Seeking greater military presence in northern Iraq, Iran has established dozens of military and political premises in the liberated areas of western Mosul, informed sources told Asharq Al-Awsat.

The Iranian forces, part of the Quds Force of Revolutionary Guards, are said to be working under the wings of the Shi’ite militia groups of Hashd al-Shaabi, also known as the Popular Mobilization Forces.

Former Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki “is currently working to form several tribal councils in Nineveh that are linked to him and directly supported by Iran’s Revolutionary Guards and Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei”, said Sheikh Muzahim Huwet, the spokesperson for the Arab tribes in Nineveh.

“They seek to win the largest number of parliamentary seats in Mosul and also the majority of seats at the governorate’s council, in order to factionalize the Sunni Arabs, to Shi’itize Mosul and fight the Kurdistan Region,” Huwet added.

An Islamic State attack on Tuesday against a position held by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in northeast Syria killed at least 32 people, like reported by reuters.com

The attack on a checkpoint at Rajm al-Salibi, the location of a refugee camp near the border between Syria and Iraq, led to violent clashes, the Observatory reported. More than 30 other people were also injured, it said.

The SDF, a coalition of Kurdish and Arab militias, has seized large swathes of northern Syria from Islamic State over the past 18 months and is engaged in a campaign to drive the jihadist group from its de facto regional capital of Raqqa.

On Monday, the SDF captured most of the strategically vital town of Tabqa, 40 km (25 miles) west of Raqqa along the Euphrates, it said.

It said on Tuesday that fierce fighting continued to capture the last few districts of the town as well as an adjacent dam, Syria’s largest, and the last major obstacle remaining before it can begin its assault on Raqqa.

Tuesday’s Islamic State attack on Rajm al-Salibi was targeted at the Asayish, a Kurdish security force that operates in northeast Syria, the Observatory said.

A car-bombing in east Mosul is confirming fears of some analysts that the offensive against the Islamic State is dealing the terror group military defeats but not necessarily political setbacks, like reported by voanews.com.

More than 190 days since U.S.-backed Iraqi security forces launched their campaign to oust IS fighters from Mosul, the militants remain in parts of the western half of the city. And last month IS detonated a car bomb in the Zuhur district of east Mosul that left four dead and 14 wounded.

Sections of Mosul still not cleared of IS fighters

Zuhur was meant to have been cleared of Sunni militants back in January when Baghdad declared eastern Mosul “fully liberated,” but the bombing demonstrated that active IS cells are still operating there, despite strenuous efforts by Iraqi security personnel to unearth them.

“Out but not down,” is how Kyle Orton, an analyst with the Henry Jackson Society, a London-based think tank, describes the terror group’s strategic position.Zuhur “is part of a pattern of attacks that suggests the Mosul operation itself was rushed and more importantly that IS is already recovering in liberated areas,” he warned in a study for the think tank.

He cautions, “IS’s loss of territory should not be seen as the sole measure of how this war is going.” U.S. and Iraqi officials estimate IS now controls just seven percent of the country, down from a high of 40 percent.

Military, not political, defeats for IS forces

IS hopes to emulate itsprecursor jihadist organizations, which were able to weather the military defeats inflicted on them by U.S. forces during the 2007-08 Surge.

The group is exploiting its strategic depth in remote territory both in west and east Iraq — in the Euphrates River Valley bordering Syria, the Jalam desert east of Samarra and in the Hamrin mountains — to launch hit-and-run attacks like an April 23 ambush on a government military convey near the western Iraq town of Rutba that left 10 Iraqi soldiers dead.

IS’s official spokesman, Abu Mohammad al Adnani, before his death in a targeted drone strike, presaged IS’s post-Mosul strategy in a 2016 audio-message to followers, in apparent reference to the 2007 Surge, he said: “Were we defeated when we lost the cities in Iraq and were in the desert without any city or land? …It is the same, whether Allah blesses us with consolidation or we move into the bare, open desert, displaced and pursued.”

IS presence in Kirkuk

IS has regrouped in the oil-rich province of Kirkuk. The militants still control half the province. “A lot of these terrorists have been able to escape from Mosul, escape from other places and regroup,” Najmidin Karin, governor of Kirkuk province, observed recently.

