A fleeing seven-year-old child was among dozens more civilians allegedly executed by the Daesh group in Mosul in recent weeks, the UN said on Tuesday.

Since the battle to retake the last Daesh bastion in Iraq began six weeks ago, the United Nations rights office has reported hundreds of alleged execution-style killings by Daesh, stressing that some of the purported atrocities have not been definitively confirmed.

The most recent allegations include a Nov. 22 killing of “a seven-year-old child who was running toward the Iraqi Security Forces in Adan neighborhood in eastern Mosul,” rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani told reporters in Geneva.

That shooting was part of a reported trend of Daesh gunmen spraying fire on those trying to escape the strife-torn city, according to the rights office.

The UN has also received reports about a Nov. 11 massacre in Mosul’s eastern Bakir neighborhood that saw 12 people reportedly shot dead for “refusing to allow (Daesh) to install and launch rockets from the rooftops of their houses,” said Shamdasani.

She added that Daesh has apparently “been installing rocket launchers and placing snipers on the rooftops of civilian houses,” in multiple locations, with consequences for residents who refuse to cooperate.

In a Nov. 25 incident, 27 civilians were reportedly shot dead in Mosul’s northern Muhandiseen Park, possibly for “leaking information” to the Iraqi Security Forces, Shamdasani said.

The rights office has said that its standard practice of verifying alleged atrocities through multiple sources has not always been possible amid the chaos in Mosul, but that its information has come from a range of reliable sources on the ground.

Iraqi forces assault 2 villages
Iraqi forces are assaulting villages far south of Mosul in the Nineveh province, attempting to clear rural areas of Daesh fighters who stayed behind to hinder their advance.

Several hundred fighters from the army, state-sanctioned Shiite militias and paramilitary federal police massed in the village of Haj Ali on Tuesday, firing mortars at Daesh positions in the villages of Shayala Abali and Shayala Ayma, 90 km from Iraq’s second largest city.

Dust obscured the view as a column of Humvees advanced on the villages across an open field, firing heavy machine guns and backed by mortars.

The government last month launched a massive campaign to retake Mosul, captured by Daesh in 2014. It is the extremist group’s last major urban center in Iraq.

Mosul struggling, says UN
The United Nations said on Tuesday there were indications that poorer families in Mosul are struggling to feed themselves as food prices increase following the US-backed offensive on the Daesh-held city in northern Iraq.

“Key informants are telling us that poor families are struggling to put sufficient food on their tables,” UN Humanitarian Coordinator in Iraq, Lise Grande, told Reuters. “This is very worrying.”

Iraqi government and Kurdish forces surround the city from the north, east and south, while Popular Mobilization forces — a coalition of Iranian-backed Shiite groups — are trying to close in from the west. Last week the Popular Mobilization forces cut off the supply route to Mosul from Daesh-held territory in Syria.

arabnews.com

Israeli planes are thought to have used Lebanese airspace to carry out the attacks

Multiple air strikes carried out by the Israeli air force reportedly hit a weapons cache and a convoy of military vehicles of the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah and the Syrian regime’s forces.

Arab media reports claim the Israeli aircraft also used Lebanese airspace. The Israel Defence Forces (IDF) has neither confirmed nor denied the attacks in line with the position Israel always takes when it comes to sensitive operations.

The aerial assault is believed to have taken place during the night of 29-30 November. According to the London-based Rai al-Youm newspaper, the Israeli warplanes hit the convoy on the Damascus-Beirut highway.

Both the weapons facility and the convoy were under the command of the Shia militant group Hezbollah, which has long been fighting on the side of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. At least four huge explosions were reported near the Syrian capital during the strikes. There is still no word on any casualties.

In the past, several air strikes in Syria and at multiple locations bordering Israel were alleged to have been carried out by Israeli forces though the Israeli government hardly confirms any of these.

The current attack comes close on the heels of the IDF confirming it targeted an Islamic State (Isis)-held position near the Syrian border. The IDF saidon Monday, 28 November, that the air strike was a response to the attack on Israeli soldiers in the region. Israeli forces “will not hesitate to act against terror groups that operate against the State of Israel”, the IDF warned in a statement.

ibtimes.co.uk

When Western navies raided three dhows in the Arabian Sea this year, some of the weapons they found matched arms taken from Houthi rebels in Yemen, a report said, suggesting links between Iranian suppliers and the Yemeni war.

