Events in the battle against ISIS have been overshadowed by other situations…..like a plane crash…..religious intolerance……you know menial crap!

I want to keep my readers ahead of the game as far as the Middle East goes…….

Item 1–The battle for the Northern Iraqi city of Tikirt is over….at least that is what the Iraqis are saying…..but is it?

Iraqi officials are bragging about a “magnificent victory” over ISIS in Tikrit, and the “liberation” of the Sunni city from foreign Islamists. The liberation looks an awful lot like another ugly occupation.

Shi’ite militias that led the offensive against Tikrit are now carrying out lynchings, insisting the people they are summarily executing are ISIS sympathizers, dragging their bodies through the streets on parade.

Then there’s the looting. The militias are gleefully running amok in Tikrit, ransacking stores and private residences, and burning homes seemingly for the run of it.

It is getting uglier by the week in Iraq….

Item 2–The Iraqis are getting cocky thanx to the ‘win’ in Tikrit…….

Iraqi officials are brimming with confidence after the capture of the city of Tikrit from ISIS. Don’t let the ugly round of lynchings and looting fool you, they’re seeing it as a trend.

Now, Iraq is ordering their military to wipe out ISIS nationwide by the end of the year, with military sources saying the aim was to have them in full retreat “within a few months.”

Me thinks that these people have gotten a bit over-confident……

Item 3–ISIS has entered into a Palestinian refugee camp and fighting is heavy in Syria…….

A surprise Wednesday offensive by ISIS saw them taking a large portion of the Yarmouk refugee camp in metro Damascus, and on Thursday they’d lost most of it back in the face of opposition from Palestinian fighters.

Within hours, ISIS launched a counter-counteroffensive, and had regained portions of the camp that they’d lost, leaving them in control of an unspecified, but significant, percentage of it.

The PLO is doing the fighting and doing the dying……..

Could the PLO and Hamas become willing partners in the fight against ISIS?

Item 4–The big plan for combating ISIS is the arming and training of Syrian rebels….but just how effect will this be?

U.S. military officials had been vetting the first unit of Syrian fighters slated to join a new force to be trained by the United States and allied nations. But when violence flared up in the unit’s home area, the fighters made a decision to stay home and defend their communities, forcing U.S military officials to line up an alternate unit.

That last-minute scramble delayed the launch of the training program by several weeks to sometime in May, military officials said. It is also a sign of the obstacles the United States and its allies face as they try to build a rebel force, from a distance, in the midst of Syria’s civil war.

A senior military official said that training preparations had been held up “due to the fluid environment in Syria” but were now moving ahead. Training sites will eventually be opened in Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Qatar and Jordan.

Maybe it is time to re-evaluate this whole damn plan….it is met with delay after delay…….a substantially well trained force looks to be further away than when the situation began.

Item 5–The next great battle, according to the Iraqi officials, is Mosul, the largest city that ISIS has taken in its run up to today……..but there is a problem brewing in the plan for Mosul…….

TIKRIT, Iraq – Mosul’s exiled governor Atheel Nujaifi ruled out any role for the Hashd al-Shaabi Shiite militia in the battle for Mosul, Iraq’s second-largest city and ISIS’ Iraq stronghold since the militants captured it 10 months ago.

After a crucial role in liberating Tikrit from ISIS, fighting alongside the Iraqi Army, the militia’s leaders have been eyeing the bigger anticipated battle for Mosul.

The presence of Hashd al-Shaabi in Mosul will cause sectarian tensions. The Iraqi government already agreed to exclude the group in the Mosul operation,” Nujaifi told Rudaw.

Sectarian in-fighting can be as harmful to Iraq as ISIS……..

Item 6–With the relative success of the Iraqi Army and militias the world seems to think that it will be Mosul as the next ‘big’ action…..but is it?

The success in liberating Tikrit presents Iraqi leaders with their next choice — determining when to begin operations to retake Mosul and Anbar. According to most predictions, the next battle will be in Anbar, because that confrontation does not require the degree of political consensus that will be necessary before the battle for Mosul can get underway.

Although the tribes in Anbar will partner with Iraqi forces, Mosul’s situation is more complex because of an overlapping of Kurdish peshmerga forces with units being trained by Atheel al-Nujaifi, the Mosul governor, with the help of Turkey and the United States. The participation of the PMU at Tikrit required taking a number of factors into consideration. It was difficult to devise an arrangement for coordinating the popular forces and the international support being provided. Developing an effective configuration of forces in Anbar will necessitate reaching understandings with the various tribes in the province.

Read more: http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2015/04/iraq-tikrit-victory-islamic-state-battle-mosul-anbar.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter#ixzz3WtQ5k5Kb

Good day….and welcome to the briefing……

The conflict against ISIS drags on and there is little to report….lots to say and most of it is all hearsay and misinformation…….these briefings are slowing down because I cannot confirm most I see and read……I want to give my readers truth…..so please forgive the slowness of these briefings…..