The jihadists presence in Kirkuk was not challenged early on in the anti-IS offensive, argues Orton and others. “Hawija sits in a prime location to cause mayhem behind the lines, and has done so,” according to Orton. Although besieged by Kurdish peshmerga forces since last August, IS fighters appear to have little trouble slipping in and out to launch attacks from Hawija on nearby cities.

“In simple military terms, Hawija should have been cleared before Mosul,” says Orton. Recently, Iraqi commanders announced they’re considering an assault on the town, which is overwhelmingly Sunni Arab, using Shi’ite militias. That would continue, argues Orton, “one of the worst aspects of the campaign against IS, namely the use of demographically inappropriate forces to cleanse local areas that has meant IS’s military losses are not political losses.”

Mixed military results

When it comes to Mosul, Baghdad has managed to prevent Shi’ite militias from entering the city, allowing the offensive inside to be conducted by regular Iraqi security forces. Even so, most Iraqi soldiers are Shi’ite, which doesn’t help Baghdad with its hearts-and-minds campaign for the longterm loyalty of local Sunnis.

Thanks to the terror group’s brutal handling of civilians the Shi’ite influx into Mosul has not turned Sunnis en masse against the security forces. But rising civilian casualties in west Mosul from coalition airstrikes is starting to anger local Sunnis.

In neighboring Syria, analyst Charles Lister of the Middle East Institute in Washington also worries about the unfolding anti-IS offensive and the assault on Raqqa repeating tactical missteps observed in Iraq, especially if mainly Kurdish forces are used for the assault on IS’s de facto capital. “The United States does not need to rush our push to Raqqa. Doing so risks achieving the short-term objective – the city’s capture – but securing groups like ISIS with an invaluable narrative victory,” he said last week in congressional testimony.

The Iranian and Syrian army commanders on Monday vowed to boost cooperation in the face of threats, Press TV reported.

Chief of Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Major General Mohammad Baqeri and his Syrian counterpart General Ali Abdullah Ayoub denounced the recent Israeli and U.S. strikes on Syria.

Baqeri said that the Syrian army and nation have put up brave resistance in the face of crimes by the terrorists, regional aggression and foreign intervention.

“By maintaining their unity and national solidarity as well as holding inter-Syria talks, the Syrian people must be prudently vigilant about foreign plots aimed at creating rifts in this country,” he was quoted as saying.

Ayoub said that Iran’s military advisory support for his country has played a decisive role in the continuation of the Syrians’ resistance and their major victories against terrorists and Israel.

Heading a high-ranking military delegation, Ayoub arrived in Tehran on Monday to hold talks with Iranian officials aimed at strengthening relations between the two countries’ armed forces and improving coordination on the latest political and military situation in Syria.

The United States fired 59 Tomahawk missiles at the Shayrat Air Base in central Syria on April 7, saying the strike was intended to deter the Syrian government from using chemical weapons.

Also, the Syrian army confirmed that Israel missile fire targeted a Syrian military position near the international airport of the capital Damascus earlier on Thursday.

After arming and training two brigades of the Kurdistan Region Peshmerga forces, the United States will fully arm and train two more Peshmerga brigades, Jabar Yawar, the Secretary General of Peshmerga Ministry, told BasNews.

Yawar told BasNews on Saturday that the United States has promised to train two Peshmerga brigades and provide them with all the necessary equipment, armament and ammunition.

He stated that arming two more Peshmerga brigades will bring the total number of the brigades trained by US to four. He noted that the US and the Global Coalition will continue to support the Peshmerga forces.

Moreover, the Pentagon announced on April 19 that the US State Department agreed to sell military equipment for the artillery and infantry Peshmerga units in the Kurdistan Region worth $295.6 million.

Iraqi army commanders said army forces killed 30 Islamic State members and took over a command center on the borders between Anbar and Salahuddin provinces, like reported by iraqinews.com .

A source at the Anbar army command told Alsumaria news that a force from the army’s 7th division, backed by fighter jets and paramilitary forces, killed 30 IS members during an operation at the Malha desert region.

The source said a communication facility and two booby-trapped vehicles were also destroyed in the assault.

Borders conjoining Anbar, Salahuddin and Diyala have witnessed occasional attacks by Islamic State against government and paramilitary troops deployments since Iraqi forces, backed by a U.S.-led coalition and PMus, launched a major offensive to retake areas occupied by IS since 2014, most notably the city of Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city and the group’s most important stronghold in the country.