Two of the dhows, all of which were unregistered and therefore stateless, were manufactured by Al Mansoor, an Iranian shipbuilder whose yard is next to an Iranian Revolutionary Guards base, the report said, citing Iranian state records.

“Since 2012, Al Mansoor dhows have been involved in multiple cases of trafficking in heroin, cannabis, and more recently, weapons,” British-based organisation Conflict Armament Research said in its report on Wednesday.

“Analysis of the weapons suggests that at least two of the three deliveries were probably supplied with the complicity of Iranian security forces.”

The report said some of the weapons captured in the raids on the dhows had sequential serial numbers of new weapons, suggesting they came from a national stockpile. Lot numbers from anti-tank weapons found aboard one of the dhows matched the production run of similar weapons said by the United Arab Emirates (UAE) to have been captured from Houthis, it said.

No UAE officials were immediately available for comment.

The report also highlighted the role of Somali ports as transfer points, and said the warships HMAS Darwin, FS Provence, and USS Sirocco had seized more than 4,500 assault rifles, mortars, machine guns, and rocket launchers in a four-week period between February and March 2016.

“This report provides evidence suggesting Iran is playing a hand in supplying weapons to the conflict in Yemen,” said Jonah Leff, the director of operations for the arms research group.

An Iranian official from the foreign ministry disputed the report’s findings.

“It is not true and Iran has never provided weapons to Houthis or any other group in Yemen,” the official told Reuters. “But we have always supported and will continue to support oppressed groups and nations.”

Yemen’s civil war pits Houthi rebels against the government of exiled President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi and a Saudi-led military coalition. The 20-month conflict has killed more than 10,000 people and displaced more than three million.

Saudi Arabia accuses the Houthis of being a proxy force for Saudi’s arch rival Iran, an accusation the Houthis strongly dispute, saying they are fighting against the corruption of the former government.

Yemen lies just across the Gulf of Aden from Somalia, which has been at war for more than 25 years and whose lawless coastline offers refuge for pirates and smugglers.

Abdallah Jama Sallah, the former Minister of Ports, Maritime Transport and Counter Piracy in the semi-autonomous Somali region of Puntland, said it was almost impossible to prevent such smuggling.

Marine forces in Puntland – at the very tip of the Horn of Africa nation – have only 12 small flat-bottomed boats that hug the shore and cannot venture into the deep seas, he said.

The region has between about 700 and 900 coastguards, he said, but their training and equipment is poor.

“In 2015, our own forces reported 160 Iranian boats fishing in our seas without permission. There’s no way of verifying them,” he said. “There’s lots of weapons going back and forth, it’s absolutely impossible to control that sea.”

middleeastmonitor.com

Daesh militants in the Iraqi city of Mosul have killed civilians who refuse to allow rockets and snipers to be sited in their houses or whom they suspect of leaking information or trying to flee, a UN human rights spokeswoman said on Tuesday.

“On Nov. 11, ISIL (Daesh) reportedly shot and killed 12 civilians in Bakir neighborhood of eastern Mosul city for allegedly refusing to let it install rockets on the rooftops of their houses,” Ravina Shamdasani told a regular UN briefing.

Information received by the UN also showed that militants publicly shot to death 27 civilians in Muhandiseen Park in northern Mosul on Nov. 25, and on Nov. 22 an Islamic State sniper killed a seven-year-old running toward the Iraqi Security Forces in Adan neighborhood in eastern Mosul.

arabnews.com

Experienced in fighting proxy wars in Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Lebanon, the Iranian leadership is aware of the important role the military plays in imposing Tehran’s foreign policy in the region and beyond.
At least this is what one can garner from hearing Iranian military Chief of Staff Mohammad Bagheri’s recent statements, which show that Tehran is entertaining the idea of gaining naval superiority by establishing bases in Syria and Yemen, convinced that “having naval bases in remote distances is not less than nuclear power. It is ten times more important and creates deterrence.”

Bagheri also said that Iran needs a fleet in the Indian Ocean that would be equal to the one stationed in the Gulf of Oman, and urged the navy to enhance its intelligence activities by working on satellite and cyber space technologies, as well as by developing naval drones.

