“We invite our people in Anbar to remain steadfast and hold their
ground as reinforcements from your brothers in Hashd al-Shaabi are
coming,” the Iraqi defence ministry said. The Hashd is a conglomerate of
fighters including mainly Shia militias and pro-government local Sunni
fighters who have taken up arms against Isis.
On Sunday Isis said it had established full control over Ramadi, the
capital of Anbar, Iraq’s largest province. It is the second provincial
capital to be taken by Isis since
Mosul was conquered in a lightning offensive last June, and its fall represents the biggest defeat since then for the government in Baghdad.
About 500 people have been killed in the fighting for Ramadi in
recent days and between 6,000 and 8,000 have fled, a spokesman for the
provincial governor said.
The US-led coalition against Isis launched seven air strikes
targeting the group in Ramadi on Sunday, signalling growing alarm at its
surge in the area.
Anbar is particularly symbolic because the precursor to Isis was
ousted from the region by local Sunni tribes with American backing, in
what was known as the Anbar awakening.
Ramadi had been under pressure after much of Anbar fell to Isis
during its offensive last summer. Late last week security forces
withdrew from their main command headquarters in the city under an intensified assault by the militants.
Anbar provincial officials have been urgently requesting
reinforcements to hold off the militants, but the government in Baghdad
has been slow to respond or to arm local Sunnis. Now the government has
asked the militias to intervene, after they led a successful campaign
to remove Isis from Saddam Hussein’s home town of Tikrit.
“We
are not going to watch as Daesh [Isis] expands,” said Karim Nouri, a
spokesman for the Hashd and the Badr Organisation, the most powerful
militia in
Iraq.
The Hashd had been preparing for an Anbar operation since Tikrit was
retaken, but Nouri blamed the dithering of politicians and a media
campaign against the militias for the delay in mobilising.
Concerns had been raised over the Tikrit operation because of the
leading role played by Shia militias, some of whom are backed by Iran
and have been involved in abuses in the past related to sectarian
bloodletting during the American occupation and in towns retaken from
Isis in recent months.
A senior Iranian official said on Monday Tehran was ready to help and that he was certain Ramadi would be “liberated”.
Ali Akbar Velayati, an advisor to Iran’s supreme leader, told
Reuters: “If the Iraqi government officially asks the Islamic Republic
of Iran … to carry out any step that helps Iraq to confront [Isis] …
then Iran will meet this call.”
Nouri said the same groups that took part in the liberation of Tikrit
would take part in the Anbar operation, alongside Iraqi security forces
and local pro-government Sunni fighters.
He said the battle would be drawn out and required good
reconnaissance, planning and arms provisions, as well as fighters
experienced in guerrilla warfare. “It’s an existential battle for us,”
he said.
It also appears to be an existential battle for Isis, which has
flooded Anbar with about 5,000 fighters, including 1,200 Arab and
foreign militants, according to Hisham al-Hashimi, a Baghdad-based
expert on the militant group. “It’s a battle to settle the score between
the Hashd and Daesh,” he said.
Isis condemns the Hashd as servants of Iran and has already executed
over 400 “awakening” members and civilians in its rampage through
Ramadi. The group now threatens multiple military encampments in the
area, including the Habbaniya base, which houses American military
advisers.
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