Item 1–The battle for Tikrit and Kirkuk rages on and info is in short supply…..

Iraqi security forces and allied militias burned and looted homes and destroyed entire villages in territory retaken from the Islamic State (IS) extremist group, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday.

These violations took place after government troops and militias broke a siege on the town of Amerli in August last year with the help of US and Iraqi airstrikes. Businesses, residences, public buildings and even mosques in the area were subsequently razed, possessions of Sunni residents looted and entire properties and villages destroyed using explosives and demolition equipment, according to evidence gathered by HRW.

The problem is sectarian in nature and this is only building…..

Item 2–The battle to re-take Tikrit has slowed……supplies are being blamed….but the truth is that ISIS snipers are taking a toll on the attackers….

Item 3–

Good day and we shall waste no time getting to the point……

Item 1–The troop build up continues….only it is NOT all the US doing so……

The UK is to send nearly 60 extra Army personnel to Iraq to support the fight against self-proclaimed Islamic State (IS) militants, it has been announced.

Defence Secretary Michael Fallon said: “This counter-IED training will give Iraqi forces a vital capability in taking the fight to Isil and is another example of our commitment to the campaign against Isil.

“Along with our airstrikes, Britain is making a major contribution to training Iraqi forces to help them defend their country.

Item 2–ISIS is attempting to eliminate the noise of battle from its troops……

ISIS really wants to make sure it covers all its bases: A recruitment video released yesterday stars two deaf and mute fighters using sign language. “We, the deaf and mute, direct our message to the Islamic world,” the video begins, per Vocativ. The video, titled “From Who Excused (sic) To Those Not Excused,” “represents an attempt by the group to recruit other physically or otherwise impaired individuals, as well as demonstrates the multifaceted responsibilities of those in its ranks,” a researcher tells NBC News. Those “multifaceted responsibilities” apparently include directing traffic, as that is what the fighters are doing (while heavily armed) in the video.

Item 3–As Iraqi forces attack to retake Tikrit, is the US seemingly sitting it out?

The Tikrit campaign lays bare the layered dilemmas facing the U.S. in Iraq. For months, Washington has sought to paint its war against ISIL as separate from, if parallel to, that of Iran and its Shia proxies — a line is growing harder to maintain. As Tikrit shows, the U.S. is uneasy about the leading role Iran has taken against ISIL, an effort that is spearheaded on many fronts, including in Tikrit, by hard-line Shia militias that many say are liable to exacerbate the alienation of Iraq’s Sunni minority. Sectarian resentments were part of what made ISIL’s surge across Sunni lands in Iraq last June possible, with Sunnis in many areas allowing ISIL forces to move in unchallenged or even providing local conscripts. With Iraq’s fight against ISIL taking an increasingly sectarian cast, the U.S. is staying behind the scenes, limiting its role to airstrikes or military advisers.

Oh God…..playing politics in a time of war…..truly a disgusting turn of events……

Item 4–The Arab league has issued a statement…….

The Arab League called for the creation of a regional force to combat militants as countries face a growing threat from Islamic State and other groups.

Speaking at the opening session of an Arab League meeting of foreign ministers, Secretary General Nabil el-Araby called for action.

“What is required now and urgently is to look into creating a…multi-national force that is able to look at what unites them in terms of responsibilities in the areas of quick intervention to fight terroism, the activities of terrorist groups, helping in peacekeeping operations and securing humanitarian operations,” he said.

Okay unless I missed something…..is not that what the US-led Coalition is suppose to be?

Item 5–Does ISIS have an eye for Lebanon?

A group of young men from Akkar were recruited to an ISIS cell recently and traveled to Turkey with the intention of undergoing training in a militant camp in Syria, sources told The Daily Star Tuesday.

Is Lebanon in the sights?  If Iraq goes bad….will they surface in Lebanon?

Update:  As writing of this SITREP….reports coming out of Iraq say that the Iraqis are winning the battle for Tikrit………Iraqi forces are claiming major progress in the ongoing war with ISIS saying they seized the town of al-Alam, just north of Tikrit, and have made their “final push” into the major Sunni city.  This may be a typical chest thumping by the army…..awaiting confirmation before going any further with this story.

Item 6–The new SecState has hit the ground running with the war drums……

Top administration officials, including Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter, are pushing hard for Congress to sign off on President Obama’s Authorization for the Use of Military Force (AUMF) against ISIS.

Carter claimed ISIS is “metastasizing” outside of Syria and Iraq, and that US military action is “desperately needed” to counter them. US military action has been going on for months now, of course, without the AUMF.

Item 7–US main strategy in Iraq is religious unity as well as a unity government…..but events are not cooperating….

Taking back ISIS-held towns for the Iraqi military has become a much bigger long-term problem than anyone expected. It’s not just the fighting that’s the problem, it’s the brutality that comes afterward.

