As the world focuses its attention on fighting the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), from Syria and Iraq to Libya, the serious dangers posed by Iran-backed Shi’ite militias in Iraq are barely noticed.

US President Barack Obama’s clear enthusiasm for the war on ISIS and his recent overtures towards Tehran have created for the latter an opportunity to tighten its grip in Syria and Iraq as well as other regional countries.

Any steps aimed at fighting ISIS, particularly in Iraq’s second largest city of Mosul which the radical group still holds, should therefore be conducted with the participation of Sunni fighters. Even those steps are not guaranteed success as long as the international community, particularly the US, continues to turn a blind eye to such violations by militias and their submission to the Iranian Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps.

With the emergence of ISIS, Washington found itself in a contradictory position: fighting in the same trench with one of its archenemies, Iran, and the allied Shi’ite militias who stand accused of committing sectarian crimes in Iraq.

As the anti-ISIS international campaign took off, Washington started to provide, whether directly or indirectly, the needed aerial cover not just for the Iraqi army but the Iran-backed militias, despite their poor human rights record across Iraq.

Both Obama and the UN Security Council have long ignored the deteriorating crisis in Iraq, turning a blind eye to countless reports relating to allegations of torture and ethnic cleansing at the hands of Shi’ite militias.

Nevertheless, Obama’s administration never ceased to sign multi-million-dollar weapon deals with the Iraqi government under former Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki—known for his sectarian policies as well as his full support for Iranian-backed militias.

Such militias include some of the most influential Shi’ite figures in Iraq, such as Hadi Al-Amri who heads the Badr Organization, Abu Mahdi Al-Muhandis who stands accused of masterminding the bombing that targeted the US and French embassies in Kuwait in 1980, and the Asa’ib Ahl Al-Haq leader Qais Al-Khazali.

On the other hand, not all Shi’ite-majority militias in Iraq are backed by Iran. Saraya Al-Salam (Brigades of peace) is one of them and operates under the authority of Iraq’s senior Shi’ite leader Moqtada Al-Sadr, who fought alongside Sunni tribes against the US occupation.

“Sadr opposed the policies of Asa’ib Ahl Al-Haq that emerged from the Mahdi Army he established a few years ago,” Renad Mansour of the Carnegie Middle East Center told Asharq Al-Awsat.

The two groups fell out after Sadr accused some of Asa’ib’s radical members of committing sectarian crimes in 2006.

The continuous coordination between those militias and the Quds Force, an elite sub-unit of Iran’s paramilitary Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, has undermined the authority of Iraq’s state institutions.

Iran’s powerful Gen. Qassem Suleimani is known for commanding the Quds Forces on several frontlines in Iraq. His powerful command has enabled Tehran to fill the vacuum left by the self-distancing approach followed by the Obama administration in Iraq.

In comments to Asharq Al-Awsat, Sinan Adnan from the Institute for the Study of War maintained that US policy towards the role of Shi’ite militias in Iraq remained vague and that “much ambiguity” surrounded US officials’ statements on the matter.

“So far there has been no clear [US] policy towards the Iranian-backed militias, and when a US official was questioned recently about the role of Shi’ite militias they only answered that they should be integrated into security forces, without giving further clarifications,” he said.

“Iranian-backed militias have carried out operations in cooperation with Iraqi security forces on local levels but we have not seen such cooperation and coordination on higher levels such as with the Ministry of Defense,” he added.

Several influential militia figures have become part of the Baghdad government’s hierarchy. Al-Hakim Al-Zamily, the leader of an Iranian-backed militia accused of running death squads, now chairs the Security Committee in the Iraqi parliament. Incumbent Minister of Interior Mohammed Al-Ghabban is a key figure at the Badr Organization, the Shi’ite militia that stands accused of committing sectarian crimes.

Adnan also highlighted the need to differentiate between militias who display absolute loyalty to Tehran and those with a nationalistic character, such as Saraya Al-Salam and the Shi’ite volunteers who responded to the call of Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani after it became clear that ISIS was posing an existential threat to the Shi’ite-led Iraqi government.

The international community in general and the Baghdad government in particular face the difficult task of restoring national stability and unity to a country that has seen its state authority diminished and future endangered thanks to the growing influence of radicalism in its Sunni and Shi’ite versions.

