Security In Iraq Jul 22-28, 2020

Security in Iraq remained at a very low level after the Islamic State’s annual Spring offensive. There were 13 incidents total reported in the media. Five of those were by pro-Iran groups targeting the U.S. That left just 8 incidents by the Islamic State. This was the second time this year that attacks by the militants were in single digits. This has now become routine in the country. There is a huge surge of violence once or twice a year and then a large drop afterwards.

 

There were five incidents by pro-Iran groups during the week. Three of those were in Baghdad where a drone and a bomb were discovered, while rockets were fired at the Besmaya and Taji bases. In Dhi Qar, a convoy carrying supplies for the Americans was hit by two IEDs. Finally, in Salahaddin, Camp Speicher was also targeted with rockets. In total, there have been 9 incidents by these groups during July. This new wave attacks began in June when the U.S. and Iraq opened talks over a new security agreement which Iran is against.

 

Overall, there was 1 incident in Babil, Dhi Qar, Diyala each, 2 in Salahaddin, 3 in Baghdad, and 5 in Anbar.

 

That led to 9 deaths and 8 wounded. 4 Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) and 5 civilians were killed and 1 civilian and 7 ISF were injured. Salahaddin had 6 of those casualties while the remaining 11 were in Anbar. 11 of the 17 were from the security forces, which has been the trend since spring.

 

In an unusual development Anbar had the most incidents with 5. A checkpoint was attacked in the Hit district and a motorcycle bomb went off against two soldiers in Kubaisa both in the center. An army patrol was shot at in Nukhaib in the south towards Saudi Arabia, and an infiltration attempt was spoiled in Akashat in the west by Jordan. The biggest incident was an attack upon a checkpoint also in the Hit district that led to an ambush of the reinforcements that arrived. An army brigade commander was killed in the process. This was the second brigade commander killed this month by IS. This was another sign of the new campaign by the insurgents to go after the security forces.

 

The water director in Hilla, Babil had his house shot at. This was the third such incident in the city with two other officials being targeted. Usually IS only focuses upon the Jurf al-Sakr district which is a large Kataib Hezbollah base. The group now appears to be branching out.

 

There was only one incident in Diyala when a village was assaulted in the Jalawla sub-district in the northeast. This was a rare week since the province is the center of the insurgency in the country. It regularly is the most violent, so being so quiet during the week was definitely a change. The government did a sweep as well along the Diyala-Salahaddin border.

 

IS killed a mukhtar, a village chief, and his sons in the Samarra district of Salahaddin. The government did two sweeps through that district as well. Mukhtars were a regular target from 2018-19 but those types of incidents have become rarities this year.

 

Security Incidents In Iraq By Province

Province	Jul 1-7	Jul 8-14	Jul 15-21	Jul 22-28
Anbar	-	1	-	5
Babil	1	2	-	1
Baghdad	2 Pro-Iran	2/ 1 Pro-Iran	3/ 1 Pro-Iran	3 Pro-Iran
Dhi Qar	-	-	-	1 Pro-Iran
Diyala	5	6	9	1
Kirkuk	1	3	3	-
Muthanna	-	1	-	-
Ninewa	1	-	1	-
Salahaddin	2	1	3	2/ 1 Pro-Iran
TOTAL	12/ 2 Pro-Iran	16/ 2 Pro-Iran	19/ 1 Pro-Iran	13/ 5 Pro-Iran

 

Casualties In Iraq By Province

Province	Jul 1-7	Jul 8-14	Jul 15-21	Jul 22-28
Anbar	-	2 (2K)	-	11 (4K, 7W)
Babil	-	1 (1W)	-	-
Baghdad	-	2 (2K)	6 (4K, 2W)	-
Diyala	8 (1K, 7W)	21 (9K, 12W)	24 (6K, 18W)	-
Kirkuk	-	2 (1K, 1W)	3 (3K)	-
Ninewa	2 (2W)	-	1 (1W)	-
Salahaddin	2 (2K)	2 (1K, 1W)	11 (4K, 7W)	6 (5K, 1W)
TOTAL	12 (3K, 9W)	30 (15K, 15W)	45 (17K, 28W)	17 (9K, 8W)

 

Islamic State Activity in Iraq 2018-20

Diyala	Shootings (Totals)	IEDs/ Sticky Bombs (Totals)	Gun Battles	Attacks on Checkpoints	Attacks on Mukhtars/ Sheikhs	Kidnappings	Attacks on Towns	Suicide Bombers	Car Bombs
2018 Totals	219	198	47	43	5	13	25	3	1
2019 Totals	185	112	33	63	2	6	29	2	-
Jan 2020	13	6	-	2	-	1	-	-	-
Feb	16	5	2	8	-	1	-	-	-
Mar	15	10	4	2	-	-	-	-	-
Apr	20	17	4	2	-	-	-	-	-
May	38	18	8	9	1	5	17	-	-
Jun	13	1	-	2	-	1	2	-	-
Jul	4	7	1	1	-	-	2	-	-