Iraq claims they’re investigating reports of atrocities carried out by the Shi’ite militias, but those investigations never go anywhere. It’s not just the militias, either, with Iraqi troops getting involved oftentimes.

With the US couching their entire Iraq strategy on religious unity, an admittedly unrealistic plan in the first place, regular sectarian massacres are really leaving that plan in tatters. Iraqi Sunnis may not like living under ISIS control, but they may look fondly back on that if living under Shi’ite occupation is too brutal.

A problem that must be solved before any measure of success can be counted.

This concludes the briefing…..have a great weekend and we will be back next week.

Thanx for your time and attention.

Turn The Page!

Good day my friends and welcome to the briefing……

Item 1–Recently a story showed up that ISIS was kidnapping Syrian Christians…..

The Islamic State group released at least 19 Christians today who were among the more than 220 people the militants took captive in northeastern Syria last week, activists and a local leader said. The news provided a modicum of relief to a Christian Assyrian community that has been devastated by the abductions, which saw ISIS fighters haul off entire families from a string of villages along the Khabur River in Hassakeh province. But fears remain over the fate of the hundreds still held captive. A senior official in the Assyrian Democratic Organization said the 16 men and three women arrived safely today at the Church of the Virgin Mary in Hassakeh. He said the 19—all of them from the village of Tal Ghoran—had traveled by bus from the ISIS-held town of Shaddadeh.

The question to ask now is…..To what end is this offer of humanity?

Item 2–Seems that US backed rebels are not fairing well in Syria……

The first of several US-armed Syrian rebel groups to show off their newly acquired heavy weaponry to the CIA, the Hazm Movement has today announced its dissolution.

The Hazm fighters had been a target of al-Qaeda in recent months, with al-Qaeda’s Nusra Front targeting them in retaliation for US airstrikes. The group had lost virtually all of its bases and is now simply giving up outright.

The statement says that what fighters remain and intend to continue their involvement in the rebellion will be joining the Shamiyah Front, which is an alliance of several Islamist factions active in Aleppo.

Hopefully this does not crap on the plan to arm “moderate” rebel groups…..

Item 3–Iraq and the Us are at odds about the Tikrit offensive…….

Tensions between Iraq and the United States over how to battle the Islamic State broke into the open on Tuesday, as Iraqi officials declared that they would fight on their own timetable with or without American help, and as United States warplanes conspicuously sat out the biggest Iraqi counteroffensive yet amid concerns over Iran’s prominent role.

On Monday, Iraq launched a politically sensitive operation to oust Islamic State militants from Tikrit, the birthplace of Saddam Hussein, without seeking American approval, officials said. Even as Iraq was taking a first step into a bigger battle to oust the Islamic State from the northern city of Mosul, it was also signaling that its alliance with the United States might be more fraught than officials had let on.

This could be a bigger issue as the fight against ISIS gets larger and more intense.

Item 4–US is losing most of its ‘moderate’ rebel groups….but there is a plan to change that…..

The dissolution of the Hazm Movement, one of the last US-armed “moderate” rebel factions in northern Syria, has created a paucity of factions for the US to throw weapons at, at a time when the Pentagon is talking up the creation of a huge moderate force.

Enter al-Qaeda? It’s hard to imagine, but Director of National Intelligence (DNI) James Clapper is insisting now that moderates are “anyone who is not affiliated with ISIS,” and that the only obstacle to arming such groups are the international rules of law.

AQ  a moderate rebel group?  I want whatever it is they are smoking.

Item 5–All the talk in DC and the American people seldom get to hear the proposals…..here is one the MSM should have reported but did not……

Testifying today at the House Appropriations Committee, Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey said it was likely that US ground troops would “eventually” be needed in the ISIS war inside Syria.

Gen. Dempsey, who has been talking up the idea of US combat forces on the ground in Iraq, insisted that “moderate” Syrian rebels might need direct US military backing, with special forces as well as close-air support, to challenge ISIS.

Hang on to your cajones……yet another Middle East country that we may need to occupy…..sound good to you?

Item 6–Finally….ISIS is chomping at the bit to engage US troops…….this newest offensive may give them an excuse…….

IS appears to be planning, or hoping, to challenge the United States in a ground fight in the vast areas of Iraq and Syria. IS believes that no matter how strong and numerous US regular forces are, they will not be able to win against its trained irregular fighters who have been confronting Iraqi forces in northwestern Iraq. The organization wants a repeat of the battle of Fallujah in 2004, when the United States failed to overwhelm the militia fighters in the city and lost a number of Marines before retreating. With the quantitative and qualitative progress it has made, IS envisions causing even greater losses among US troops.

Direct participation by US forces in a war against IS would be used to provide legitimacy to IS propaganda portraying the fighting as evidence of the ongoing Western crusade against Islam. This could help the group mobilize more supporters in majority Muslim countries and among Muslim communities in the West. It could also help expand the combat zone by activating IS cells to carry out attacks in the West and eventually lead Western states to withdraw from the region, enabling IS to impose its will.