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发帖数: 29846 | 1 BAGHDAD – Militants with the Islamic State group on Monday claimed control
of a key military training camp in Anbar province -- which Iraqi officials
called a "tactical retreat" -- as a spate of deadly bombings shook Baghdad,
hitting mostly Shiite neighborhoods and leaving at least 30 dead.
Meanwhile, a source tells Fox News that ISIS fighters hold nearly 50 percent
of the Syria border town of Kobani, which has been the focus of fierce
fighting between ISIS and Kurdish forces, backed up by US-led coalition
airstrikes. The fall of Kobani would be a major victory for the Islamic
State, and would raise new concerns that the Sunni militant group is making
gains despite U.S.-led coalition airstrikes.
Islamic State extremists have carved out a vast stretch of territory from
northern Syria to the outskirts of Baghdad and imposed a harsh version of
Islamic rule. The fighters have massacred hundreds of captured Iraqi and
Syrian soldiers, terrorized religious minorities, and beheaded two American
journalists and two British aid workers. Hundreds of thousands of refugees
have fled into Turkey from Syria ahead of the militants.
Monday’s attacks in Iraq, came as Iraqi Shiites marked a major holiday for
their sect with families crowding the streets in celebration. Iraqi troops
, overstretched and overwhelmed by the Islamic State group's summer blitz
that seized large swaths of territory in western and northern Iraq,
continued to come under intense pressure Monday in the western Anbar
province, where militants seized an Iraqi military training camp.
The camp, near the town of Hit that fell to the insurgents earlier this
month, was overrun in the morning hours after clashes with Iraqi soldiers,
who were abandon the camp and withdraw from the area, two Anbar officials
told The Associated Press, speaking on condition of anonymity because they
were not authorized to talk to the media. Town residents confirmed the camp'
s fall, speaking to the AP also on condition of anonymity, fearing for their
own safety.
The Islamic State group touted its conquest of the camp in a statement
Monday. The statement couldn't immediately be verified but it was posted on
websites commonly used by the group.
In Baghdad, which has largely been spared of the violence seen in other
parts of the country amid the Islamic State group's onslaught, bombings
killed at least 30 people and wounded scores more on Monday, hitting three
Shiite-majority neighborhoods. The attacks came as many Iraqi Shiites
families took to the streets to celebrate the Eid al-Ghadeer holiday, which
commemorates the Shiite Imam Ali, the Prophet Muhammad's cousin and son-in-
law and the sect's most sacred martyr.
In the eastern Habibiya district, police said 15 people died and 34 were
wounded when a suicide bomber rammed his explosive-laden car into a police
checkpoint. Earlier, a car bomb struck near a bus stop in northern Baghdad,
killing 11 and wounding 22. And in the sprawling district of Sadr City, a
bomb hidden in a vegetable cart went off, killing four and wounding 18.
Hospital officials confirmed the casualties. All spoke on condition of
anonymity because they were not authorized to brief the media.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attacks but the Islamic
State group says it has a foothold inside Baghdad and has claimed several
large-scale bombings in the city in the past months, particularly in the
Shiite stronghold of Sadr City.
In Anbar, the capture of the Iraqi military camp despite the U.S. airtrsikes
' campaign. The U.S. military, which withdrew its forces from Iraq in late
2011 after more than eight years of war, first launched the airstrikes in
early August to help Iraqi and Kurdish ground forces fight back and retake
ground lost to the Islamic State group. The strikes in Iraq were followed in
September by the first U.S.-led airstrikes in Syria, where the Islamic
State group has captured much of the country's east, declaring a self-styled
caliphate on the territory under its control straddling the Iraqi-Syria
border.
A suicide bomber from the Islamic State extremist group detonated his
explosives-laden vehicle in Kobani Monday, as fierce fighting with Kurdish
militiamen resumed in the northern Syrian town near the Turkish border.
The sound of explosions and occasional gunfire could be heard across the
border from Kobani a day after Kurdish fighters managed to slow the advance
of the jihadist group.
Activists said Islamic State militants were carrying out a three-pronged
attack from the eastern side of the town and that clashes were ongoing in
the southern part.
The Syrian Kurdish enclave has been the scene of heavy fighting since late
last month, with the better-armed Islamic State fighters determined to
capture the border post.
Meanwhile, British Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond on a visit to Iraq
warned that the airstrikes will not be enough to defeat the militant group
and stressed that the Iraqi security forces would have to do the "heavy work
on the ground."
More than a dozen countries have entered the fight, providing air power,
weapons or humanitarian assistance to more than a million Iraqi's people
displaced by the militant offensive.
The British government joined the U.S.-led aerial campaign on Sept. 30.
However, it has refused to join the air campaign in Syria, where the U.S.
has been joined by a coalition of Arab partners. The use of foreign ground
troops in the battle against the Islamic State group has been frowned upon,
both by the Iraqi government and by those foreign governments providing
assistance.
"'The coalition can only deliver effective support to the Iraqi government
and Iraqi security forces," said Britain's top diplomat during his visit to
Baghdad on Monday. "The Iraqi people, the Iraqi security forces and Iraqi
government will have to take the lead on the ground."
"We always understood that our campaign alone was not effective to be
decisive in turning the tide against ISIL," Hammond added, using an
alternate acronym for the militant group. "But it has halted the ISIL
advance, it has forced ISIL to change its tactics and it is degrading their
military capabilities and their economic strength, their ability to exploit
oil revenues, for example."
The U.S. military said Sunday it conducted an airstrike southwest of Hit in
Anbar, destroying a militant armored vehicle. It said another airstrike
southeast of Hit targeted an armored personnel carrier. Airstrikes were also
conducted near the Iraqi cities of Ramadi and Kirkuk, U.S. Central Command
said.
The Associated Press and Fox's Greg Palkot contributed to this report. |
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