Flashback: When DoD Hopeful Flournoy Attacked Romney for Saying Iraq Withdrawal was Mistake
Flashback: When DoD Hopeful Flournoy Attacked Romney for Saying Iraq Withdrawal was Mistake (Obama campaign video - October 21, 2012)
By: Washington Free Beacon
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Flashback: When DoD Hopeful Flournoy Attacked Romney for Saying Iraq Withdrawal was Mistake - Video
Iraqi and allied forces have wrested control of two towns in the eastern province of Diyala from the militant group Islamic State, Iraqi officials said Monday.
Saadiya and Jalawla, less than 20 miles from the Iranian border, were retaken after a two-day operation that brought together Iraqi army and police units along with Shiite paramilitary groups and Kurdish peshmerga fighters, officials said.
A statement from the Interior Ministry said the towns had been liberated "from the defiling of the terrorist gangs of Daesh," an Arabic term for Islamic State.
Vast stretches of Iraqi territory still remain under the sway of Islamic State, including much of Anbar province in the west; the northern city of Mosul, Iraqs second-most populous city; and other areas. Retaking those will be a much greater challenge.
The Badr Organization, a powerful Iraqi Shiite militia backed by Iran, was a major participant in the operation to retake Saadiya and Jalawla. According to the group's Facebook page, its leader, Iraqi Transportation Minister Hadi Amiri, led the militiamen in the attack.
More than 70 Islamic State militants were killed and survivors fled to the nearby Hamrin Mountains, said Jabar Yawar, secretary-general of the Ministry of Peshmerga, who was reached by phone in the northern city of Irbil.
"Today there are operations to comb those areas, said Yawar, referring to the mountains.
Diyala, an embattled, ethnically mixed province, was an important stronghold for Al Qaeda-affiliated militants during the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq from 2003 to 2011. Parts of the province remain under the sway of Islamic State.
The towns of Saadiya and Jalawla were overrun by Islamic State in August, part of a militant blitz through stretches of Iraq that left Iraqi and peshmerga forces reeling. Iraqi commanders say they have since regrouped and made gains against the militants, aided by U.S. airstrikes.
The militant threat to Iraq prompted a U.S.-led coalition to initiate a widescale aerial campaign to "degrade and ultimately destroy" Islamic State, in the words of President Obama.
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Iraq army, allies reclaim towns from Islamic State
BAGHDAD (AP) Baghdad's neighborhood of Gorayaat, a small Shiite enclave on a bend in the Tigris River, exemplifies the failures of Iraq's security agencies trying to protect the capital from attacks by the Islamic State. The district has been a target for years, hit by so many bombings, suicide attacks, rockets and mortars that residents have lost count.
After a car bomb ripped through its main commercial street earlier this month, killing 15 people and wounding 42, security forces responded as they have after every previous attack. Soldiers and police swarmed in to secure Gorayaat's streets. At checkpoints, they checked people's IDs, and anyone who was not a resident had to account for his presence.
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By: TomoNews US
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Iraq car bomb: driver detonates car at governors compound in Kurdish capital Erbil, kills 4 - Video
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By: Gladius Labs
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