Contents: Iranian, American, Saudi military head for confrontation off Yemen; In repeat of Mosul disaster, Iraqi army abandoned US weapons in Ramadi; Report: Saudi Arabia seeking nuclear weapons from Pakistan
This victory will permit ISIS to threaten Baiji, Iraq’s largest oil refinery, as well as the villages in the suburbs around Baghdad, and Baghdad itself. Furthermore, weapons stores and other assets in Ramadi were not destroyed and are available to ISIS.
With all due respect to Nigerian media, it should be noted that at the time of this writing, only Nigerian outlets seem to be reporting on the alleged death of five Boko Haram militants in Mosul, Iraq, where they were said to be training with Islamic State fighters.
Harjit Masih, a 25-year-old Indian national, returned from Iraq to his native country this week after he and 39 other Indians working in Iraq were abducted by the Islamic State. He claims he survived by playing dead after being missed in a firing squad lineup, and that his colleagues are all dead, but the Indian government is denying the report, insisting the men are still alive.
On Tuesday, the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) destroyed the 200-year-old Maryam Khatoon Mosque in Mosul, Iraq, which the Ottoman Empire erected in 1821.
Josef Yousif, the director of the Alqush Museum in Mosul, believes his museum is the next target.
The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL/IS) has opened the first five-star hotel in its self-declared Caliphate. The Ninawa Hotel in Mosul, a favorite among visitors on TripAdvisor, is now open to all commanders who visit the region.
Hundreds of captive Yazidis have been shot and killed by Islamic State jihadis near Mosul, Iraq, according to sources from Yazidi and Iraqi officials, and local news outlets.
According to the World Tribune, the latest demand inflicted upon the captive population of Mosul by their ISIS overlords is a ban against shaving male beards. The terror state has decreed that beards are mandatory under sharia law.
Aymenn Al-Tamimi, a Shillman-Ginsburg Fellow at the Middle East Forum at the Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya in Israel, reports that Islamic State in Iraq and Syria has established a bureaucracy to grant birth certificates and medical care to its residents.
Bashar Matti Warda, the Chaldean archbishop of Erbil, has had more firsthand experience than most with the atrocities of the Islamic State, a group that he describes as “a cancer” in the Middle East.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi is in Washington for his first visit in office, and is scheduled for a meeting with President Obama at which he will request a massive increase in military aid against the Islamic State. A senior Iraqi official told Reuters, “We’re talking about billions here… This is a new approach for us because of the scale of the challenge we have ahead. Mosul and Nineveh province and Anbar will cost us a lot.”
Cardinal Vincent Nichols, the Archbishop of Westminster, reported that the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) turned the Catholic cathedral in Mosul into a mosque.
According to a report at the Times of Israel, the children were marched out of classrooms, loaded into military vehicles, and taken to an unknown location to be trained as fighters for the terror state — a training that culminates in a beheading.
Another day in the Islamist paradise created by ISIS, as women in the captive city of Mosul find themselves surrounded by billboards announcing the body-bag look is the hot new summer fashion, it’ll be in style forever, and fashion crimes will be punished.
The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) released images of a couple being stoned to death in Iraq. The militants charged the man and woman with having sex before marriage.
Two weeks ago, the seemingly effective Iraqi operation to retake the city of Tikrit from ISIS ground to an abrupt halt, the “final push” delayed for an indefinite period out of concerns over collateral damage, according to Iraqi officials. It was widely speculated the more pertinent problem was that Islamic State forces proved to be much harder to dislodge than anyone wanted to admit, so time was needed to bring up reinforcements and prepare the battlespace.
Iraq’s battle for Tikrit reaches a standstill, humiliating Iran; Disorganization plagues Iraq’s soldiers assaulting Tikrit; Correction to yesterday’s report on France’s elections; Greece’s Tsipras visits Germany’s Merkel and demands reparations
US veteran Brett Felton told CBS’ 60 Minutes that he returned to Iraq to fight against the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) to defend the Christians the terrorist group is liquidating as they expand their caliphate through the Middle East.
