Operation Featherweight: Month 8, Week 2, Day 5.

At dawn today the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) began their operation to liberate the city of Tikrit itself from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

The assault began with a push from the university complex in the north down into the city. Initially I was a little concerned that this would be the only front of the assault which would obviously allow ISIL to concentrate their forces into repelling it. However the ISF have since also entered the city from the south opening up a second front.

So far the resistance being faced by the ISF has been light to moderate. However ISIL have built their defence of the city around heavy mining of the area backed up by sniper fire. As a result the operation is moving slowly with it taking roughly 30 minutes for the ISF to move through each street. The situation in Tikrit is obviously developing as a I write so I will keep and eye on its progress.

Even excluding the Tikrit operation it has been a tough couple of weeks for ISIL with them losing territory in the al-Huwaija district south-west of Kirkuk, around al-Baghdadi and Fallujah both in Iraq's Anbar province and an area of around 3000km^2 (1800 miles^2) surrounding the town to Tel Hamees in the Kurdish Cizire Canton in north-eastern Syria. Therefore there has been growing pressure on ISIL to show that they can still attack the Kurdish forces and the ISF and seize fresh territory.

Today ISIL's fightback has begun with co-ordinated attacks on the government held section of Ramadi which is roughly 100km (60 miles) to the west of Baghdad in Anbar province and on the town of Serekanyie/Ras al-Ayn which sits on the north-west border to the Cizire Canton.

The attack on Ramadi began with 7 co-ordinated car bombings and quickly developed into a large scale assault from several directions. The battle there is still ongoing making difficult the assess the situation but it appears that the ISF have succeeded in holding off the assault so far with no reports of ISIL gaining ground. There has also been no indication that the US-led coalition has been conducting air-strikes to help repel the attack.

The situation in Serekanyie appears to be more serious with at least 1000 ISIL fighters in tanks and armoured vehicles attacking the lightly armed Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) that control the canton. It would appear that so far ISIL have succeeded in capturing a small village outside of the town although there are no reports of Serekanyie itself being over-run.

It appears as though the attack on Serekanyie has been launched from Tel Abayd the main ISIL held town between the Cizire and Kobane cantons. This again raises the question of why coalition air-power isn't being better used to eliminate the threat that Tel Abayd poses to Kurdish positions in the area.

Last night ISIL released a video that purported to show the killing a 19 year old Palestinian - Muhammad Musallam - whom ISIL claim was a spy sent by Israel's Mossad spy agency.

The roughly 13 minute video which claims to have been produced by ISIL's own spy agency begins with  a seated Musallam wearing the traditional orange jumpsuit being interviewed in front of a plain white wall about his spying activities. A resident of East Jerusalem on the West Bank Musallam claims that he was first recruited by Mossad to inform on people who take part in the frequent protest/riots in the area. 

This is an inflammatory issue within Israel and the West Bank and just the other day it emerged that Israel's security forces had instructed the local councils to target people who participate in the protests by making sure all their taxes are up to date and they have all the correct building permits. The Israelis of course already make it pretty much impossible for West Bank residents to obtain the correct building permits. However I should point out that issues relating to West Bank protests are pretty much a weekly event in Israel.

The main problem with Musallam's claim is that Mossad don't operate in the West Bank because considered part of Israel it falls under the jurisdiction of Shin Bet - the internal security service. Musallam's story became even more incredible when he went on to claim that he'd been sent to a secret Mossad training camp where he was the only Palestinian student. It seems extremely unlikely that any branch of the Israeli intelligence services would go to the trouble and expense of sending someone they simply wanted to act as a low level informant for such intensive training.  

Musallam went on to claim that after a few years working as an informant he was called into Mossad's headquarters and given the top secret mission of infiltrating ISIL. To prove how skilled they are at intelligence work ISIL illustrated this sequence with a Google-type map showing Mossad's HQ as if it was somehow considered a secret location.

After accepting his mission Musallam then described how he'd travelled to Syria using the much talked about pipeline through Turkey where people stay in guesthouses on the border for a few days before slipping into Syria. Apparently it was immediately after he'd crossed into Syria that ISIL's own intelligence agency used their vastly superior skills to identify Musallam as an Israeli spy and he was arrested. Curiously Musallam who was supposedly a prisoner in fear of his life helpfully decided to feature in a filmed reconstruction of his capture that was used to iillustrate this sequence.

