Re: ISIS militants press forward, threaten to seize more Iraqi cities as soldiers bol
Now this is interesting. The ISIS ppl looking to get married in town they invade. I think we need some life1 experts to comment on this :hmmm:
As the Sunni terror spreads, its fighters look for wives - Middle East - World - The Independent
As the Sunni terror spreads, its fighters look for wives
**Isis is closing in on Baghdad and the government is faltering, but the Shia’s militias are mobilising
**
**PATRICK COCKBURN **](http://www.independent.co.uk/biography/patrick-cockburn)
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BAGHDAD
Sunday 22 June 2014
The Iraqi army and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (Isis) are battling for control of Iraq’s largest refinery outside Baiji north of Baghdad, with each side holding part of the complex. But in the town of Baiji itself, a few miles away, which is completely under the control of Isis, residents say they are most frightened by Isis militants going door to door asking about the numbers of married and unmarried women in the house.
“I told them that there were only two women in the house and both were married,” said Abu Lahid. “They said that many of their mujahedin [fighters] were unmarried and wanted a wife. They insisted on coming into my house to look at the women’s ID cards [which in Iraq show marital status].”
Isis says its men have been ordered not to bother local people if they are Sunni, but in many places they are imposing their puritanical social norms in the towns they have captured. In Mosul people were at first jubilant that Isis had removed the checkpoints that for years had made movement in the city very slow.
Merchants and farmers were ordered to reduce the prices of their goods. But tolerance and moderation on the part of Isis is intermittent and may be temporary. In one case in Mosul a woman was reportedly whipped, along with her husband, because she was only wearing a headscarf rather than the niqqab cloak covering the whole body. In some captured towns fanatical Isis militants start imposing rules about women’s clothing, watching TV in coffee shops and cigarette smoking almost before the fighting is ended.
The restraint, or lack of it, shown by Isis has important political implications. When al-Qa’ida in Iraq, the forerunner of Isis, insisted on local women marrying their fighters during the Sunni-Shia civil war between 2004 and 2008, they alienated much of the Sunni community. They killed even minor government employees. “I would rather have my door kicked in by American soldiers than by al‑Qa’ida because, with the Americans, I would stand a better chance of staying alive,” a young Sunni man in Baghdad said at the time. Such feelings enabled the Americans to create Sahwa, an anti-al-Qa’ida force among the Sunni.
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On guard: Iraqi Turkmen forces man a checkpoint in the northern city of Tuz KhurmatuIsis could isolate itself again through its brutality and bigotry, though its leaders show signs of recognising where they went wrong last time. Its fighters act as the shock troops of what has turned into a general Sunni uprising, but it is only one part, albeit the most important, of a loose alliance of seven or eight militant Sunni groups that could easily break apart.******
For now, it is held together by a common sense of grievance and hatred against Nouri al-Maliki, the Prime Minister, and his government whom it sees as persecuting and marginalising the Sunni community. The departure of Mr Maliki will remove part of the glue holding together the Isis-led Sunni alliance.
Some strains between the Sunni rebel factions are already evident: When the Naqshabandi Army, of which Saddam Hussein’s former deputy Izzat al-Douri is titular head, put up posters of Saddam in Mosul, Isis gave them 24 hours to take them down or face the consequences. The Naqshabandi Army did not want a confrontation and complied.
Government television channels try to push the idea that the Sunni coalition is already in disarray, but this is probably premature. In most Sunni towns captured by the insurgents, people say they are more frightened by the return of vengeful government forces than they are by the presence of Isis.
For the moment, the battle lines have steadied north of Baghdad after the blitzkrieg advance of Isis and its allies. The fighting for Baiji refinery has been swaying backwards and forwards for the past five days. Further south, Isis holds Tikrit, though a resident said “many people are fleeing to Erbil and Sulaimaniyah in Kurdistan because they think that if the Iraqi Army returns, it will shoot everybody indiscriminately”. In Sunni areas Isis is still mopping up resistance: yesterday its fighters captured al-Qaim close to the border with Syria after a fight in which 30 government soldiers were killed.