“When I recently spoke to Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi he said he knew well that the democratic process was enough to put an end to those militias,” Mansour added.

Source:  aawsat.net

Mossad has used specially trained cyber warfare agents to crack coded messages sent by terrorists to their operatives through popular web sites like Reddit and eBay.

The Israeli cyber warriors have tracked message boards online in search of specially encrypted messages from the likes of al-Qaida and Islamic State.

These terroristic groups often use pornographic material “to conceal documents and orders for the next target.”

Mossad has enlisted the services of linguistic specialists in Arabic, Urdu and Pashto to help decipher online material published by jihadist groups.

Once the Mossad uncovers a specific plan abroad, it alerts the relevant intelligence agencies who act on the information and thwart the plot.

Mossad cyber spies are specialize in ferreting out sites that do not appear on popular search engines like Google, Yahoo, and Bing.

It was Mossad that was behind Stuxnet, the devastating computer worm that caused severe damage to the software used by Iranian nuclear engineers.

In addition, the Iranian threat compelled Saudi officials to forge ties with Mossad, with Riyadh reportedly committing to allow Israel use of its airspace in attacking Iran.

Some 30,000 Iraqi troops and militia backed by aircraft pounded ISIL positions in and around Tikrit on Monday in the biggest offensive yet to retake one of the group’s main strongholds.

Government forces have been working their way north in recent months, notching up key victories against ISIL but the city of Tikrit – where troops have been resisted several times – is their toughest target yet.

Building on recent successes, commanders voiced hope that the broadest operation since ISIL overran swathes of the country last June would be a step towards the liberation of Mosul, the extremists’ main hub in Iraq.

“Security forces are advancing on three main fronts towards Tikrit, Ad Dawr (to the south) and Al Alam (to the north),” said a senior army officer on the ground.

The operation began early on Monday morning after being announced by prime minister Haider Al Abadi the previous evening.

The army officer said the forces involved in the battle were from the army, police, counter-terrorism units, a government-controlled volunteer group known as the Popular Mobilisation units and local Sunni tribes opposed to ISIL.

“The attack is being carried out using fighter jets, helicopters and artillery targeting Tikrit to secure the advance and cut supply routes,” he said.

Military sources said Iraqi warplanes were involved but it was not immediately clear whether foreign air support – Iranian or from the US-led coalition fighting ISIL – was also called in.

According to both Iraqi and Iranian media, Qassem Suleimani – commander of the Al Quds Force covert operations unit of Tehran’s elite Revolutionary Guards – was in Salahuddin province to help coordinate operations.

Mr Al Abadi urged the security forces on Sunday to spare civilians during the offensive.

Speaking from Samarra, the other main city in Salahuddin province, the prime minister appeared to be addressing fears of reprisals against the Tikrit area’s Sunni population.

“The priority we gave to the armed forces and all the forces taking part alongside them is to preserve the security of citizens,” he said.

On social media, he called “for utmost care in protecting civilian lives and property.”

Hadi Al Ameri, the Popular Mobilisation commander and a central figure in Iraq’s fightback against ISIL, appealed to Tikrit residents on Saturday to leave their homes within 48 hours so government forces could “wrap up the battle of the revenge for Speicher.”

Speicher is a military base near Tikrit from which hundreds of new, mostly Shiite, recruits were kidnapped before being executed in the early days of the ISIL offensive that swept through much of the Sunni Arab heartland north and west of Baghdad last June.

Shiite militias in particular have vowed to avenge the Speicher executions, sparking fears of mass killings against Sunnis if Tikrit were to be recaptured.

Some Sunni tribes in the Tikrit area have been accused of direct involvement in the Speicher massacre.

Mr Al Abadi appealed to residents to turn against the extremists, who have suffered a string of military losses since Iraq’s foreign partners stepped up their support.

“I call on all those who were misled and made mistakes in the past to lay down their arms today. This may be the last chance,” Mr Al Abadi said, suggesting that some could be granted amnesty.

Iraqi forces have tried and failed several times to wrest back Tikrit, a Sunni Arab city on the Tigris river around 160 kilometres north of Baghdad.

The military commander for Salahuddin province, Abdel Wahab Saadi, said Tikrit had both symbolic and strategic importance.

“The aim of course is to liberate Salahuddin to allow for the return of displaced families but it is also going to be a stepping stone on the way to liberating Mosul,” he said.

