Concern has been raised by the Sunni community in Iraq that many young men joined IS by coercion, and are now vulnerable to prosecution under the country’s strict anti-terror law. Al Hayat stated that many of them provided valuable intelligence about IS troops, while simultaneously seeking a pardon.
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“From the center of al-Julan neighborhood, we congratulate the Iraqi people and the commander in chief…and declare that the Fallujah fight is over”, he told Iraqi state TV, flanked by military officers and soldiers. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has pledged to retake Mosul this year.
Lt. Gen. Abdel Wahab al-Saadi, a special forces commander who led the operation to retake the city, said Monday that the houses were torched by IS militants as they fled.
“This Iraqi flag is flying in Fallujah”, he said in an address carried by state television, donning a black military-style uniform and waving a large flag.
Iraq’s army sought Monday to eliminate Daesh (ISIS) fighters holed up in farmland west of Fallujah to keep them from launching a counterattack on the city, a day after the government declared victory over the extremist militants there.
This image made from Associated Press video shows, Iraqi troops turn the Islamic State flag upside down in Fallujah, Iraq, Sunday, June 26, 2016.
The city is also of significance to American troops as the site of bloody battles in 2004 that killed more than 100 US troops fighting insurgents from house to house. Officials have called for more funds to meet mounting needs. Civilians are likely to remain in refugee camps “for some time as [Fallujah] is reported to be littered with IEDs”, said the local representative of the United Nations refugee agency.
“We need a thorough de-mining of civilian areas and safety assessments before civilians are given the option to go back”, he said. The time-consuming de-mining process there is still continuing.
The city had been a bastion of Islamic State control and served as a command center from which it has coordinated devastating suicide attacks against civilians in Baghdad.
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A spokesman for Iraq’s federal police acknowledged the arson, but said his forces no longer controlled the area. A similar scenario is expected to play out in the Mosul campaign, because the various groups that make up Iraq’s security forces – including Kurdish forces known as the peshmerga – have all vowed to participate in the complex operation. More than 40 percent are from Anbar province, where Fallujah is located.