With Musallam's "confession" out of the way the video announced that he'd been sentenced to death for his crimes. It then cut to an short sequence showing the killing which I will deal with after dinner. 

18:15 on 11/3/15 (UK date). 

Edited at around 19:40 on 11/3/15 (UK date) to add;

The first thing you notice about the death sequence is that it doesn't feature "Jihadi John." This could be a sign that now his identity has been revealed ISIL are no longer happy using Jihadi John in their videos. However I should point out that Jihadi John has only appeared in videos that are intended to send a message to a particular nation through the execution of a hostage. These spy agencies videos such as the killing of Jordanian pilot Moaz al-Kasaesbeh are aimed much more at ISIL's own supporters so haven't featured Jihadi John before.

In this video the executioner role was filled by an unmasked Frenchman who has since been identified as Sabri Essid - the step-brother of Mohammed Merah who carried out a series of terror attacks in France in 2012. With the big COP21 climate change summit taking place in Paris, France at the end of the year jihadists around the world have declared France to be their number 1 target and will remind everybody of that fact at every opportunity.

Essid is accompanied by a boy of around 12-13 years old who has also been identified as a French national. He is part of what ISIL have dubbed "The Cubs of the Caliphate" who are children - often kidnapped - that ISIL have indoctrinated to fight as child soldiers. ISIL are immensely proud of their "Cubs" are frequently release videos of them being trained. I recently mentioned one of these which was featured on the UK TV show "The Last Leg" in which ISIL was compared to conservative, gun-owning American voters.

Very much in the style of that video the cub 'shoots' Musallam in the head with a handgun. I found this to be completely hilarious because being used to high quality TV shows and movies including cop shows such as "CSI" it was blatantly obvious that Musallam had not been shot at all. Instead ISIL had faked the execution using some truly terrible special effects.

As such I don't think that it terms of violence there would have been any problem showing this video on TV or allowing it to stay up on YouTube. However I do appreciate that people who don't share my knowledge of the security situation in the Israeli West Bank could have been taken in by the propaganda element of the video that proceeded the death sequence. I also suppose that it is possible that an Arab audience that aren't quite as experienced in artistic expression could have been fooled into think the shooting was real.

The video ended with a list of the names and addresses of people Musallam had claimed were his fellow Israeli spies operating in the West Bank. As Musallam has never been an Israeli spy this was most probably just a list cobbled together of people suspected of being spies, political rivals or simply neighbours that Musallam had fallen out with.

I think the main purpose of the video was to boost support for ISIL by appealing the the anti-Semitic sentiment that is sadly all too prevalent in the Muslim world. However the video was also released just a week before Israel's March 17th (17/3/15) election. Therefore it also seems like an attempt by ISIL to muscle in on that election by threatening to attack Israel. 

At one point Essid talks about liberating Jerusalem "with permission." There has long been a suspicion that ISIL's Saudi backers have repeatedly assured Israel that ISIL will not attack them in order to avoid having  Israel drop their demands for more sanctions on Saudi Arabia's mortal enemy Iran. This video seems to be ISIL making clear that the deal is off. Worryingly the video was proceeded by a gun attack on Israeli soldiers in the Golan Heights from within Syria. Fortunately no-one was seriously injured.

Perhaps even more alarmingly the day before the video was released Fatah who control the West Bank arrested more then 100 Hamas supporters who live in the West Bank on accusations that they were preparing acts of violence. This may have been a coincidence but it seems to indicate to me that Fatah have good enough links to ISIL to have advance knowledge that the video was being edited together and was about to be released. Hamas who control Gaza have of course been extremely difficult to deal with since ISIL emerged having not only fallen out with Israel but also now Egypt.

One thing that was noticeably missing from the video was any reference to Boko Haram's recent pledge of allegiance to ISIL. However it must be said that I don't really see how ISIL could have included a response within the narrative of the video especially with Boko Haram's pledge coming just two days before the video's release.

20:25 on 11/3/15 (UK date).