The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) is in the process transforming their self-proclaimed Iraqi capital Mosul into a moated city by digging trenches and constructing other forms of fortifications around it.
ISIS believes “ancient relics promote idolatry that violates their fundamentalist interpretation of Islamic law.”
Baghdad museum director Fawzye al-Mahdi claims the “invaluable artifacts” at a Mosul museum that the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) destroyed in a video are in fact replicas.
Lebanese terror group Hezbollah, at the behest of Iran, is expected to send around 800 of its elite militants to fight alongside Iraqi forces and Shiite militias to retake Mosul from the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL), reports the London-based al-Araby al-Jadeed newspaper.
According to a statement from the Kurdish Regional Security Council, the Islamic State has crossed that fabled WMD “red line” by deploying chemical weapons against Kurdish peshmerga forces fighting along the Iraqi border with Syria, near the captive city of Mosul.
The tomb of Iraq’s late dictator Saddam Hussein was virtually leveled in heavy clashes between militants from the Islamic State group and Iraqi security forces in a fight for control of the city of Tikrit.
ISIS now charges high “departure taxes” on territory they control, requiring civilians to sign over the title to a car or a family home in order to leave for only two weeks.
Fears grow of Shia revenge killings in Iraq; Russia plans military development, including nuclear weapons, in Crimea
NBC News reports the latest ISIS recruitment video features “two deaf and mute fighters communicating in sign language in what analysts said was an attempt to demonstrate ‘normal’ life for everyone under the brutal terrorist group’s domination.”
As the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) expands, members are reporting rifts in various factions of the group. Those who have fled the group and residents in areas the jihadist group controls claim that the more fighters the group recruits, the more problems ISIS leaders have begun to face.
The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) destroyed the archaeological site of Hatra in northern Iraq. As the terrorist group extends its caliphate, its jihadist soldiers exterminate anything that, in their eyes, promotes idolatry.
The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) has developed a significant volume of propaganda as they extend their caliphate through Iraq and Syria, based both on their military prowess and attempts to depict their civilians as living the good life. A tourism brochure advertising the alleged high quality of life in Mosul, Iraq is their latest effort to entice the world to join them.
WASHINGTON — Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter told a Senate panel that it was a “mistake” for a U.S. military official to divulge details of an Iraqi-led ground operation to retake Mosul from the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) in Iraq.
The U.S. is now considering launching airstrikes against Islamic State (ISIS, ISIL) targets inside Mosul for months prior to sending in Iraqi ground troops to recapture the city.
Having established themselves in Mosul, the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) has continued its efforts to destroy the history of the second-largest city in Iraq. The terrorist group published a video of militants destroying thousands years old artifacts with glee and smiles on their faces.
The Pentagon leaked that one of its training camps to help combat the Islamic State (ISIS, ISIL) is on Jordanian territory — information that the government of Jordan did not want disclosed.
The Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) burned down the Mosul public library, which was home to over 8,000 rare books and manuscripts.
On Monday, Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI)—noting the Pentagon’s astonishing desire last Thursday to speak to defense reporters about details of a prospective attack to Mosul on the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS)—said she was “mind-boggled” at what transpired.
Myriam, a young Christian girl in Iraq, and her family fled their village near Mosul before the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) reached them. Now they live in a refugee camp located in an unfinished mall with only the bare necessities. Despite the hardship, Myriam hopes God forgives the terrorist group.
There are signs that the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIL or ISIS) is in decline as the U.S. prepares a massive attack to retake Mosul from the jihadists, according to a U.S. Central Command official.
Friday on MSNBC’s “The Rundown With José Díaz-Balart,” while discussing the Obama administrations unusual move of announcing a planned military assault on the Iraq city of Mosul, NBC News’ chief foreign correspondent Richard Engel said there are “enormous questions” about
