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| US places sanctions on senior Isis member as Iraq bombing campaign intensifies | |
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| The US State Department banned a senior member of the Islamic State (Isis) on Monday as the United States sharply intensified its new bombing campaign in Iraq. | The US State Department banned a senior member of the Islamic State (Isis) on Monday as the United States sharply intensified its new bombing campaign in Iraq. |
| The designation came as US fighter jets, bombers and drones on Monday launched 15 strikes against Isis positions around one of Iraq’s most important pieces of infrastructure, a third day of support for a difficult effort by Iraqi forces to retake the Mosul Dam that has doubled the lethal US strike total. | The designation came as US fighter jets, bombers and drones on Monday launched 15 strikes against Isis positions around one of Iraq’s most important pieces of infrastructure, a third day of support for a difficult effort by Iraqi forces to retake the Mosul Dam that has doubled the lethal US strike total. |
| Now banned from any financial dealings in the United States or with people in the United States is the group’s spokesman, Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, a Syrian whose given name is Taha Sobhi Falaha. Also banned was Said Arif, an Algerian member of the rival Nusra Front who escaped house arrest in France and was linked to a plot to bomb the Eiffel Tower. | Now banned from any financial dealings in the United States or with people in the United States is the group’s spokesman, Abu Mohammed al-Adnani, a Syrian whose given name is Taha Sobhi Falaha. Also banned was Said Arif, an Algerian member of the rival Nusra Front who escaped house arrest in France and was linked to a plot to bomb the Eiffel Tower. |
| The designations, which followed sanctions by the United Nations security council on the two Isis and Nusra members and four others, do not explicitly authorize military targeting of the banned Isis members. But they come as the US military sharply stepped up its air attacks on Isis positions by a critical dam, a departure by degree from the previous rounds of US air strikes. | The designations, which followed sanctions by the United Nations security council on the two Isis and Nusra members and four others, do not explicitly authorize military targeting of the banned Isis members. But they come as the US military sharply stepped up its air attacks on Isis positions by a critical dam, a departure by degree from the previous rounds of US air strikes. |
| The US continued to provide air cover for a third day for a force of Kurdish fighters and Iraqi security forces as they attempted to wrest the Mosul Dam away from Isis. Fighting was said to proceed along a 30-mile front, and both sides traded competing claims on Monday of control of the dam. | The US continued to provide air cover for a third day for a force of Kurdish fighters and Iraqi security forces as they attempted to wrest the Mosul Dam away from Isis. Fighting was said to proceed along a 30-mile front, and both sides traded competing claims on Monday of control of the dam. |
| The US Central Command announced that a mix of manned and unmanned warplanes on Monday destroyed “nine [Isis] fighting positions”, a checkpoint, an anti-aircraft gun mounted on a truck, an “emplacement belt” for homemade bombs, and at least seven Isis vehicles. | The US Central Command announced that a mix of manned and unmanned warplanes on Monday destroyed “nine [Isis] fighting positions”, a checkpoint, an anti-aircraft gun mounted on a truck, an “emplacement belt” for homemade bombs, and at least seven Isis vehicles. |
| Damage to the Mosul Dam could result in massive flooding across central Iraq and down to Baghdad. Like the previous waves of air strikes launched by the US over the past 10 days, President Barack Obama, in a letter to Congress on Sunday, justified air strikes supporting the recapture of the dam on protection of US personnel, as the hundreds of special-operations “advisers” and diplomats would be potentially imperiled by the flooding. | Damage to the Mosul Dam could result in massive flooding across central Iraq and down to Baghdad. Like the previous waves of air strikes launched by the US over the past 10 days, President Barack Obama, in a letter to Congress on Sunday, justified air strikes supporting the recapture of the dam on protection of US personnel, as the hundreds of special-operations “advisers” and diplomats would be potentially imperiled by the flooding. |
| But last week’s strikes were aimed at breaking Isis’s siege of Yazidi and other civilians atop Mount Sinjar and preventing Isis from entering Iraqi Kurdistan. By expanding the map of US airstrikes into Nineveh Province, traditionally under the control of Baghdad, Obama moved the US closer into outright war against the Islamist army that has overrun significant parts of Iraq and Syria. | But last week’s strikes were aimed at breaking Isis’s siege of Yazidi and other civilians atop Mount Sinjar and preventing Isis from entering Iraqi Kurdistan. By expanding the map of US airstrikes into Nineveh Province, traditionally under the control of Baghdad, Obama moved the US closer into outright war against the Islamist army that has overrun significant parts of Iraq and Syria. |
| The numbers indicate the extent of the shift in approach. Over the past 10 days, US warplanes have launched 68 airstrikes. Central Command said on Monday that 35 of them have come “in support of Iraqi forces near the Mosul Dam” – meaning that just over half the total strikes have come since Saturday night. | The numbers indicate the extent of the shift in approach. Over the past 10 days, US warplanes have launched 68 airstrikes. Central Command said on Monday that 35 of them have come “in support of Iraqi forces near the Mosul Dam” – meaning that just over half the total strikes have come since Saturday night. |
| The State Department denied that striking Isis at the Mosul Dam represented mission creep. | The State Department denied that striking Isis at the Mosul Dam represented mission creep. |
| “Anything that threatens our people or facilities is fair game under the guidelines the president announced,” said spokeswoman Marie Harf. | “Anything that threatens our people or facilities is fair game under the guidelines the president announced,” said spokeswoman Marie Harf. |
| Those attacks, authorized by Obama on Friday, according to the White House letter, follow a decision by Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki not to contest the elevation of his replacement, the US-backed Haider al-Abadi. For two months, Obama indicated that US military support to Baghdad would increase once Maliki, whose thorough alienation of Iraqi Sunnis contributed to Isis’s rise, was out of the picture. Many Arab Iraqis had questioned Obama’s decision to attack Isis on behalf of Iraq’s ethnic minorities and not to protect their own interests. | Those attacks, authorized by Obama on Friday, according to the White House letter, follow a decision by Iraqi prime minister Nouri al-Maliki not to contest the elevation of his replacement, the US-backed Haider al-Abadi. For two months, Obama indicated that US military support to Baghdad would increase once Maliki, whose thorough alienation of Iraqi Sunnis contributed to Isis’s rise, was out of the picture. Many Arab Iraqis had questioned Obama’s decision to attack Isis on behalf of Iraq’s ethnic minorities and not to protect their own interests. |
| Obama said in his letter to Congress that the strikes on Isis at the dam would be “limited in their scope and duration”. | Obama said in his letter to Congress that the strikes on Isis at the dam would be “limited in their scope and duration”. |
| The State Department described Adnani, the Isis spokesman, as among “the first foreign fighters to oppose Coalition forces in Iraq.” It said Arif had fled house arrest in France last year to join an Isis rival in Syria, the al-Qaida-aligned Nusra Front, after Arif had been convicted of involvement in a 2006 plot to assault French malls, police stations and the Eiffel Tower. | The State Department described Adnani, the Isis spokesman, as among “the first foreign fighters to oppose Coalition forces in Iraq.” It said Arif had fled house arrest in France last year to join an Isis rival in Syria, the al-Qaida-aligned Nusra Front, after Arif had been convicted of involvement in a 2006 plot to assault French malls, police stations and the Eiffel Tower. |