 

Kirkuk	Shootings (Totals)	IEDs/ Sticky Bombs (Totals)	Gun Battles	Attacks on Checkpoints	Attacks on Mukhtars/ Sheikhs	Kidnappings	Attacks on Towns	Suicide Bombers	Car Bombs
2018 Totals	172	182	39	18	10	14	29	9	6
2019 Totals	77	116	24	19	6	8	18	-	1
Jan 2020	10	1	2	2	-	1	-	-	-
Feb	5	-	2	1	-	2	1	-	-
Mar	1	-	-	1	-	-	-	-	-
Apr	17	7	6	3	-	2	1	1	-
May	15	10	1	7	1	4	10	-	-
Jun	5	4	-	1	-	1	4	-	-

 

Ninewa	Shootings (Totals)	IEDs/ Sticky Bombs (Totals)	Gun Battles	Attacks on Checkpoints	Attacks on Mukhtars/ Sheikhs	Kidnappings	Attacks on Towns	Suicide Bombers	Car Bombs
2018 Totals	139	74	43	7	5	6	6	2	3
2019 Totals	63	49	14	3	9	6	17	-	3
Jan 2020	7	5	2	1	-	1	-	-	-
Feb	5	5	-	-	1	-	-	-	1
Mar	2	5	1	-	-	-	-	-	-
Apr	8	8	1	4	-	1	1	-	-
May	5	9	-	2	-	-	2	-	-
Jun	-	5	-	-	-	-	-	-	-
Jul	-	1	-	1	-	-	-	-	-

 

Salahaddin	Shootings (Totals)	IEDs/ Sticky Bombs (Totals)	Gun Battles	Attacks on Checkpoints	Attacks on Mukhtars/ Sheikhs	Kidnappings	Attacks on Towns	Suicide Bombers	Car Bombs
2018 Totals	110	102	41	18	1	16	4	9	5
2019 Totals	60	54	32	5	2	6	8	2	6
Jan 2020	4	-	-	1	1	-	-	-	-
Feb	5	-	1	-	-	1	-	-	-
Mar	5	2	3	-	-	-	-	-	-
Apr	4	3	3	-	-	1	-	-	-
May	21	6	9	5	-	2	2	-	-
Jun	5	4	1	2	-	-	1	-	-
Jul	3	3	2	1	1	-	-	-	-

           

Security In Iraq 2019-20

Week	Security Incidents (Total/By IS)	Dead (Total/By IS)	Wounded (Total/By IS)
Jan 1-7	32	17/10	24
Jan 8-14	32	94/31	53
Jan 15-21	22	17/11	16/14
Jan 22-28	27	36/17	31
Jan 29-31	12	7	6
JAN 2019	114	139	130/128
Feb 1-7	29/1	76/16	30
Feb 8-14	24	26	18
Feb 15-21	40	112/37	12
Feb 22-28	25	36	70
FEB	118/1	250/115	130
Mar 1-7	13	22	45
Mar 8-14	19	75/10	37
Mar 15-21	12	66/37	21/11
Mar 22-28	13	8/5	1
Mar 29-31	6	8	7
MAR	61	147	101
Apr 1-7	20	22	13
Apr 8-14	41	28	42
Apr 15-21	17	9/8	26
Apr 22-28	19	45	15
Apr 29-30	2	1	4
APR	99	105	100
May 1-7	20	15	18
May 8-14	24	31	41
May 15-21	37/1	62/25	39
May 22-28	43	39	54
May 29-31	13	16	48
MAY	137/1	163/125	200
Jun 1-7	26	19	44
Jun 8-14	25/1	29	15
Jun 15-21	21/2	6	13/10
Jun 22-28	18	17	41
Jun 29-30	9	3	9
JUN	99/3	74	122/119
Jul 1-7	20	11	39
Jul 8-14	14	31	10
Jul 15-21	17	14	37
Jul 22-28	23	14	20
Jul 29-31	8	13	13
JUL	82	83	119
Aug 1-7	27	14	31
Aug 8-14	18	13	13
Aug 15-21	20	33	15
Aug 22-28	27	24	72
Aug 29-31	11	19	10
AUG	104	103	141
Sep 1-7	39	39	38
Sep 8-14	30	35	43
Sep 15-21	23	27	26
Sep 22-28	24/1	15	20
Sep 29-30	7	6	4
SEP	123/1	122	131
Oct 1-7	3	1	2
Oct 8-14	14	25	17
Oct 15-21	19	29	13
Oct 22-28	22/1	33	10
Oct 29-31	12/1	4	11
OCT	70/2	92	53
Nov 1-7	6/1	4	1
Nov 8-14	9/1	2	25
Nov 15-21	15/1	11	2
Nov 22-28	17/1	24	33
Nov 29-30	8/1	6	37
NOV	55/5	47	98
Dec 1-7	36/3	33	44
Dec 8-14	19/3	19	19
Dec 15-21	26	44	25
Dec 22-28	30/1	30	38
Dec 29-31	9	8	7
DEC	120/7	134	133
Jan 1-7	25/7	16	84
Jan 8-14	24/3	12	34
Jan 15-21	23/2	11	12
Jan 22-28	11/1	10	8
Jan 29-31	8/1	4	1
JAN 2020	91/12	53	139
Feb 1-7	22	13	11
Feb 8-14	18/1	5	38
Feb 15-21	16/2	42	18
Feb 22-28	25	15	34
Feb 29	4	5	2
FEB	85/3	80	103
Mar 1-7	17/3	11	17
Mar 8-14	15/2	13	33
Mar 15-21	14/2	5	19
Mar 22-28	14/1	13	11
Mar 29-31	9	5	10
MAR	69/8	47	90
Ap 1-7	27/1	27	37
Apr 8-14	24	25	51
Apr 15-21	33/1	19	34
Apr 22-28	22	8	40
Apr 29-30	5	2	4
APR	111/2	81	165
May 1-7	44/1	47	36
May 8-14	49	21	47
May 15-21	66/1	45	64
May 22-28	30	9	21
May 29-31	7	3	12
MAY	196/2	125	180
Jun 1-7	17	13	19
Jun 8-14	16/4	10	15
Jun 15-21	16/3	11	19
Jun 22-28	10/1	8	13
Jun 29-30	1	4	2
JUN	60/8	46	68
Jul 1-7	12/2	3	9
Jul 8-14	16/2	15	15
Jul 15-21	19/1	17	28
Jul 22-28	13/5	9	8