Observers have said Islamic State’s occasional attacks against security and civilians outside Mosul aimed at distracting security attention from the Mosul front. IS still holds a few areas in Salahuddin, Diyala, Anbar and Kirkuk, but the Iraqi government, employing most of its military power in the Mosul campaign, is expected to aim at those strongholds once the battle in Mosul realizes victory.

Iraqi generals say IS militants currently control less than seven percent of Iraqi territory.

The United Nations Assistance Mission in Iraq says violence in Iraq left 720 people dead and wounded in April.

A delegation of the U.S.-led coalition was deploted on the Kurdish town of Derbassiye in Syria’s northeastern Hasakah province, to inspect the areas bombed by the Turkish army and took with them fragments of the explosives that were fired by the Turkish army on Kurdish positions, like reported by aranews.net .

“A delegation of international coalition leaders visited the region of Derbassiye. They were briefed on the areas bombed by the Turkish army,” Abdulkarim Omer, the Co-Head of Foreign Affairs of the local administration in the Cezire Canton said on Friday.

“Yesterday the Turkish army bombed Haddon village near Amude. There is a YPG centre on the mountain near the village. Also the Kharza village near Amude was bombed yesterday,” reported Heybar Othman, a freelance journalist working for international media.

“On Friday, US troops visited the border areas after Turkish attacks on the YPG. This is a message from the United States to Turkey to stop attacking the YPG, since they fear this could threaten the anti-ISIS Raqqa operation,” he added.

Othman further said that three US army units will be deployed on the border area to prevent further attacks. “The first unit will be spread out between Dirbesiyê [Derbassiye] and Serikaniye, the second unit between Serikaniye and Tel Abyad, and the third unit will be deployed between Kobani and Tel Abyad,” he said.

This however still leaves the region of Afrin vulnerable to more Turkish attacks, although there is also a Russian army presence there.

The delegation of the US Army included 8 commanders of the coalition accompanied by leaders of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), according to local sources.

The commanders visited the villages of Arade, Bir Knes, Jetele, and Qarmane, which were targeted by the Turkish Army two days ago, beside inspecting the positions that were hit.

“US troops are now in an air base near Derbassiye, after inspecting the sites of Turkish shelling in the nearby villages,” local Kurdish journalist Can Mirzo told ARA News. “Kurdish Asayish forces were also deployed at checkpoints near the town and prevented strangers from entering the area,” he said.

The YPG said in a statement that the Turkish army continued to attack YPG forces and said they will strongly answer these attacks.

“Following this brutal attack, the Turkish state launched attacks on many of our forces along the border of Rojava. From the Canton of Efrin to the Canton of Cindirês, and to Dirbesiyê of the Cizre Canton, many points of our forces were attacked by the Turkish army,” the YPG said in a statement.

“Our forces have responded strongly to these attacks of the Turkish state. In the conflicts over the border, the Turkish army was inflicted heavy blows,” the YPG said.

“The attacks of the occupied Turkish state did not stop at all despite the fact that not all the attacks of the Turkish army until now have been answered, and we have tried to develop good relations with the Turkish state,” the YPG concluded.

Fighting between rebel groups in the biggest insurgent stronghold near the Syrian capital Damascus entered a second day on Saturday, while government forces pressed an offensive against the besieged enclave, a war monitor said, like eported by reuters.com .

The clashes broke out in part of the densely-populated rural area east of Damascus known as the Eastern Ghouta which has been besieged by Syrian government forces since 2013.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said it had documented the deaths of at least 38 fighters in the first 24 hours of fighting between rebel groups. It also reported civilian casualties.

Jaish al-Islam is pitted against the Failaq al-Rahman group and fighters from an alliance with links to al-Qaeda, rebels, activists and the Observatory said.

Fighting between the groups killed hundreds of people last April before a ceasefire was agreed in Qatar in May.

The rift was exploited by Syrian government forces to capture parts of the Eastern Ghouta, whose territory shrank by about a third in the second half of last year.

Jaish al-Islam is one of the biggest Syrian rebel groups and has been the dominant faction in the Eastern Ghouta. Its leader, Zahran Alloush, was killed in an air strike in December 2015.

