Crisis In Iraq

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Nov 19,2014 A Dutch mother has returned to the Netherlands with her daughter after going to Syria to bring her back from the Islamic State stronghold of Raqqa. The mother, identified only as Monique, she went to ISIS-controlled Raqqa, found her daughter and brought her safely to Turkey, inspite Dutch police warned her not to go. The daughter, Aicha, ran away from home in February aged 18, and married Omar Yilmaz, a Dutch-Turkish jihadist who had once been in the Dutch military. Monique traveled to Syria in October to try and rescue her daughter, but it was in vain. Once Monique returned to the Netherlands, she received a “cry for help” from her daughter. “She wants to come home, but can not leave Raqqa without help”, says lawyer Landerloo. Monique asked Maastricht police to try and help in her quest to bring her daughter back to the Netherlands. However, they proved to be of little assistance, saying merely that it was too dangerous to travel t...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Nov 16,2014 The Islamic State militant group released a video Sunday that shows American aid worker Peter Kassig was beheaded in Syria. The video did not show the beheading but showed a masked man standing with a decapitated head covered in blood lying at his feet. Speaking in English in a British accent, the man says: "This is Peter Edward Kassig, a U.S. citizen." President Barack Obama confirmed Kassig 's beheading, saying Kassig "was taken from us in an act of pure evil by a terrorist group that the world rightly associates with inhumanity." Kassig,a 26-year-old from Indiana was captured in eastern Syria while delivering relief supplies to refugees whose lives had been upended by war, His friends say he converted to Islam in captivity and changed his name to Abdul-Rahman and quietly worked to secure the former U.S. Army ranger's release. The video, which was posted on websites used by the group in the past, appeared...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 31, 2014 Dozens of Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga fighters have been crossed into the embattled Syrian border town of Kobane from Turkey on Thursday, to help push back Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants .who have defied U.S. air strikes and threatened to massacre its Kurdish defenders. The Iraqi peshmerga delegation crossed back into Turkey at nightfall after discussing with Syrian Kurds details of the expected deployment of a force According to the British-based monitoring group, a convoy carrying Peshmerga fighters arrived near the Turkish town of Suruc on Wednesday night. They, in turn, made contact with other Kurdish fighters who had flown in earlier that day. “The force is equipped with heavy guns including mortars, canons, rocket launchers, etc.,” the Guardian cites Safeen Dizayee, spokesman for the Iraqi Kurdistan regional government, as saying on Thursday. The Kurdish troops have set up a temporary camp in a farming depo...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 30, 2014 Islamic state of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) militants executed 46 people and besieged 500 families in the Iraqi city of Heet, Al Arabiya News Channel’s correspondent to Anbar reported on Wednesday. ISIS militants targeted members of the Sunni Albu Nimr tribe, which had fought against them in Anbar, according to media reports. killing over 40 people on , including Iraqi army soldiers, in a city captured earlier in October. Anbar provincial council chairman Sabah Karhout said those killed were captured when the Islamic State group overran the town, located about 85 miles west of Baghdad, earlier this month The slayings took place on a main street in al-Bakir district in the town of Heet, which has been the scene of intense fighting by jihadis and local resistance groups in recent weeks. A photograph obtained by The Associated Press showed a line of the men's bodies by a small pool of blood as onlookers walked by. While ISIS did not claim ...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 21, 2014 Islamic State group fighters have seized earlier this week a cache of weapons airdropped by U.S.-led coalition forces that were meant to supply Kurdish fighters battling the extremist group. The cache of weapons included hand grenades, ammunition and rocket-propelled grenade launchers, according to a video uploaded by a media group loyal to IS. The video appeared authentic and corresponded to the Associated Press' reporting of the event. Meanwhile, the IS released video footage on Tuesday showing one of its fighters showcasing the captured weapons near Kobane. The weapons included grenades and RPG shells. The air drops on Sunday were the first of their kind and followed weeks of US and coalition air strikes in and near Kobani, near the Turkish border. The US earlier said it had launched 11 air strikes overnight in the Kobani area. Senior administration officials said that on Sunday night three American C-130 aircraft dropped 27 pal...