The United States is “squeezing” the heart of ISIS and hitting it “harder than ever”, resulting in the terrorist formation losing territory and some of its top leaders lately, President Barack Obama asserted after a review of the American military campaign on Monday.
“As we squeeze its heart, we’ll make it harder for ISIl to pump its terror and propaganda to the rest of the world,” Obama told reporters at the Pentagon. He also announced that he was dispatching Defence Secretary Ash Carter to the Middle East to secure more military contributions from coalition partners in the region.
In a robust defence of his strategy that has been termed weak and inadequate by the Republicans, Obama maintained that the US strategy is proceeding with “a great sense of urgency on four fronts” — hunting down the terrorists, training and equipping Iraqi and Syrian forces to fight ISIS on the ground, disrupting its recruiting, financing and propaganda operations, and diplomatic push to end the Syrian civil war in order to focus on destroying ISIS.
As of Monday, coalition fighters, bombers and drones have conducted nearly 9,000 airstrikes, Obama said, adding several top ISIS leaders have been taken out since spring, including Abu Sayyaf, second-in-command Haji Mutazz, Junaid Hussain, Mohamed Emwazi, finance chief Abu Saleh, Abu Maryam and Abu Rahman al-Tunisi.
“We’re going after ISIS from their stronghold right down — right in downtown Raqqa, to libya, where we took out Abu Nabil, the ISIS leader there,” he said, asserting, “The point is, ISIS leaders cannot hide. And our next message to them is simple, You are next.”
Obama, however, conceded that it continues to be a difficult fight since ISIS is dug in, including in urban areas, and is hiding behind civilians, using them as human shields. This has made it imperative conduct a smart operating, targeting ISIS surgically and with precision.
At the same time, he said a new wave of strikes has been unleashed on the lifeline of ISIS, namely its oil infrastructure, destroying hundreds of tanker trucks, wells and refineries. ISIS, he said, continues to lose territory both in Iraq and Syria. In Iraq, the group has lose about 40 per cent of the areas it once controlled, including Kirkuk province, Tikrit, Sinjar and Baiji. Iraqi forces are now fighting their way deeper into Ramadi.
Meanwhile, Obama’s top aides held meetings with Muslim and Sikh religious leaders at the White House on Monday to discuss the backlash their communities are facing in the wake of the Paris attacks and the San Bernardino shootings.
The aides, including senior adviser Valerie Jarrett, held three separate meetings with the faith leaders to discuss concerns about rising hostility toward religious minorities. Some Muslim leaders have mooted that President Barack Obama, like his predecessor George W. Bush, visit a mosque to send the right message across the country.
Sikh concerns arise from the fact that in large parts of the US, they continue to be mistaken for Muslims. A spurt in profiling has been reported by Sikhs in the wake of the San Bernardino attacks.
last week, a Sikh gurdwara in California was vandalised, while a group of Sikhs were denied access to a football game in San Diego because they were turbans.