BAGHDAD: Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi on Thursday declared the end of the militant organization, Daesh, in northern Iraq after security forces, backed by a US-led military coalition and the Shiite-dominated paramilitary troops, retook the town of Hawija and the adjacent areas.
Hawija, 45 km southwest of Kirkuk, was the last Daesh stronghold in northern Iraq. It was seized by the radical forces in 2014 after the dramatic collapse of the Iraqi army.
The town was the “Daesh command and control headquarters in the north.” It supervised and controlled militant operations on the eastern bank of the Tigris River where Kirkuk and Diyala provinces are and the western bank of the river where Nineveh and Salahuddin provinces are.
“Today, the city of Hawija was liberated by the hands of the Iraqi security forces, with nothing remaining under Daesh control except the border with Syria,” Al-Abadi said in a joint televised press conference with French Prime Minister Emmanuel Macron.
“In this case, we have defeated terrorism in Iraq. This could not have been done without the courage of our heroes and the backing of the international community, including France.”
Hawija, surrounded by mountains, was the biggest source of Daesh fighters and supplies and a haven for the group’s leaders and their families who had fled from the liberated areas. More than 78,000 people were estimated to be trapped inside Hawija, according to the UN mission in Iraq.
“The liberated areas include the center of Hawija, Abassi, Rashad and Riyadh towns in addition to 300 small villages,” a senior military officer involved in the ongoing military operation told Arab News.
“Our troops will keep advancing until they are in touch with the peshmerga (the Kurdish troops in the area), so not an inch will be left for Daesh,” the officer said.
Regaining control of Hawija facilitates the mission of the federal forces assigned to secure the oil fields in Kirkuk and get them back from the Kurdish forces, which drove the army away in the summer of 2014 and took control of them.
Baghdad seeks to impose its constitutional federal authority in the areas that were outside the borders of the Kurdish region before 2003. The Kurdish regional authorities declared a rebellion against the constitution and the federal government by holding a controversial referendum on Kurdish independence late last month.
“We do not want an armed confrontation (with Kurdistan) nor do we do want any hostility or clashes, but federal authority must be imposed in these areas,” Al-Abadi said in the conference.
“My call is for the peshmerga to be part of the federal forces and to operate under its command in order to secure these (disputed) areas,” he added.
Backed by Iraqi and international military aviation, the military operation to re-take Hawija and the nearby areas was launched on Sept. 21 with the participation of thousands of Iraqi troops, including the counterterrorism squad, the federal police, armed units, and some Popular Mobilization Units.
Lt. Gen. Ra’ad Jawdat, the commander of the Iraqi Federal Police during the operation, said 270 militants were killed, 640 square km of land was seized and 141 targets were liberated.
Dislodging Daesh militants from these areas is expected to take time; on the other hand, Iraqi forces did not need more than two days to liberate Hawija itself, military sources told Arab News.
Military officers and analysts said that the morale of Daesh fighters was significantly affected by the group’s huge losses in Mosul, Tal Afar and Shirqat towns during the last few months. Daesh lost more than 20,000 fighters during the military operations launched by the Iraqis to re-take Mosul, the largest Iraqi city seized by the extremists.
“Daesh fighters have been feeling that there was no point in fighting. Their will to fight was broken,” Maj. Gen. Abdulkareem Khalaf, former manager of operations at the Interior Ministry, told Arab News.
“Daesh leaders are fugitives, on the run, and unable to maintain contact with each other. Their central command is missing and the severe airstrikes carried out by US forces in the region prior to the launch of the operation all contributed to the militants’ rapid collapse,” Khalaf said.
Al-Abadi and several military officers contacted by Arab News said that the next target for the Iraqi security forces would be the western Iraqi-Syrian border which extends for more than 600 km.
“Gaining control of the borders means regaining control of security in Iraq. All our troubles and disasters over the last few years have come across the Syrian border,” Khalaf said.
“Al-Abadi’s next priority is securing the Iraqi border. The first stage will be the Iraqi-Syrian borders as the situation there is urgent; then the Iraqi-Turkish border, and the last stage will be securing the remainder,” he added.
