While Russia bombs, Isil tries to goad ‘Crusaders’
Islamist leader puts out audio message claiming attacks by West are only making caliphate stronger
THE LEADER of the self-declared Islamic State issued a rare public message of defiance to his “Crusader” enemies last night, as both the West and Russia claimed significant victories against his forces.
In his first public statement in seven months, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi goaded the widening international coalition against him, saying they did not dare send in ground troops to confront his forces directly.
“Crusaders and Jews don’t dare to come on the ground because they were defeated in Iraq and Afghanistan,” he said in a 23-minute long audio message released through an Isil-run internet account.
The message, dubbed an “alternative Christmas broadcast” on social media, appeared to be an effort to rally his followers against the growing number of enemies opposing them. It came as his forces lost control of a key dam in Syria, and as Russia claimed to have decimated an Isil oil-smuggling empire.
Baghdadi, oblivious to the setbacks, insisted his group had not been weakened by Russian or US-led airstrikes and was only “expanding and getting stronger”.
“Hear the good news that our state is doing well,” he said. “The more intense the war against it, the purer it becomes and the tougher it gets.”
Baghdadi generally avoids public appearances or video broadcasts, to avoid detection, although he is thought to have been injured in an air strike in May. He is believed to move regularly between Isil’s strongholds of Raqqa in north-eastern Syria and Mosul in Iraq.
His message called on Saudi citizens, a major contributor to Isil’s ranks, to “rise up” against their government. He also claimed that Isil would soon be in Palestine to establish an Islamic state there. “Jews, soon you shall hear from us in Palestine which will become your grave,” Baghdadi said.
As the broadcast was released Isil suffered a major blow after a US-backed alliance of Syrian Kurds and Arab rebel groups, supported by coalition planes, captured a dam from its fighters, cutting a main supply route of the militants across the Euphrates.
Colonel Talal Selo, the spokesman for the alliance, said the rapid advance overnight by thousands of troops from the Democratic Forces of Syria brought the dam, 15 miles from Raqqa, under their control yesterday afternoon.
At the same time, Iraqi troops said they had pushed deeper into the last Isil-held district of the city of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, despite being slowed by booby traps and bombs.
Meanwhile, Russia released spectacular footage of what Kremlin officials claim to be a successful bombing campaign to destroy the Islamic State’s oilsmuggling rackets into Turkey.
At a briefing by the Russian ministry of defence in Moscow, generals produced videos and photographs of Russian warplanes pulverising huge columns of tankers allegedly transporting oil for sale on the black market.
The Kremlin claimed to have destroyed 17 such truck columns in the past week alone, part of a Moscow-led onslaught against Isil’s oil rackets that Russia says has wiped out nearly 2,000 oil tankers since it directly entered the war in Syria in September.
The pictures were released to journalists by Lieutenant General Sergei Rudskoy, a senior figure in Russian Armed Forces command, in a briefing apparently designed to be a mirror image to those conducted by the Pentagon in America.
He sat in front of a giant video screen showing aerial footage of the Russian attacks, which led to tankers being engulfed in plumes of thick black smoke.
However, experts questioned whether the Russian briefing was primarily a stunt to irritate Turkey, whose government is a leading opponent of Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad.
After Turkey shot down a Russian bomber at the Syrian border last month, Moscow accused the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and his family of involvement in the illegal oil trade with Isil. Mr Erdogan denies the claims.
Russia’s defence ministry said that 12,000 trucks were seen on their way to and from Turkey from the frontier point of Zakho, which lies close to Turkey’s borders with both Syria and northern Iraq. The ministry said the route involved “a significant detour” to avoid previous Russian bombing efforts, but added that “Turkey remains the final point of the smuggling route.”
Eliot Higgins, a research associate at London’s Kings College who specialises in studying weapons deployed in the Syrian conflict, told The Sunday Telegraph : “The Russian MoD has lied repeatedly, so their word is worthless.”
Meanwhile, a United Nations-sponsored deal to evacuate more than 2,000 rebel fighters from rebel-held parts of south Damascus has been delayed after the death of a key rebel leader.
The deal, which would have included Isil fighters, would have gone through territory controlled by Zahran Alloush, the leader of the Jaysh al Islam rebel group, who died in Friday’s airstrike. Although a hardline Islamist, Alloush’s group were represented at recent peace talks on Syria’s future.