However, Tuesday’s deadly assaults come amid a series of bombings in and around the Iraqi capital which left more than 100 people dead. At least five people were killed in another attack on the city’s southern, Shiite-majorty Dora neighborhood. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to release information.
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At least 14 people, including workers, were killed and 27 soldiers were wounded.
An officer said the Islamic State attack appeared created to delay an expected army offensive that would have completely severed militant supply routes to Falluja on the western approaches to Baghdad, which Iraqi forces have ringed for more than six months.
Similarly, the targeting of sites that have armed protection, such as the natural gas plant north of Baghdad in which at least 14 people died, show that it is not exclusively choosing soft targets, such as the football cafe and market its members also attacked this week.
At least 18 people were killed and another 32 injured on Sunday when a suicide car-bomb rocked Baghdad’s northern Taji district.
Islamic State, which considers Shiite Muslims heretics, claimed both of these assaults.
Medical officials confirmed the casualty figures.
Although the attack was costly, it is not believed to threaten production at the gas plant, Oil Ministry of Iraq explained.
The victims also included young men applying for jobs with the local police, according to the officials.
The attack on the gas plant started at dawn Sunday with a suicide vehicle bomber hitting the plant’s main gate in Taji, about 12 miles north of Baghdad.
In Syria, Islamic State militants are repositioning forces in its defacto capital in Syria in response to increasing military pressure from coalition airstrikes and ground forces growing in effectiveness there, USA officials say.
As Islamic State has been pushed out of key towns and cities it seized in 2014, it has resorted increasingly to guerrilla-style attacks in civilian areas under nominal Iraqi government control.
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said on Saturday the militants were taking advantage of a political crisis in the country, sparked by his attempt to overhaul its quota-based governing system, to conduct bombings in areas under nominal government control.
Clashes lasted for hours before Iraqi troops managed to repel the attackers. One employee who lives nearby said he heard a powerful blast before seeing flames and black smoke coming from inside the factory.
“ISIS has receded somewhat militarily; they don’t have a… standing army to hold territory”, political risk analyst Kirk Sowell told CNN earlier this week.
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Percentages aren’t particularly informative on territory lost in Iraq at any rate, with much of the Anbar Province, where virtually all the fighting is, empty desert.