Tikrit is the hometown of executed dictator Saddam Hussein, the remnants of whose Baath party have collaborated with ISIL in attempting to topple the Shiite-dominated government.

ISIL declared a “caliphate” last June straddling Iraq and Syria, where the US-led coalition has also been conducting air strikes but not coordinating with any significant ground force.

Source:  thenational.ae

Renzi will meet Putin on Thursday morning for discussions that will also include Russia’s exit from Ukraine following a ceasefire last month.

Renzi last week appealed for international help over the situation in Libya amid threats from Isis extremists, who have threatened to use the north African country as a springboard for attacks in Europe.

Although Italy has been pushing its allies to take a more proactive approach to the situation, Renzi has ruled out intervention in the short-term.

“The important thing is to get the message across that the UN must play a role in the Libya situation, and Russia is a permanent member [of the UN Security Council],” he said last week.

Italy had long enjoyed good relations with Russia, mostly cemented when Silvio Berlusconi was leader, until the Russian-Ukraine conflict and is considered by some as only a moderate supporter of the sanctions against Russia.

This will be Renzi’s first visit to the Kremlin since becoming premier in February last year. The pair last met in Milan in October, at a summit of European and Asian leaders (Asem).

Also Egypt’s President Abdel-Fattah El-Sisi is scheduled to meet on Monday with a Russian security delegation headed by Secretary of the Security Council of Russia Nikolai Patrushev.

The visit by the head of the Kremlin’s Security Council comes less than a month following a two-day visit by Russian President Vladimir Putin to Cairo.

The meeting will touch upon the results of El-Sisi’s visit to Russia last August and Putin’s recent visit to Cairo, Presidency spokesman Alaa Youssef told state news agency MENA.

The talks will also include strategic, security and political aspects of mutual interest between the two countries.

During Putin’s visit in February, he signed an agreement with El-Sisi to construct a nuclear-power plant to generate electricity in Egypt.

More than 800 Islamic State (IS) militants were killed in areas around Mosul, northern Iraq in February by Kurdish forces and international coalition airstrikes.

Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) Mosul spokesman Saed Mamuzini told local media, “In February alone, 804 IS insurgents were killed in areas inside and around Mosul. Some were killed by coalition airstrikes while Peshmerga accounted for the rest.

“Since the start of this war with Islamic State in Iraq, IS has not suffered such a high number of casualties. In their communications with emirs [leaders], the militants have noted these big losses,” said Mamuzini.

On Sunday, an anonymous Peshmerga commander said, “Today, there were heavy clashes between jihadists and Peshmerga forces in the Tl-Reem area.

“Peshmerga forces surrounded IS insurgents and clashes continued into the afternoon. 15 insurgents’ bodies were left at the frontline as coalition jets shelled their bases,” said the commander.

He revealed that on Saturday 17 extremists surrendered themselves to the Peshmerga without taking part in any clashes. “They surrendered themselves and their weapons to commander Najat Ali in Makhmour.”

The commander claimed that more insurgents wanted to surrender, but were shelled by the coalition jets before they had the chance.

Another Peshmerga officer said, “Jets have heavily shelled IS bases in Kazakani, near the Khazir front.”

He claims that the planes are flying longer missions, targeting bases in the area with greater accurac.

Source: BasNews

The Malian government signed a peace agreement with some northern armed groups on Sunday in Algiers but the main Tuareg rebel alliance asked for more time to consult its grassroots.

The deal, hammered out in eight months of tough negotiations in neighbouring Algeria, provides for the transfer of a raft of powers from Bamako to the north, an area the size of Texas that the rebels refer to as ‘Azawad’. Militants linked to Al-Qaeda seized control of northern Mali for more than nine months until a French-led military intervention in 2013 that partly drove them from the region.

Jihadist groups were not invited to the Algiers talks. The Tuareg rebel alliance that includes the National Movement for the Liberation of Azawad said it had asked for a ‘reasonable delay’ for consultations before signing.

‘An agreement that has not been shared with the people of the region has little chance of being implemented on the ground,’ an alliance representative said.

But Algerian Foreign Minister Ramtane Lamamra expressed optimism that the rebel alliance would sign soon. ‘The agreement will be signed by all the groups,’ he said. The delay sought by the Tuareg alliance was merely an indication of their ‘desire to secure the maximum support for the deal.’ Mali’s former colonial ruler France welcomed the agreement and called on all groups to sign it without delay.

