Why America Invaded Iraq
Why did America invade Iraq in 2003? Was it for oil? Or was it because Saddam Hussein was a mass-murdering dictator who harbored terrorists and threatened the region with Weapons of Mass ...
By: PragerUniversity
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Why America Invaded Iraq - Video
ISIS Is The Newest Threat To Iraq #39;s Oldest Artifacts
The destruction of antiquities in Iraq is nothing new, but the pace at which ISIS is doing it has preservationists racing to protect them. Follow Sebastian Martinez: http://www.twitter.com/sebasti...
By: Newsy World
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ISIS Is The Newest Threat To Iraq's Oldest Artifacts - Video
BAGHDAD Iraq's government is investigating reports that theancientarchaeological site of Khorsabad in northern Iraq is the latest to be attacked by theIslamicStatemilitant group.
Adel Shirshab, the country's tourism and antiquities minister, told The Associated Press there are concerns the militants will remove artifacts and damage the site, located 15 kilometers (9 miles) northeast of Mosul. Saeed Mamuzini, a Kurdish official from Mosul, told the AP that the militants had already begun demolishing the Khorsabad site on Sunday, citing multiple witnesses.
On Friday, the group razed 3,000-year old Nimrud and on Saturday, they bulldozed 2,000-year old Hatra both UNESCO world heritage sites. U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki Moon has called the destruction a "war crime," and a statement by his spokesman on Sunday night said Ban was "outraged by the continuing destruction of cultural heritage in Iraq" by theIslamicStategroup.
Khorsabad was constructed as a new capital of Assyria by King Sargon II shortly after he came to power in 721 B.C. and abandoned after his death in 705 B.C. It features a 24-meter thick wall with a stone foundation and seven gates.
Since it was a single-era capital, few objects linked to Sargon II himself were found. However, the site is renowned for shedding light on Assyrian art and architecture.
The sculptured stone slabs that once lined the palace walls are now displayed in museums in Baghdad, Paris, London and Chicago.
TheIslamicStategroup currently controls about a third of Iraq and Syria. The Sunni extremist group has been campaigning to purgeancientrelics they say promote idolatry that violates their fundamentalist interpretation ofIslamiclaw. A video released last week shows them smashing artifacts in the Mosul museum and in January, the group burned hundreds of books from the Mosul library and Mosul University, including many rare manuscripts.
At a press conference earlier Sunday, Shirshab said they have called for an extraordinary session of the U.N. Security Council to address the crisis in Iraq.
"The world should bear the responsibility and put an end to the atrocities of the militants, otherwise I think the terrorist groups will continue with their violent acts," he said.
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Iraq investigates reports of third ancient site looted by ISIS militants
TIKRIT, Iraq, March 2 (UPI) -- Iraq has launched a military offensive against the Islamic State to gain control of the strategic city of Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's hometown.
Iraqi security forces are attacking from different fronts in the large-scale offensive in the city about 90 miles north of Baghdad. Tikrit and Mosul, Iraq's second-largest city, fell into Islamic State capture last summer.
About 20,000 government troops and 4,500 militia members, mostly Shiite members but also some Sunni, are participating in the attack and the Iraqi military is nearing the heart of the city, according to BBC News.
Airstrikes are being conducted against the IS and many of its militants have retreated from areas surrounding Tikrit.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said it was the "last chance" for Sunni tribal fighters to abandon support of the Islamic State in Tikrit. Sunni insurgents began to support IS after months of protesting a Shiite-led government.
Former loyalists to Saddam Hussein also joined the Islamic State's efforts.
"I call upon those who have been misled or committed a mistake to lay down arms and join their people and security forces in order to liberate their cities," al-Abadi said Sunday during a news conference.
Reclaiming Tikrit is a strategic first step in retaking the Islamic State stronghold in northern Iraq -- Mosul, which was populated with more than a million people before it fell to IS capture.
U.S. military officials said the operation to retake Mosul could begin as early as April, depending on the degree of preparation by Iraqi security forces.
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Iraq begins offensive against Islamic State to recapture Tikrit
KIRKUK, Iraq Shiite prayers billow from a mosque loudspeaker at a sprawling Iraqi military base on the fringes of the northern oil-rich city of Kirkuk as Shiite militiamen, most of them in mismatched military fatigues, shuttle back and forth to nearby front-lines, eager for a taste of victory against the Islamic State group.
When ISIS militants blitzed across northern and western Iraq last year, tens of thousands of Shiite men answered a call-to-arms by the country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, to defend the nation against the Sunni extremists.
Now the Shiite militiamen have arrived in Kirkuk, long one of Iraq's most hotly disputed territories, and have made a string of bases just six miles from the city their home. A marriage of convenience has since emerged with Iraq's strained Kurdish forces, which had been exclusively in charge of the city since last year when they repelled ISIS advances.
As they face a common enemy, the unexpected and often uncomfortable alliance between the Kurdish and Shiite rivals is on display. The friction is feeding the combustible inter-ethnic competition over who will ultimately get control of the city.
The Shiite fighters, officially known as the Popular Mobilization Forces, were instrumental in helping the Iraqi military which dissolved in the face of the militants' initial onslaught in northern Iraq stall the ISIS push outside Baghdad. They have also teamed up with Kurdish peshmerga fighters in a number of battles, breaking the siege of the northern Shiite-majority town of Amirli in August, and recently, driving Islamic State militants out of a string of towns in Diyala province, northeast of the Iraqi capital.
But their arrival in Kirkuk, 180 miles north of Baghdad, has provoked deep-rooted sensitivities. Kurdish forces claimed control of Kirkuk just days after the Islamic State group swept across northern Iraq, seizing major cities, including Mosul and Tikrit. Kirkuk, located along the fluid line that separates Kurdish northern Iraq from the rest of the country, is home to Arabs, Kurds and Turkmen, and all have competing claims to the area. The Kurds have long wanted to incorporate the city into their semi-autonomous region, but Arabs and Turkmen oppose this.
The Kurdish troops held their ground, but ISIS attempted a comeback. With what the Kurds say was assistance from a Sunni sleeper cell in the city, Islamic State extremists stormed an abandoned Kirkuk hotel last month, then staged a surprise attack on a Kurdish peshmerga outpost, killing a top commander and several of his troops.
The apparently coordinated attack was a blow to the Kurds and underscored their tenuous hold on the city, while the semi-autonomous Kurdish government appealed for more weapons and training from the U.S.-led coalition forces.
Since then, thousands of fighters from a handful of militias such as the powerful Iran-backed Badr Brigades, have flooded into Kirkuk and the surrounding Tamim province.
Kirkuk Governor Najmaldin Karim welcomed the Shiite forces but Massoud Barzani , the president of the Kurdish regional government, insisted that the Shiite militiamen would be "prohibited under any circumstances" from entering the city.
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Iraq's Shiite militias rush to defend oil-rich Kirkuk from Islamic State