 

Violence By Province Jul 22-28, 2020

Province	Violence
Anbar	5 Incidents 4 Killed 4 ISF 7 Wounded 7 ISF   4 Shootings 1 Motorcycle Bomb
Babil	1 Incident   1 Shooting
Baghdad	3 Pro-Iran Incidents   2 Rockets 1 Drone found
Dhi Qar	1 Pro-Iran Incident   2 IEDs
Diyala	1 Incident   1 Shooting
Salahaddin	2/1 Pro-Iran Incident 5 Killed 5 Civilians 1 Wounded 1 Civilian   1 Shooting 1 Rockets

 

SOURCES

 

Bas News, "Iraqi Army Launches Fresh Operation against IS Remnants in Diyala," 7/26/20

- "Iraqi Trucks Delivering Logistic Support to US Forces Hit by Roadside Bombings," 7/22/20

- "Multiple Rockets Hit Iraqi Base Housing US-led Coalition Forces," 7/27/20

 

Al Hurra, "No human casualties … Two explosion at Speicher Air Force base in northern Iraq," 7/27/20

 

Iraq Newspaper, "Mukhtar, Samom Village, in Abbasiya, Samarra and 4 of his sons were killed in ISIS terrorist attack," 7/24/20

 

Al Maalomah, "ISIS foil attack on an army checkpoint west of Anbar," 7/23/20

- "The PMF is carrying out a security operation east of Samarra in search of ISIS terrorist operatives," 7/22/20

 

Al Monitor, "Rockets hit Iraqi base used by coalition troops, no casualties," 7/24/20

 

NINA, "Armed Men Attack The House Of The Director Of Water Resources in Babylon," 7/22/20

- "A brigade Commander and a first lieutenant officer were killed in an ISIS attack in Heet," 7/29/20

- "Clashes Between ISIS And The Residents Of A Liberated Village In Diyala," 7/27/20

- "Four members of border guards killed and wounded in an attack by ISIS in the desert of Anbar," 7/28/20

- "Killing and wounding two soldiers with a motorcycle bomb explosion in Anbar," 7/25/20

- "Salah Al-Din Operations Command carries out a broad military operation," 7/27/20

 

NRT, "Drone Carrying 2 KG Mortar Seized In Baghdad: Security Media Cell," 7/23/20

- "Five Civilians Killed, One Wounded In ISIS Attack In Saladin Governorate," 7/25/20

 

Al Sumaria, "Killing and wounding five border guards in an armed attack west of Ramadi," 7/28/20

- "The PMF foils an ISIS attempt to infiltrate through Syrian territory," 7/28/20

 

Xinhua, "Update: Iraqi army's helicopter damaged by rocket attack near Baghdad," 7/28/20