Although it is doubtful that Iran has the means to effect such a costly naval expansion, it is obvious that Tehran has two main strategic goals: To strengthen its military power and flex its muscle beyond its borders, and revive the Shah’s old dream of becoming the Gulf’s policeman. Nowadays, however, Iran wants to be the region’s policeman from the Indian Ocean to the Mediterranean Sea.

Such schemes are bound to increase tension in our already troubled region and push countries to resort to military power as a political tool. The Iranian chief of staff’s justification that the aim of this military objective is to counter piracy does not seem logical, knowing that Iran has limited maritime trade when compared to countries such as India, the Gulf, Egypt and others that use the maritime corridors in the Gulf waters. Moreover, piracy does not exist in the Sea of Oman and in the Mediterranean. It is not clear whether his statement is simply bragging or a reflection of the new Iranian strategy after it had to forego its nuclear project under Western pressure, which resulted in Tehran dropping it in return for the West lifting sanctions.

What is clear, though, is that the new Iranian design, followed the signing of the nuclear deal, is to gain military superiority, in total contradiction to the US administration’s declaration that the nuclear deal will open the Iranian market to its benefit.

The logical thing to believe is that talk about Iranian naval bases in the Mediterranean is an exaggeration, for European countries will not allow such a presence in their waters, particularly belonging to a state of whose activities they are suspicious.

Neither will Israel allow it. It once sent back an Iranian ship loaded with weapons on its way through Bab Al-Mandab. That was preceded by chases by the Israeli navy of Iranian ships that were heading to Sudan; one was even bombed.

In case Iran succeeds in maintaining the regime of Bashar Assad in Syria, it will not need to build a naval military base there, as it is already ruling the regime in Damascus as part of a deal that Assad will find difficult to get rid of. Iran gave two reasons for engaging in war in Syria: To protect Shiite shrines and to reciprocate the Assad regime’s gesture, for it stood with Iran in the war against Iraq in the 1980s. Neither reason is convincing in political relations.

Tehran considers controlling Syria the way it controls Iraq; in both cases, it hopes to secure its presence, influence and interests in the Arab world. Iran’s military operations in Iraq and Syria are proof that warfare is the new Iranian policy and that enhanced military capability is the main goal of its foreign policy.

Iran is trying to become a hegemon in the region, a dominant force that wishes to expand geographically, both on land and in the sea, after the West lifted its embargo and it opened up to international trade.
This can only mean one thing: That we should brace for heightened arms race and more military adventures in the region.

arabnews.com

A leader of Yemen’s Houthis and a member of the group’s delegation to the talks in Kuwait, Mehdi Mashat, has slammed the Iranian Chief of Staff, Major General Mohammad Bagheri over remarks published Sunday about Iran’s desire to establish naval bases in Yemen and Syria.

“This creature should read the history of Yemen before he talks, because I am sure that if he knew that Yemen throughout history has been a cemetery for invaders, he would not have said a word”, Mashat said in a post on his official Facebook page.

Mashat has also shared a picture from an Iranian news site about Iran’s determination to establish military bases in Yemen.

“We need distant bases, and it may become possible one day to have bases on the shores of Yemen or Syria, or bases on islands or floating (bases),” said General Mohammad Hossein Bagheri as quoted by the Shargh daily newspaper.

middleeastmonitor.com

Syrian government forces and their allies captured another major eastern Aleppo neighborhood and several smaller areas Monday, putting much of the northern part of the city’s besieged rebel-held areas under government control for the first time in four years, state media reported.

Russia’s Defense Ministry said the areas captured by Syrian government troops include 12 neighborhoods and over 3,000 buildings in the past few days. It added that Syrian government troops are now controlling 40 percent of the rebel-held parts of the Syrian city of Aleppo.

The ministry added in a statement that more than 100 rebels have laid down their arms and exited the Syrian city’s eastern suburbs.

Aleppo, Syria’s largest city and former commercial center, has been contested since the summer of 2012 and a rebel defeat in the city would be a turning point in the five-year conflict. If Syrian forces capture all of east Aleppo, President Bashar Assad’s government will be in control of the country’s four largest cities as well as the coastal region.

The government’s push, backed by thousands of Shiite militia fighters from Lebanon, Iraq, and Iran, and under the cover of the Russian air force, has laid waste to Aleppo’s eastern neighborhoods. Medical and food supplies have been running short in recent weeks as Syrian warplanes pounded the besieged enclave, rendering all remaining functioning hospitals out of service.

