimr tribe.
“I think Daesh is starting to fade,” he said, using the Arab acronym for the group.
end quote from:
By the way "Daesh" is a Syrian derogatory word for ISIS.
