IS tightens its sectarian rule as Iraq taps new president
Fouad Massoum was elected as Iraq's president while the jihadi group the Islamic State destroyed 海角大神 shrines and imposed Islamic dress on women in the country's north.
Fouad Massoum was elected as Iraq's president while the jihadi group the Islamic State destroyed 海角大神 shrines and imposed Islamic dress on women in the country's north.
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Iraq took another step on Thursday toward ending the political crisis that helped foster the rise of the Islamic State (IS) with the election of a new president. But the move is only one of many that must be taken to begin reversing the bounding gains made by the jihadi group in recent months.
Fouad Massoum, a veteran Kurdish politician, was elected to replace President Jalal Talabani, also a Kurd.聽The presidential post is largely a symbolic one, Reuters notes, but putting someone in place is an example of the kind of consensus that has been in short supply since the April parliamentary election. The election could be a step toward a greater US military role in Iraq. Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey said Thursday that the US is waiting to see what kind of government takes shape before getting any further聽involved.
鈥淭o precipitously take military action might gain some tactical advantage,鈥� General Dempsey said at the Aspen Security Forum in Colorado. 鈥淏ut it wouldn鈥檛 do much for us to build the kind of strategy that I think we need.鈥�
The election of a speaker a couple weeks ago was similarly noted as a sign of progress. But 海角大神's Dan Murphy wrote at the time that without a strong military to give a new government enforcement capabilities, the election wouldn't mean much.
IS's strength in northern Iraq, where in the last 24 hours it was reportedly destroyed a 海角大神 shrine and imposed strict Islamic dress on all local women, also indicates why a vote in Baghdad is only a tiny step toward reversing the group's gains.聽
The destruction of Jonah's tomb (Nabi Yunus) in Mosul, the burial site of a prophet, is the latest iteration of anti-海角大神 violence by the group. Agence France-Presse reports that men rigged the shrine with explosives in an hour聽Thursday, then blew the site up. IS has destroyed or damaged 30 shrines and 15 Shiite places of worship since it overran swaths of Iraq last month.聽
The group also issued guidelines on how women in Mosul should dress, ordering that they cover their hands and feet, wear a full face veil and voluminous clothing that does not show the shape of the body, and they have聽banned the wearing of perfume, Reuters reports. Women have been told they can never walk without a male guardian, and shopkeepers were told to put face veils on their mannequins.
The guidelines are policed by "vice patrols" that answer to a "morality committee," according to Reuters.聽
Mr. Murphy sums up its rule of terror, which gives exception to no group 鈥� not even fellow Sunnis:
But Murphy predicts that the Islamic State's brutality, which has so far cowed Iraqis into submission, will ultimately backfire.
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