A Hezbollah commander said that the Iranian proxy group plans to bring its war against Israel to “the Galilee someday soon,” Buzzfeed News reported Sunday. The outlet reported on Iran’s multinational network of tens of thousands of highly trained and experienced combatants from across the Middle East, which Tehran uses to...

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Since American troops withdrew from Iraq, Iran has come to “dominate” its western neighbor in “military, political, economic and cultural affairs,” The New York Times reported Sunday. Tim Arango, the paper’s Baghdad bureau chief, detailed Iran’s history of working to subvert Iraq when it was ruled by Saddam Hussein, and then...

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In the wake of the successful Iraqi fight to liberate the city of Mosul from ISIS, the world should thank the Kurds for the vital role they played by supporting their quest for independence, French philosopher Bernard-Henri Lévy wrote Wednesday in Tablet Magazine. “It was the Kurdish peshmerga that, in October and November 2016, opened Mosul’s...

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After a brutal nine-month war, the Iraqi Army has liberated Mosul from ISIS. The city, Iraq’s second largest, is all but destroyed. The butcher’s bill tallies 30,000 people dead and counting. Another 600,000, roughly a third of the population, have been displaced. Roughly three-fourths of Mosul’s buildings are in ruins,...

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One of the most effective Iraqi Shiite militias has captured a town on the Syria border, drawing Iran’s “Shiite crescent” closer to Israel, Seth Frantzman reported for The Jerusalem Post on Tuesday. The Badr Brigade has reached the Iraqi village of Um Jaris, meaning that “forces that are close to Tehran pose...

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In 2001, Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) established a special unit consisting of handpicked members of the IRGC’s land, sea, and air forces. Dubbed the Saberin Unit, its members were described as volunteers “seeking martyrdom,” tasked to carry out special missions and/or widespread cross-border attacks for the IRGC. Amanollah...

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Newly displayed assertiveness by Iran-backed Shiite militias is concerning Sunni residents of the strategic Iraqi city of Tal Afar on the Syria border, the Associated Press reported Friday. With the Iraqi army is currently involved in the battle to defeat the Islamic State in Mosul, the country’s second largest city, the...

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The Iraqi parliament recently passed a law allowing Iran-backed Shiite militias to keep their command structure in place, raising concerns among the country’s Sunni leaders, The Wall Street Journal reported Monday. “The legislation legally empowers the militias and makes them ultimately answerable to Iraq’s prime minister, but it also allows groups that have...

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On October 17, the Iraqi government officially declared its plans to liberate Mosul from the Islamic State, more than two years after the city was captured. Unfortunately, winning will require cooperation many different parties. The Shiite government of Iraq, as well as the country’s Shiite militias, both want to be...

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Iran-backed militias in Iraq are raising flags identifying their Shi’ite loyalties in the battle to oust the Islamic State from Mosul, raising concerns among local leaders in the Sunni-majority region, Reuters reported Sunday. The militias, also known as Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), mostly includes “groups trained by Iran and loyal to its Supreme...

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