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 17, 2014 Iraqi pilots who have joined the Islamic State in Syria are training members of the group to fly three captured fighter jets, a group monitoring the war said Friday, Last August three fighter jets captured when it took control of military airports in Syria’s Aleppo and Raqqa, provinces., which are believed to be MiG-21 and MiG-23 jets, are capable of flying although it is unclear if they are equipped with missiles, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. U.S. Central Command said it was not aware of Islamic State flying jets in Syria. Rami Abdul Rahman, the monitoring group’s founder, claims former Iraqi officers who served under Saddam Hussein have been training the Iraqi militants to fly the aircraft, the BBC reported. “People saw the flights, they went up many times from the airport and they are flying in the skies outside the airport and coming back,” Mr Rahman said. U.S. Central Command said it was not aware of I...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 18, 2014 Iraqi parliamentarians named two relatively unknown politicians to head its most sensitive security posts in Prime Minister Haidar al-Abbadi's government, on Saturday. Mohammed Salem al-Ghabban, a Shia, was appointed interior minister, while Khaled al-Obeidi, a Sunni, was confirmed as defence minister. Al-Ghabban, a lawmaker with al-Abadi’s State of Law political bloc, was approved as minister of interior by a 197-63 vote. He holds degrees from universities in both Tehran and London and he is currently pursuing a PhD in political science in Baghdad. He was a long-time opponent of Saddam and was detained in 1979. Al-Obeidi, a lawmaker from Mosul, was selected for the post of defense minister, by a vote of 175-85. He had served as an officer in Saddam Hussein’s military and holds a PhD in political science. The ministries — interior and defense — are particularly important because each controls an array of security forces fighting t...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 17, 2014 Iraqi pilots who have joined the Islamic State in Syria are training members of the group to fly three captured fighter jets, a group monitoring the war said Friday, Last August three fighter jets captured when it took control of military airports in Syria’s Aleppo and Raqqa, provinces., which are believed to be MiG-21 and MiG-23 jets, are capable of flying although it is unclear if they are equipped with missiles, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. U.S. Central Command said it was not aware of Islamic State flying jets in Syria. Rami Abdul Rahman, the monitoring group’s founder, claims former Iraqi officers who served under Saddam Hussein have been training the Iraqi militants to fly the aircraft, the BBC reported. “People saw the flights, they went up many times from the airport and they are flying in the skies outside the airport and coming back,” Mr Rahman said. U.S. Central Command said it was not aware of ...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 13, 2014 Islamist insurgents on Monday seized control of a key military training camp in Anbar province ,The base outside the city of Hit was one of the Shiite-led government’s few remaining military outposts in Anbar. Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) fighters had assaulted and eventually seized the center of the western city on the Euphrates river, but a sizeable contingent of government forces remained holed up in a nearby base. The Iraqi military still controls the Ayn al-Asad military base, which helps defend Iraq’s second-largest dam and the provincial capital of Ramadi. High quality global journalism requires investment. Please share this article with others using the link below, do not cut & paste the article. A security source in Iraq described the loss of Hit as a “tactical withdrawal” by the Iraqi army unit that controlled the base and protected the town. It is the latest military base to fall in Anbar. High quality global...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 13, 2014 Turkey denied Monday that it has reached any “new agreement” with the United States to allow the use of Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey for attacks on the Islamic State militant group. The Turkish prime minister’s office said an agreement had been reached to train several thousand Syrian moderate rebels, may not be enough to stop the massacre of civilians in Syria’s border town of Kobani, where intense fighting continues. On Sunday, the US said Turkey had agreed to let US and coalition forces use its military bases, including the key Incirlik airbase close to the southern city of Adana, 100 miles from the Syrian border.But Turkish officials insisted that no decision had been taken on Incirlik Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said the Incirlik air base was already being used for reconnaissance purposes in Iraq but suggested its use for wider operations would depend on whether Turkey's demands for a no-fly zone and a safe...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 10, 2014 Islamic State fighters seized more than a third of the Syrian border town of Kobani, a monitoring group said on Thursday. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Islamic State, which is still widely known by its former acronym of ISIS, had pushed forward on Thursday. The US military said that US-led coalition warplanes have intensified bombing raids to push back ISIS, intent on seizing the Kurdish town of Kobane in Syria. US Central Command, which is overseeing the air war and American forces in the Middle East, said on Wednesday,US and Jordanian aircraft conducted eight additional strikes on ISIL around Kobane, for a total of 14 coalition strikes for the day and 19 bombing raids near the town since Tuesday. Observatory this morning said that despite overnight airstrikes, which have continued into this morning, Islamic State fighters managed to capture a police station in the east of Kobane and now control one third of the city...