Simultaneous advances by Syrian government and Kurdish-led forces on Sunday set off a tide of displacement inside the divided city, with thousands of residents evacuating their premises to safety in government and Kurdish-controlled areas of the city since Saturday.

Rebel defenses swiftly collapsed as government forces pushed into the Hanano district on Saturday, the first time they had pushed this far into eastern Aleppo since 2012.

Ahmad Araj, senior official with the Syrian National Democratic Coalition, an opposition organization of Arab and Kurdish groups, said 8,000 people have fled to the Kurdish-controlled Sheikh Maqsoud district so far. He called on international aid organizations to help those who are now displaced.

Araj, whose group is part of the Kurdish-led and U.S.-backed Syria Democratic Forces, acknowledged there was “something of” an agreement to surrender areas of northeast Aleppo to the SDF’s Kurdish-led forces in exchange for guarantees to protect the civilians that come under their care.

He added that it is likely that the SDF would absorb Arab fighters and moderate factions into its ranks saying: “We will coordinate with (the moderates) so we have a shared front.”

With Monday’s capture of Sakhour, the rebels are now left boxed in mostly in central and southeastern Aleppo, encircled by government troops on all sides.

The Syrian army’s media arm said troops now control 20 square kilometers (nearly 8 square miles) of the total 45 square kilometers (17 square miles) of east Aleppo.

A correspondent for Al-Manar TV of Lebanon’s Hezbollah group reported from inside east Aleppo’s Haidariyeh area, which was captured Monday, showing bulldozers removing barriers to open roads as Syrian troops drove through the streets in armored personnel carriers. Hezbollah fighters are taking part in battles along with Syrian troops.

State TV said 3,000 people, half of them children, have fled over the past few hours. It showed men, women and children in green buses being taken to government-controlled areas.

“It is stinging cold, food is scarce and people are shaken in the streets,” Mohammad Zein Khandaqani, a member of the Medical Council in Aleppo, told The Associated Press in a voice text message from east Aleppo.

He added that some residents are taking refuge in mosques while others moved to homes of displaced people in safer areas.

He said although thousands of people have fled to government or Kurdish-controlled areas in Aleppo, many stayed because they are wanted by the state and fear being caught if they leave.

The Russian Defense Ministry also said Syrian government troops had pushed the rebels from Qadisia which it described as the “key neighborhood of eastern Aleppo.”

Near the capital Damascus, government buses left the Palestinian suburb of Khan al-Shih Monday carrying scores of gunmen with their families to the northwestern province of Idlib, a rebel stronghold, according to Palestinian official Khaled Abdul-Majid. A deal was reached earlier this month in the rebel-held suburb for fighters to leave.

He told The AP in a telephone interview that the evacuation of 1,640 gunmen along with some 300 families would be carried out over three days.

ap.org

Sputnik Arabic has obtained documents, found in Iraq’s city of Mosul, revealing the full names of Daesh militants, names of the units of terrorist organizations and their heads, as well as a full list of stolen Russian weapons in their possession.

The documents were found in one of Daesh’s bunkers in the south-east of Iraq’s second-largest city of Mosul. Each of the four documents has a list of Daesh militants and the names of stolen Russian weapons they have in their possession. All the documents have the Daesh logo in the left-hand upper corner and Wilayat Ninawa (Mosul province preciously occupied by Daesh) inscription in the center.

One of the documents shows a list of Daesh militants, each of whom is in possession of a Kalashnikov assault rifle and five replaceable magazines.

Other documents specify registration numbers of Kalashnikov assault rifles, RPG-7 shoulder-launched anti-tank grenade launchers, bullpup straight-pull bolt-action rifles, VSSK Vykhlop magazine-fed sniper rifles and other weaponry. Commenting on the above documents, General Behnam Abbush told Sputnik that the terrorists have obtained the Russian-made weapons from military depots in Iraq and from terrorists in Syria after Daesh captured vast territories in these two countries.

The general said that the Iraqi army abandoned the bulk of their weapons when the terrorists overran Mosul back in 2014.

Behnam Abbush told to Sputnik that the above documents should be taken to court as they contain the full names of Daesh militants, the names of the terrorist organizations units and their leaders.

sputniknews.com