Fighting against ISIL in both Ramadi and the Beiji oil refinery continued on Wednesday,even as ISIL adjusts to a new leader.Sniper fire and booby traps,as well as suicide bombers,were hindering the advance of Iraqi counterterrorist forces into the city.Still,they have managed to retake positions near the city's centre.
They are trying to drive ISIL militants away from the residential areas and toward open areas where they will be an easier target,a spokesman for the CT forces said.The militants captured Ramadi,which is the capital of Anbar Province,two weeks ago,even digging tunnels between houses to enable their hit and run tactics.
At the same time,at the Beiji oil refinery,which is Iraq's largest,ISIL seized an important installation in the northern section of the facility Tuesday,but were driven out by Iraqi troops.They still have a foothold near the refinery's south gate,however,and Iraqi forces within the complex are calling for reinforcements.*
According to an Iraqi government source,ISIL has a new leader in the person of Abu Alaa Afri,who has at least temporarily replaced Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi.Al-Baghdadi was seriously wounded in a US-led coalition airstrike on his truck convoy in March,incapacitating him.Afri,a former Iraqi physics teacher and a reputed Islamist intellectual,had served as an ISIL provincial coordinator,linking the senior leadership with the provincial emirs.Afri,now believed to be residing in Mosul,Iraq,was previously a member of al-Qaida and highly regarded by Osama bin Laden,who favoured him to head al-Qaida in Iraq,ISIL's precursor organisation.*
In 2006,US and Iraqi troops,along with tribal militias,waged a pitched battle against al-Qaida in Iraq and its allies in the Mujahideen Shura Council for control of Ramadi.Indeed,an Islamic State was declared by the Council in October 2006 and chose al-Baghdadi as emir.By early 2007,the IS had been all but driven out of Ramadi,at the cost of the lives of at least 78 US troops and many others being wounded.
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