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 09, 2014 U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Wednesday that a buffer zone along the border between Syria and Turkey is worth considering ,wall street Journal reported Kerry, appearing at the State Department with his U.K. counterpart, said a buffer zone is “worth examining, worth looking at very closely.” He added that Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan should not bear the “incredible burden” of thousands of refugees fleeing from Syria into neighboring countries. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel and General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff said Friday a no-fly zone over northeastern Syria and a buffer zone along the border between Syria and Turkey are among the options being considered by the Obama administration to protect civilians from airstrikes by the Syrian government. Turkey's parliament has approved any incursions the Turkish government sees fit to launch over the border in either Iraq or Syria. Turkey is an importa...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 08, 2014 An Iraqi military helicopter crashed Wednesday near Baiji, around 200 kilometers (120 miles) north of Baghdad, killing the crew, a senior officer and residents said. According to two Iraqi officials, the extremists used a shoulder-fired missile to take down the Bell 407 helicopter, which crashed just north of the refinery town of Beiji, located about 200 kilometers (130 miles) north of Baghdad. Iraqi federal forces have been battling the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria group at the Baiji oil refinery since the beginning of the jihadist offensive in early June. It was the second time in less than a week that militants of the extremist group the Islamic State have shot down an Iraqi military helicopter.Despite weeks of an escalating US-led air campaign against Isil, the jihadis have continued to press Iraqi forces west of the capital. The two incidents highlight the Islamic State group’s ability to counter air operations, potentially ...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 08, 2014 Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militant group, claimed responsibility for an explosion on Tuesday , wounding two Israeli soldiers and drawing artillery fire in response. “At 2:22 pm Tuesday, the brigade of the martyred Ali Hasan Haidar of the Islamic Resistance set off an explosive device under an Israeli patrol in the Shebaa heights, which led to several casualties among the ranks of the occupying soldiers,” a statement issued by the resistance group. The soldiers were on a patrol along the border when an explosive device went off, the Israeli military said. Israeli troops then found a second explosive device on the Israeli side of the border, which was detonated by Israeli bomb squads. The Israeli Defense Force has confirmed the shelling of Lebanese territory, saying that it hit two outposts of the Hezbollah militant group in the south of the country on Tuesday. Israel and Lebanon are technically at war but their 80 km (49 mile) ...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 08, 2014 Canada's Parliament voted Tuesday to authorize airstrikes against the Islamic State militant group in Iraq following a U.S. request, Associated Press reported The motion backing a Canadian combat role passed 157 to 134, with members of the two main opposition parties voting against following two days of debate. Six hundred air crew and other personnel, along with six fighter jets and several other military aircraft, will now head to the Middle East. The approval means Canada is now the latest country to lend air support to U.S.-led efforts in the Middle East,Canada is among dozens of countries that have joined the US-led coalition fighting the Islamic State militant group. “The United States welcomes the Canadian government’s deployment of fighter and refueling aircraft, as well as intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance aircraft to participate in the campaign to degrade and destroy ISIS in Iraq,” a White House spokesman said. ...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 07, 2014 Islamic State fighters have reportedly moved closer to capturing the Syrian town of Kobani, near the Turkish borders, Associated Press reported Militants raised their flag on a building on the eastern outskirts of the Syrian border town of Kobani after an assault of almost three weeks, but the town's Kurdish defenders said they had not reached the city center on Monday. The U.S.-led coalition has launched several airstrikes over the past two weeks near Kobani in a bid to help Kurdish forces defend the town, but have failed to interrupt the advance of Islamic State fighters closing in on a key city on the Turkish border, raising questions about the western strategy for defeating the jihadi movement. The assault has forced some 160,000 Syrians to flee and put a strain on Kurdish forces, who have struggled to hold off the extremists. Hundreds more civilians fled Kobani on Monday as the jihadists advanced, according to Britain-based Sy...