Related reports — Page 6
Daesh loses its last stronghold in northern Iraq
Daesh loses its last stronghold in northern Iraq
Fresh air strike hits Sanaa, say Houthis
- Strikes came in response to series of Houthi attacks on Israel
- No immediate comment from Israel, the US or Britain
SANAA: An air strike hit Yemen’s capital on Friday, a day after deadly Israeli raids, according to the Iran-backed Houthis who blamed the US and Britain for the latest attack.
A Houthi statement cited “US-British aggression” for the new attack, as witnesses also reported the blast.
There was no immediate comment from Israel, the United States or Britain.
“I heard the blast. My house shook,” one resident of the Houthi-held capital Sanaa told AFP.
The attack followed Thursday’s Israeli raids on infrastructure including Sanaa’s international airport that left six people dead.
The strikes came in response to a series of Houthi attacks on Israel.
The Houthis have also been firing on the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden shipping route for months, prompting a series of reprisal strikes by US and British forces.
Turkiye to allow pro-Kurdish party to visit jailed militant leader
- Militant leader Ocalan is serving life sentence in prison on the island of Imrali
- Pro-Kurdish DEM Party meeting is the first such visit in nearly a decade
ANKARA: Turkiye has decided to allow parliament’s pro-Kurdish DEM Party to hold face-to-face talks with militant leader Abdullah Ocalan on his island prison, the party said on Friday, setting up the first such visit in nearly a decade.
DEM requested the visit last month, soon after a key ally of President Tayyip Erdogan expanded on a proposal to end the 40-year-old conflict between the state and Ocalan’s outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).
Ocalan has been serving a life sentence in a prison on the island of Imrali, south of Istanbul, since his capture 25 years ago.
Devlet Bahceli, leader of the Nationalist Movement Party, made the call a month after suggesting that Ocalan announce an end to the insurgency in exchange for the possibility of his release.
Erdogan described Bahceli’s initial proposal as a “historic window of opportunity.” After the latest call last month, Erdogan said he was in complete agreement with Bahceli on every issue and that they were acting in harmony and coordination.
“To be frank, the picture before us does not allow us to be very hopeful,” Erdogan said in parliament. “Despite all these difficulties, we are considering what can be done with a long-range perspective that focuses not only on today but also on the future.”
Bahceli regularly condemns pro-Kurdish politicians as tools of the PKK, which they deny.
DEM’s predecessor party was involved in peace talks between Ankara and Ocalan a decade ago, last meeting him in April 2015. The peace process and a ceasefire collapsed soon after, unleashing the most deadly phase of the conflict.
DEM MPs Sirri Sureyya Onder and Pervin Buldan, who both met Ocalan as part of peace talks at the time, will travel to Imrali island on Saturday or Sunday, depending on weather conditions, the party said.
Turkiye and its Western allies designate the PKK a terrorist group. More than 40,000 people have been killed in the fighting, which in the past was focused in the mainly Kurdish southeast but is now centered on northern Iraq, where the PKK is based.
Growing regional instability and changing political dynamics are seen as factors behind the bid to end the conflict with the PKK. The chances of success are unclear as Ankara has given no clues on what it may entail.
Since the fall of Bashar Assad in Syria this month, Ankara has repeatedly insisted that the Kurdish YPG militia, which it sees as an extension of the PKK, must disband, asserting that the group has no place in Syria’s future.
The YPG is the main component of the US-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
In a Reuters interview last week, SDF commander Mazloum Abdi acknowledged the presence of PKK fighters in Syria for the first time, saying they had helped fight Daesh and would return home if a total ceasefire was agreed with Turkiye, a core demand from Ankara.
Authorities in Turkiye have continued to crack down on alleged PKK activities. Last month, the government replaced five pro-Kurdish mayors in southeastern cities for suspected PKK ties, in a move that drew criticism from DEM and others.
