Words by Warrior Actual
The people of Fallujah have fallen prisoner to Al-Qaeda backed group ISIL after a gruesome three day battle resulting in militants capturing the western city. Even though the walls of the city are still in the hands of the local police force, the center of the city, which was left entirely unguarded has been taken.
This is the same city that U.S. troops had previously secured and occupied for two years before withdrawing, leaving it in the hands of the local authorities. Over the past week both Fallujah and the nearby capital of Ramadi, have been taken over by the Al-Qaeda militants and have been the center of incursions by local government forces, which the militants have successfully fended off.
In efforts to help the Iraqi people, the U.S. State Department is working closely with Iraqi authorities and the tribes allied against ISIL. Already several people have been killed and at least a dozen injured in the joint effort between the Iraqi Army and Ramadi tribesmen on Friday to retake the city. The terrorists group tried to gain the cooperation of the Iraqi people by broadcasting during Friday’s prayer worship that they were here to defend Sunnis from the government.
The already volatile state of the population with the Sunni minority showing discontent to the Shiite political domination has been a source of an increase in violence over the past year. This takeover adds another level of complexity to the already troubling situation for the Shiite-led government. Al-Maliki, Iraqi Prime Minister, had recently instructed the military to move out of the heavily Sunni populated Anbar cities and allow local police to assume security duties as a show of compromise to theSunni population who saw the army as a symbol of Al-Maliki’s rule.
Soon after, the Al-Qaeda militants made their move in taking over the cities of Fallujah and Ramadi with force.