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 05, 2014 Islamic State fighters are within a kilometre of Kobane and US air attacks will not halt them, a Kurdish leader has said, as the group continued to bomb the Syrian-Kurdish town. Islamic State forces captured a strategic hill overlooking the Syrian stronghold of Kobani on the border with Turkey after a three-week siege of the town, according to NTV television and local Kurds. U.S.-led coalition warplanes had struck at Islamic State targets overnight to halt the insurgents' advance and Saturday's barrages were less intense than the previous day. "Clashes continue now, they are shelling on all three fronts. They tried to invade Kobani last night but they were repelled," senior Kurdish official Asya Abdullah told Reuters from the town on Saturday. Fighting for Kobane has raged for weeks. Kurdish fighters have managed to hold the town as dozens of surrounding villages fell to ISIL. IS fighters launched a major offensive ag...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 04, 2014 Islamic State forces shelled the Syrian border town of Kobani on Saturday and its Kurdish defenders said they were expecting a new assault to try to capture it. Kurdish forces backed by U.S.-led airstrikes are trying to defend the town of Kobani from the militant advance. Kurds have been struggling to repel IS militants for weeks. The main Kurdish armed group in Syria called on its kinsmen across the region to help it stop a massacre in the Syrian town of Kobani as Islamic State militants armed with tanks edged closer on its outskirts and pummel it with artillery fire. Islamic State said they would take the town within days, Is launched an offensive to capture Kobane On September 15 and have advanced steadily despite U.S.-led air strikes. Kurds have expressed anger and disappointment over Ankara's policy against ISIS, accusing the government of turning a blind eye to the group and refusing to allow Turkish Kurds to cross the border...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 04, 2014 Islamic State militants beheaded British aid worker Alan Henning in a video posted on Friday. Henning (47) from Eccles, Greater Manchester has been beheaded by Islamic State militants .Henning,taxi driver from Salford in northern England, was part of an aid convoy taking medical supplies to a hospital in northwest Syria in December last year when it was stopped by gunmen and he was abducted. The footage on YouTube, highlighted on pro-Islamic State Twitter feeds, showed Henning , in an orange jumpsuit kneeling next to a black-clad militant in arid scrubland . In the video, titled "Another Message to America and its allies," Henning says: "I am Alan Henning. Because of our parliament's decision to attack the Islamic State, I as a member of the British public will now pay the price for that decision". A male voice with a British accent says, a masked man standing behind Henning, who is seen kneeling in front, says ...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 02, 2014 Turkey’s parliament has approved a motion that allows the government to authorise cross-border military incursions against Isis fighters in Syria and Iraq, and allow coalition forces to use Turkish territory. Parliament voted 298-98 in favour of the motion, which sets the legal framework for any Turkish military involvement in Iraq or Syria. Turkey has been under pressure to play a more active role in the US-led fight , after the insurgents advanced to within clear sight of Turkish military positions on the Syrian border. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitoring group, said Islamic State fighters were only a few hundred yards away from the town town of Ayn al-Arab, known as Kobani in Kurdish. The varying estimates, which could not be independently verified, appeared to underscore the chaotic situation on the ground. The past two weeks , Isis launched an offensive against the predominantly Kurdish town of Kobani, forcing mor...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Oct 01, 2014 The United Kingdom launched its first airstrikes against ISIS since parliament approved military action Friday. British fighter planes on had launched their first airstrikes against Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) positions in Iraq on Tuesday, targeting a weapon position and armed truck. “Royal Air Force Tornado GR4 aircraft have been in action over Iraq today in the fight against ISIL,” the ministry said in a statement. “This action is part of the international coalition’s operations to support the democratic Iraqi government,” the statement added. The U.K. only joined the U.S.-led fight against ISIS militants on Friday when lawmakers there voted 524-43 for action — after being urgently recalled from a scheduled recess. Arab countries have joined the military operation faster than the traditional Western allies. France responded Sept. 19, followed by Australia, Belgium, the Netherlands and Denmark. The goal of the campaign is to...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep29, 2014 U.S.