Jordan leads Arab condemnation of Gaza hospital burning by Israeli forces
- Actions of troops are a ‘heinous war crime’ and ‘blatant violation of international law and humanitarian law,’ Jordanian Foreign Ministry says
- Qatar calls it a ‘dangerous escalation’ with potentially ‘dire consequences for the security and stability of the region’
LONDON: Jordan has described the actions of Israeli forces in clearing and burning one of the last hospitals that was still operating in northern Gaza as a “heinous war crime.”
Troops stormed the Kamal Adwan Hospital in Beit Lahia on Friday, forcing staff and patients from the building and setting fire to it.
Sufian Al-Qudah, a spokesperson for Jordan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said the attack was a “blatant violation of international law and humanitarian law. Israel is also held accountable for the safety of the hospital’s patients and medical staff.”
Jordan categorically rejects the “systematic targeting of medical personnel and facilities,” he added, and this was an attempt to destroy facilities “essential to the survival of the people in the northern Gaza Strip.”
Al-Qudah urged the international community to put pressure on Israel to halt its attacks on civilians in Gaza.
The UAE foreign ministry also said the destruction of the hospital was “deplorable.”
The ministry statement “condemned and denounced in the strongest terms the Israeli occupation forces' burning of Kamal Adwan Hospital … and the forced evacuation of patients and medical personnel.”
Qatar denounced “in the strongest terms” the attack on the hospital as a flagrant violation of international humanitarian law.
The country’s Foreign Ministry said it represented a “dangerous escalation of the ongoing confrontations, which threatens dire consequences for the security and stability of the region,” and called for the protection of the “hundreds of patients, wounded individuals and medical staff” from the hospital.
UN worker seriously hurt in Israeli Yemen strike moved to Jordan, WHO says
- WHO chief Tedros was at Sanaa airport with his team when Israel attacked
ZURICH: The UN worker hurt in an Israeli air strike on Yemen’s main international airport on Thursday suffered serious injuries and has been evacuated to Jordan for further treatment, the World Health Organization said on Friday.
Israel said it had struck multiple targets linked to the Iran-aligned Houthi movement in Yemen, including Sanaa International Airport, and Houthi media said at least six people had been killed.
“Attacks on civilians and humanitarians must stop, everywhere. #NotATarget,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a post on X that showed him sitting in a plane looking across at what appeared to be the injured man.
Tedros was at the airport waiting to depart when the aerial bombardment took place that injured the man, who worked for the UN Humanitarian Air Service. A spokesperson for the WHO said the man had been seriously injured.
Tedros said he and the UN worker were now in Jordan.
The man underwent a successful surgical procedure prior to his evacuation for further treatment, Tedros said.
He had been in Yemen to negotiate the release of detained UN staff and to assess the humanitarian situation.
Jordan’s King Abdullah reaffirms support for Syria’s sovereignty, calls for Gaza ceasefire
- King in phone conversation with French president
AMMAN: King Abdullah II reaffirmed on Friday Jordan’s commitment to supporting Syria in building a free, independent, and fully sovereign state that reflected the aspirations of all its people.
In a phone conversation with French President Emmanuel Macron, the king emphasized the importance of Syria’s security, and stability for the Middle East region as a whole. He also reiterated Jordan’s firm stance against any violations of Syria’s territorial integrity and sovereignty, Jordan News Agency reported.
Syria faced nearly 14 years of devastating civil war before the fall of President Bashar Assad’s regime earlier this month following a swift takeover by militants led by Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham.
The country remains fragmented, grappling with the challenges of rebuilding amid competing political and military influences.
The discussion between King Abdullah and Macron also addressed the ongoing Israeli war on Gaza.
The conflict, which erupted in the aftermath of a Hamas attack on Israeli territory on Oct. 7 last year, has led to a humanitarian crisis in the Palestinian enclave, with tens of thousands of lives lost and infrastructure heavily damaged.
King Abdullah called for an immediate cessation of hostilities and a strengthened humanitarian response to alleviate the suffering of Palestinians trapped there.
He also stressed the urgent need for progress toward a just and comprehensive peace in the region, underscoring the two-state solution as the basis for resolving the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
King Abdullah highlighted the importance of sustained efforts to ensure the success of the ceasefire in Lebanon.
