Orientul Mijlociu

At a time when the Sadrist movement is seeking understandings with Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish parties to form a government, the forces rejecting the results of the elections are taking to the streets in protest against any Cabinet formation talks before the results issue is resolved.

Iraq’s Sadrist movement head Muqtada al-Sadr discussed on Nov. 5 his Cabinet formation with Victory Alliance head Haider al-Abadi during a rare visit by Sadr to the capital. This came after meeting with parliamentary speaker Mohammed al-Halbusi and National Wisdom Movement head Ammar al-Hakim. Sadr had become accustomed to handling political issues and making decisions while at his residence in the Shiite town of al-Hanana, west of Najaf.

Here’s What You Need to Remember: In 2017 forces loyal to the Syrian regime recaptured Ksheesh air base from ISIS.

Between 2013 and 2017 a small number of L-39 light attack jets at a Syrian air force base east of Aleppo changed hands several times. Syrian rebels captured them from the Syrian air force. Then Islamic State militants seized the planes from the rebels. Finally, forces loyal to the Syrian regime recaptured the L-39s.

Deir Ezzor province: SOHR activists have reported that a 25 year-old displaced woman from al-Mayadeen was killed in al-Busayra city in Deir Ezzor countryside.

According to local sources, two unidentified women were accused of the murder, as they had entered the victim’s house, which is next to the culture center in al-Busayra, this morning.

Mazlum Kobane, commander in chief of the Syrian Democratic Forces, also says Damascus is not yet ready for negotiations.

Turkey has resumed its threats of yet another large military operation against the Syrian Democratic Forces, the United States’ top ally in the fight against the Islamic State.

Unlike in October 2019 when Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan got the go-ahead from then-President Donald Trump to invade a large chunk of the Syrian Kurdish region, Turkey is facing resistance from the international community.

The attempted assassination of Iraq’s prime minister was carried out by at least one Tehran-backed militia using explosives-laden drones made in Iran, security officials and militia sources said on Monday.

Mustafa Al-Kadhimi escaped unhurt when three drones targeted his residence in Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone on Sunday. Two of the weapons were intercepted and destroyed, but a third detonated, damaging the building and injuring several of his personal bodyguards.

Whenever Iran’s expansionist project in Iraq encounters obstacles, Tehran immediately starts to open old wounds, such as demanding compensation for the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq War and using this as a stick to beat Baghdad with. This Iranian policy has one objective: Blackmailing Iraq into submission and compliance.

Over the years, Iran has also employed various other levers to bring Iraq to its knees, such as withholding the supply of water from its sources and reducing or cutting off the supply of electricity. To justify the latter, Iran has argued that Baghdad has failed to pay its bills.

SDF members destroyed a vehicle-borne improvised explosive device “to prevent possible harm to locals in the area and recovered weapons cache and detained maligned actors to eliminate the threat.”

The General Command of the Internal Security Forces (Asayish) in northeast Syria announced on Monday the arrest of a suspected ISIS cell that was planning to launch an attack on a terrorist detention facility in the Syrian city of Hasakah.

Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi survived an attack by an armed drone on his residence on November 7 amid escalating tensions over the refusal of Iran-backed militias to accept last month’s parliamentary election results.

The Baghdad residence inside the city’s fortified Green Zone was hit by a rocket attack early on November 7, the prime minister’s office said in a statement.

Kadhimi was unharmed in the attack, which the statement said was a “failed assassination attempt.”

Besides Pope Francis and the Dalai Lama, few religious leaders today command as much respect among Muslims and non-Muslims alike as Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, the 91-year-old “supreme marja” of the world’s Shiite Muslims.

Al-Sistani was a disciple of Ayatollah Abu Al-Qasim Al-Khoei, who was for decades the most renowned religious teacher in Iraq’s shrine city of Najaf, where he was known as the “professor of jurisprudence.”