11 Dead in Iraq Attack Blamed on ISIS

A view of the old city of Mosul and buildings destroyed during past fighting with ISIS militants, in Mosul, Iraq February 22, 2021. REUTERS/Thaier al-Sudani
A view of the old city of Mosul and buildings destroyed during past fighting with ISIS militants, in Mosul, Iraq February 22, 2021. REUTERS/Thaier al-Sudani
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11 Dead in Iraq Attack Blamed on ISIS

A view of the old city of Mosul and buildings destroyed during past fighting with ISIS militants, in Mosul, Iraq February 22, 2021. REUTERS/Thaier al-Sudani
A view of the old city of Mosul and buildings destroyed during past fighting with ISIS militants, in Mosul, Iraq February 22, 2021. REUTERS/Thaier al-Sudani

ISIS militants killed 11 people including a woman on Tuesday in an attack on a village in Diyala province, east of Iraq, the country's Joint Operations Command said in a statement.

The attack that targeted "defenseless civilians" in the village of Al-Hawasha, near the town of Muqdadiya, injured others, it added.

The attack left "11 dead and 13 wounded", a local security source said.

Another said that civilians were among those killed by small arms fire in the village, home to many members of the security services.

The area has been sealed off and reinforcements sent to hunt for the attackers, the first source said.

Both sources said most of the village's inhabitants belong to the same Bani Tamim tribe as the Diyala provincial governor.

ISIS surged to control large swathes of Iraq and Syria in 2014, but its "caliphate" later crumbled under successive attacks.

Iraq declared it defeated in 2017 and the group was smashed in neighboring Syria in 2019.

But the extremist threat remains and the group continues to carry out attacks.

A UN report published early this year estimated that around 10,000 ISIS fighters remained active across Iraq and Syria.



Syrian Security Forces Search for Militants Who Refuse to Turn in Their Weapons

Weapons and ammunition handed over by members of Bashar Assad regime security forces are collected by members of the new government, in Damascus, Syria, Tuesday, Dec. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Mosa'ab Elshamy)
Weapons and ammunition handed over by members of Bashar Assad regime security forces are collected by members of the new government, in Damascus, Syria, Tuesday, Dec. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Mosa'ab Elshamy)
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Syrian Security Forces Search for Militants Who Refuse to Turn in Their Weapons

Weapons and ammunition handed over by members of Bashar Assad regime security forces are collected by members of the new government, in Damascus, Syria, Tuesday, Dec. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Mosa'ab Elshamy)
Weapons and ammunition handed over by members of Bashar Assad regime security forces are collected by members of the new government, in Damascus, Syria, Tuesday, Dec. 31, 2024. (AP Photo/Mosa'ab Elshamy)

The forces together with armed vehicles were deployed in the city of Homs Thursday to look for the militants affiliated with ousted President Bashar Assad, state media reported.
SANA, citing a military official, said that the new de facto authorities led by the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham group had set up centers in Syria’s third-largest city for former soldiers and militants to hand over their weapons, similar to other parts of Syria.
In early December, a lightning insurgency took out the decades-long rule of Assad in less than two weeks. HTS has since run much of war-torn Syria under the authority of its leader Ahmad al-Sharaa, The Associated Press said.
Officials who were part of Assad's notorious web of intelligence and security apparatus have been arrested over the past few weeks.