‘The agreement finalised this morning in Algiers is an excellent development,’ Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius said, describing it as ‘a balanced and beneficial document for the country and the region’. ‘I salute the decision of the president and the Malian government to sign it and call on all groups in the north to do so without delay,’ he added.

A spokesman for the groups that did sign hailed the agreement as ‘an essential document for restoring peace and reconciliation’. ‘We have undertaken to respect the spirit and the letter of it,’ Harouna Toureh said. ‘We will do all we can so that the agreement comes to life and allows all the peoples of the region to rediscover one and another and live together, as they did in the past, in brotherhood and solidarity.’

Ethnic divisions run deep in the northern desert, the cradle of a Tuareg separatist movement which has spawned several rebellions since the 1960s. The 30-page ‘Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation in Mali from the Algiers Process’ calls for ‘reconstruction of the country’s national unity’ in a manner that ‘respects its territorial integrity and takes account of its ethnic and cultural diversity’.

In deference to the concerns of the Malian government about separatism, it does not use the word autonomy in setting out the powers the region will enjoy. It proposes the creation of powerful elected regional assemblies led by a directly elected president, as well as ‘greater representation of the northern populations in national institutions’. From 2018 the government will set up a ‘mechanism to transfer 30 percent of budget revenues from the state to local authorities… with particular attention to the North’.

Militants are to be integrated into the Malian army to be redeployed in the north of the country, with joint patrols to start within two months of the deal being signed. An international commission of inquiry is to be tasked with investigating allegations of war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other serious violations of human rights committed in the Mali conflict.

Political scientist Rachid Tlemcani told AFP the accord would be ‘a great victory of Algerian diplomacy’ if it succeeds, but remained ‘sceptical’ that it would resolve the root causes of the conflict.

Source:  nation.com.pk

Back in September Sky News worked with Recorded Future, an open-source intelligence firm, to examine how Islamic State (IS) was using Twitter and other social media to spread its message.

Recent analysis found 60,000 pro-IS Twitter accounts had been set up in six months.

Recorded Future has taken another look to see how the situation has changed, digging through a total of 44 million tweets – 15.8 million of those from 2015.

And social media seems to work as a dim mirror for events on the ground.

First, there’s a lot more activity. Recorded Future says that the number of IS-related tweets grew from August to October in 2014, then declined for the rest of the year.

But there’s been an explosion of activity in 2015  –  almost entirely due to tweets written in Arabic rather than English.

Arabic is now the dominant language for tweets discussing IS  -  it used to be English.

Two countries are mainly responsible for that growth.  Saudi Arabia is the biggest contributor, followed by Egypt, which saw a 483% increase from February to January. That’s based on the 10% of all tweets that are geotagged.

Second, the majority of those Arabic tweets are negative about Islamic State.

They also follow specific events: the two Japanese journalists held by the group, the video showing the burning death of Jordanian pilot Muad Al-Kasasbeh and the murder of 21 Egyptian Coptic Christians in Libya all led to spikes of negative tweets.

The murder of Al-Kasasbeh prompted the biggest negative reaction ,  with 1.2 million tweets condemning the attack in Arabic alone.

That said, those three events also led to spikes in tweets praising or supporting IS violence. This had been fairly stable from June to the end of January 2015. Then, with Al-Kasasbeh’s murder, positive tweets increased by a factor of six.

So what can the social data tell us?

It seems fairly clear that the increased Twitter concern in Saudi Arabia and Egypt is responding to increased IS operations throughout the Middle East – the UAE, Israel, Jordan and Oman all also saw big increases.

The two big Twitter spikes concerned two nations dealing with IS executions for the first time: Jordan and Egypt (there was also another mass-murder by IS of Egyptian “spies” in the northern Sinai in February), and the Egyptian Coptic Christians were killed in Libya, another new front for the group.

As Recorded Future puts it: “I think we can at least see which countries are stepping up their efforts in the conflict –  the big increase in tweets from Saudi Arabia and the campaign we identified is a good example of that.”

In the West, we’ve maybe grown weary of engaging with IS on Twitter, or have decided that we’d rather not give their regular outrages any more publicity. In the Middle East, though, Twitter users are increasingly preoccupied.