Stiri

• ISIS Leader Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi Is Not Dead and Will Turn Group Into 'Al-Qaeda on Steroids'

  Newsweek

  Jul 17, 2017

  The leader of the Islamic State militant group (ISIS), Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, is almost certainly still alive, according to one of Iraqi Kurdistan's intelligence chiefs, despite several reports that he was killed in Syria in June. "Baghdadi is definitely alive. "Don't forget his roots go back to Al-Qaeda days in Iraq. Read More

• Winning the peace in Mosul

  Stability requires skillful diplomacy: Our view Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Abadi waved his national flag in a devastated Mosul last week and with good reason. He was celebrating the hard-fought victory of his U.S.-supported troops over the stubborn Islamic State terrorists who held Iraq's third-largest city for more than three years. But Abadi was candid about the challenge going forward: "We have another mission ahead of us — to create stability."  Bringing peace to a region fraught with tension and fear, riven by spasms of score-settling violence and angry rivalries, is the toughest victory to achieve. Mosul was the great prize for the Islamic State's twisted dream of an ISIS-controlled territory.

  USA Today

• Air strikes pummel Syria's Raqa as US-backed forces advance on IS

  Heavy bombardment and fierce fighting shook the Islamic State group's Syrian stronghold Raqa on Monday, as US-backed forces said they captured a new neighbourhood from entrenched jihadists. Bursts of gunfire and artillery as well as the thud of air strikes conducted by the US-led coalition filled the air in western neighbourhoods of Raqa, on what AFP's correspondent said was the heaviest day of bombardment to date. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, updating an earlier toll, said the air strikes killed at least 10 civilians, two of them children.

  AFP

• As Islamic State militants routed in Iraq, their families fear reprisals

  By Isabel Coles BARTELLA, Iraq (Reuters) - Their husbands, sons and brothers are dead, but the women and children Islamic State militants left behind will live to pay the price for their actions. As Islamic State's days of ruling over vast swathes of Iraq come to an end, questions are emerging about what to do with their families. "All the men were killed," said 62 year-old Umm Hamoudi, who fled the Midan district last week with 21 members of her family -- all women and children.

  Reuters