IRAQ: Popular Mobilization Forces take heavy casualties in Tikrit ISIS ambush

TIKRIT, Iraq – An Iraqi security source stated that the Islamic State (ISIS) launched an attack on Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) in Salah al-Din Governorate in northern Iraq, killing 10 members of the PMF and wounding many others.

The source stated that one of the checkpoints of Brigade 35 in the Mukeshefah area, south of Tikrit city, had been attacked by ISIS members and the 10 members of the checkpoint had been killed.

Moreover, when a patrol of PMF, Federal Police Force (FPF), and an intelligence unit reached the scene, an explosive device was detonated, killing several members of the patrol and wounding three more.

The Popular Mobilization Authority stated in a press release that fierce PMF–ISIS confrontations had taken place in the Balad and Mukeshefah areas.

Observers expect that Iraq might be the scene of ISIS’s return as a result of the covert and overt Sunni–Shia conflict and the political persecution practiced against the Sunnis of Iraq by the Shia–majority Iraqi government and the predominantly Shia PMF.