A Failaq al-Rahman statement on Friday said Jaish al-Islam attacked some of its positions and said the factional fighting was not in the interests of the Eastern Ghouta or the Syrian revolution.

A statement by Jaish al-Islam said its dispute was with the group called Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (Liberation of the Levant Committee) which had been obstructing Jaish al-Islam members from going about their business.

Hayat Tahrir al-Sham is an alliance of factions formed in January, whose members include Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, formerly al Qaeda’s Nusra Front group.

aish al-Islam said it shared the same goals as Failaq al-Rahman and called on them to contain the crisis.

During the fighting, Syrian government and allied forces attacked the rebel-held district of Qaboun northwest of Eastern Ghouta by land and air.

The Syrian government, which is backed by Russian air power and Iranian-backed militias, launched an offensive against Qaboun and neighbouring Barza, which are believed to contain supply tunnels for the besieged enclave, in February.

Government forces advanced slightly in Qaboun on Friday, the Observatory said.

A key leader of the terror group Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) was killed in a U.S. airstrike in Yemen on Sunday, the Pentagon said according to foxnews.com .

Abu Ahmed Al Awlaqi had led operations for the group in the Shabwa province. He also planned external attacks and coordinated the group’s movement of weapons and explosives, authorities said.

The death of the leader, according to Navy Captain Jeff Davis, was the result of a monthslong campaign designed to kill leaders of the group and other Yemeni operatives.

Seven other members of the group were also killed in Sunday’s strike, Davis said.

The U.S. has completed more than 80 precision strikes against AQAP militants since February 28. That includes strikes against equipment, fighting positions and infrastructure.

U.S. forces are completing the operations in the country against AQAP in order to simultaneously determine how the group plans external terror attacks and to degrade the ability of the group to complete those operations.

Clashes continued for the third consecutive day between Kurdish fighters of the People’s Protection Units (YPG) and Turkey’s military in several areas in northern Syria, military sources reported on Friday according to aranews.net.

The Turkish Army bombed several villages in the Kurdish Afrin district, including Panerak, Shankila, Midan Akbas and Rajo.

“The Turkish artillery bombarded YPG security checkpoints and residential buildings in Afrin countryside, killing and wounding dozens, most of them civilians,” a spokesperson for the YPG told ARA News.

The bombardment led to clashes between the Kurdish units and Turkish military forces in the sub-districts of Rajo and Shiya.

“Our units responded to the Turkish offensive by hitting the positions of the Turkish troops near Susk hill in Afrin. At least three military vehicles were destroyed by YPG fire,” the Kurdish official said.

The YPG also released a video showing the destruction of a Turkish base in northwestern Aleppo.

“At least 17 Turkish soldiers were killed and three others were wounded under heavy bombardment by the YPG,” a member of the YPG media office in Afrin told ARA News.

The source added that the clashes between the YPG and Turkey’s military are still ongoing in the Shiya and Rajo sub-districts.

Clashes broke out on Wednesday between the Syrian Kurdish forces and Turkish troops after the latter targeted the Kurdish town of Derbassiye in Syria’s northeastern Hasakah province with heavy artillery, shutting down the road between Derbassiye and Serikaniye. This coincided with similar clashes between the YPG and Turkish troops in Afrin.

This comes after the Turkish jets killed over 25 Kurdish fighters in Iraq and Syria on Tuesday.

The US-led coalition expressed concerns over the Turkish attacks against the Kurdish fighters who are in war with ISIS in northern Syria.

“We call on all forces to remain focused on the fight to defeat ISIS, which is the greatest threat to regional and worldwide peace, security,” said Air Force Col John L. Dorrian, Spokesman for the US-led coalition against ISIS.

“Turkish strikes were conducted without proper coordination with the Coalition or the Government of Iraq,” he said.

“Our partner forces have been killed by Turkey strike, they have made many sacrifices to defeat ISIS,” the American Colonel said. “We are troubled by Turkey airstrikes on SDF and Kurdish forces,” he added.

On Tuesday, the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) called on the international community to intervene to stop the Turkish attacks.

“The regime in Turkey has consistently harmed the good neighborly relations through countless violations against our citizens and fighters in northern Syria,” the SDF said. “This was the most blatant attack of these crimes committed by the Turkish regime.”

“Therefore, we demand and appeal to the international community to intervene to put an end to this aggression and the ongoing violations on our territory,” the SDF concluded.