-led coalition strikes targeted Islamic State group positions overnight across in northern and eastern Syria, killing civilians and wounding militants, a group monitoring the war said on Monday. Washington and its Arab allies have been carrying out strikes in Iraq against the militant group since last month and in Syria since last week . It aims to destroy the bases and forces of the al-Qaida offshoot that has captured large areas of both countries. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Monday the strikes hit a grain silo and jihadist sites in Aleppo and Raqqa. The Observatory said the grain silo was run by civilians, and it appears there were casualties. The report has not been confirmed. Other strikes are said to have hit the entrance to the country's main gas plant in an apparent warning to Islamic State militants to leave the facility. The United States has said it wants strikes to target oil facilities h...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep25, 2014 The United States has identified the militant in the videos depicting the killings of two US journalists and a British aid worker, FBI Director James Comey told reporters on Thursday. Comey, said his agents believe they have identified the man nicknamed "Jihadi John" but would not be releasing his identity. In the three videos, the man speaks British-accented English. He holds a long knife and appears to begin cutting the three men American journalists James Foley and Steven Sotloff, and British aid worker David Haines were all killed in a similarly public, brutal fashion. The life of another British citizen, Alan Henning, was threatened in the last video. British authorities refused to comment on the FBI’s statement, and would not say whether any arrests were imminent in the London area , according to The Daily Mail. last week, A new video posted online by supporters of the Islamic State militant purportedly shows a British j...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep25, 2014 Iraq's prime minister said on Thursday,his country has received "credible" intelligence that Islamic State militants plan to attack subway systems in Paris and the United States The Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said at the United Nations in New York that his country’s intelligence agents had received word of a plot by Isis to attack the Paris Metro system and the New York subway. Asked if the attacks were imminent, he said, “I’m not sure.” Asked if the attacks had been thwarted, he said, “No.” "Today, while I'm here I'm receiving accurate reports from Baghdad that there were arrests of a few elements and there were networks from inside Iraq to have attacks ... on metros of Paris and U.S.," al-Abadi said, speaking in English. "They are not Iraqis. Some of them are French, some of them are Americans. But they are in Iraq." National Security Council spokeswoman Caitlin Hayden said the White ...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep24, 2014 An Algerian extremist group linked to the Islamic State has decapitated a French hostage in retaliation for France’s airstrikes against militants , according to a video obtained Wednesday by a U.S.-based terrorism watchdog. The French national, identified as Herve Gourdel, 55, was kidnapped Sunday while hiking in mountains southeast of the capital Algiers. A video released by a U.S. terrorism watchdog showed Algerian extremists allied with the Islamic State group decapitating a hostage after France ignored their demand to stop airstrikes in Iraq. The group, which calls itself Jund al-Khilafah, said after abducting Herve Gourdel on Sunday that he would be killed within 24 hours unless France ended its airstrikes against Islamic State fighters in Iraq. Gourdel is then shown kneeling in a grey T-shirt before four hooded militants, two of them bearing assault rifles while another reads out a message in Arabic denouncing French military ...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep23, 2014 The United States and five Arab countries launched airstrikes against Sunni militants in Syria early Tuesday, the Pentagon said, a heavy bombardment against multiple targets that marked an aggressive expansion of President Obama's war on Islamic State militants. U.S. officials said the airstrikes began around 8:30 p.m. EDT, and were conducted by the U.S., Bahrain, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Jordan and the United Arab Emirates. At a conference on Sept. 11 with Secretary of State John Kerry, key Arab allies promised they would ‘‘do their share’’ to fight the Islamic State militants. The airstrikes focused on the city of Raqqa, the Sunni extremists' stronghold in northeastern Syria, and along the border with Iraq, targets included fuel and weapons depots, command and control facilities, training camps and other targets .The first wave of strikes finished about 90 minutes later, but the operation was expected to continue for several more ...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep19, 2014 Thousands of Kurds fleeing the "Islamic State" have crossed into Turkey. The militant group has seized Kurdish villages in northern Syria over the past two days. TV footage showed exhausted people, mostly women and children, crossing checkpoint near the Turkish town of Suruc as mortar fire struck a village on the Syrian side. Turkey has allowed thousands of Syrian Kurds fleeing Islamic State to cross borders - which shares a border with Iraq and Syria - has taken in more than 847,000 Syrian refugees since the uprising against President Bashar al-Assad began in 2011. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which tracks developments in the war, said on Friday IS had seized three more villages near Kobani, bringing to 24 the number it had taken. Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said that he had given the order after receiving information that 4,000 Kurds had arrived at the border seeking shelter. "We have taken in 4,00...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep19, 2014 France carried out its first airstrikes in Iraq on Friday, hitting a logistics depot held by the Islamic State extremist group, French President Francois Hollande announced. A statement from Hollande's office read: "This morning, at 9.40am, our Rafale aircraft carried out a first attack against a logistics center of the terrorist organization Daesh [Isis] in the north-east of Iraq. The target was hit and entirely destroyed. Other operations will be carried out in the days to come." The target was near Tall Mouss in the Zoumar sector of northern Iraq. The French aircraft are based at Al-Dhafra, near Abu Dhabi in the United Arab Emirates. The strikes came after a night of violence in the Iraqi capital. The Islamic State again demonstrated its capability to target mostly Shiite neighborhoods in Baghdad. Suicide bombers and mortar fire struck the Shiite district of Kadhimiyah overnight, officials said. Later, at least 17 people w...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep18, 2014 The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) captured on Thursday 21 Kurdish villages in northern Syria, according to the Associated Press. Rami Abdulrahman, founder of the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said the villages had been seized in an ISIL advance that started on Wednesday. "They have a large number of fighters," he told Reuters by phone. For more than a year, the Islamic State group and Kurdish militias have been locked in a fierce fight in several pockets of northern Syria where large Kurdish populations reside. The clashes are but one aspect of Syria's broader civil war  a multilayered conflict that the U.N. says has killed more than 190,000. The aid organization said Kurdish civilians were feeing their villages in fear of being massacred by the advancing militants. Nawaf Khalil, a spokesman for Syria's powerful Kurdish Democracy Democratic Union Party, said the Kurdish fighters withdrew or ...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep18, 2014 A new video posted online Thursday by supporters of the Islamic State militant purportedly shows a British journalist who was captured nearly two years ago in Syria. The Internet video, titled “Lend Me Your Ears” and subtitled in Arabic, shows the journalist, John Cantlie, dressed in an orange jumpsuit and apparently reading from a script, " In November 2012, I came to Syria, where I was subsequently captured by the Islamic State. Now, nearly two years later, many things have changed, including the expansion of the IS to include large areas of eastern Syria and western Iraq, a land mass bigger than Britain and many other nations. Now, I know what you're thinking. You're thinking he's only doing this because he's a prisoner. He's got a gun at his head and he's being forced to do this, right? Well, it is true, I am a prisoner. That I cannot deny, but seeing as I've been abandoned by my government and my fate...

 Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep17, 2014 Qatar's emir told German Chancellor Angela Merkel that his country "has never and will never supportIslamic State in Iraq and Syria, telling  that his own country's security was jeopardised by the militants. "Qatar has never supported extremist groups," Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al-Thani told a joint press conference, according to the German simultaneous translation. "What is happening in Iraq and Syria is extremism, and those groupings are being partially funded from abroad, but Qatar has never and will never support terrorist organisations.” The comments came after Tamim was asked about a German politician’s comments last month suggesting that Qatar has played a role in funding militants belonging to the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. Merkel said she was happy the emir could answer the question in an open forum to "correct faulty assessments." Tamim, 34, the emir is the youngest head of state in th...

Written by : Mohamed Abdel Fattah Sep15, 2014  Iran has refused a U.S. appeal to join a global fight against Islamic State militants, the country’s leader said Monday, as about 30 countries have pledged to support Iraq in its fight against Islamic State militants by "all means necessary," including military aid. Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei said Monday that the US offered to discuss a coordinated effort with Iran against Islamic State (IS, also known as ISIS or ISIL), a common foe in the region, in the midst of an escalating campaign of violence that continues to claim lives across Iraq in Syria. The Islamic State group, which has taken over large areas in northern and western Iraq as well as eastern Syria. The state-run FARS News agency reports Khamenei said he rejected any cooperation because "they have a corrupt intention and stained hands." “ISIL presents a serious threat to Iran as it does to every other state in the region,”U.S. State D...