IRAQ: The Daesh group media center was hidden in plain sight in an upscale part of a west Mosul neighborhood now recaptured by Iraqi forces.
Inside a two-story villa, complete with a garden and a shed, Daesh produced placards and broadcast its Al-Bayan radio station, according to Iraqi forces and residents.
“The neighbors told us that they Daesh produced their adverts here,” said Lt. Col. Abdulamir Al-Mohammedawi, of the interior ministry’s elite Rapid Response Division.
“And after we came in and examined it completely, we discovered that it was a media center that broadcast the Al-Bayan radio station.”
The building was set alight by Daesh fighters as they fled the neighborhood, Mohammedawi said, and little was left behind.
Inside, the walls were caked with black soot all the way up the roof, where a toy car was untouched.
The kitchen was virtually unrecognizable, and reams of documents were reduced to ash by the fire.
A handful of calculators, some melted but others intact, sat by the kitchen entrance, and the shells of computer hard drive towers were still visible.
“Everything is totally burnt... we found a few computers, adverts, some CDs, which will be taken to the intelligence unit,” said Mohammedawi.
He said radio broadcasting equipment had also been found, and Rapid Response members were seen moving a sound mixing board.
“This place used to belong to Daesh, no one entered it because it was forbidden,” said neighbor Obaida Radwan, 22, using an Arabic acronym for IS.
“They used it as a media point, to print their adverts, the ones you see on the street,” he told AFP
“It was also used... for the Al-Bayan radio station.”
Daesh has developed a sophisticated media output that experts say is a key plank of its operations.
It has used Al-Bayan, along with its other media channels, to claim attacks overseas, including the Orlando nightclub shooting that killed 50 people in June.
It also regularly distributes material intended to lionize its fighters and romanticize life under its rule in the hope of attracting recruits.
“Propaganda is everything for Daesh,” said Charlie Winter, a senior research fellow at the International Center for the Study of Radicalization at Kings College.
“Not just in terms of its ability to brand itself around the world but also to sustain some level of acquiescence in its heartland in Syria and Iraq,” he said.
Daesh own media, as well as discoveries made in territory recaptured from the group, show it often erects large placards with its religious rules, including instructing women on the all-covering clothes they must wear in its domain.
Winter said it was unsurprising the group had set fire to its Jawsaq center to protect its secrets.
“They are perhaps more secretive about the media than they are about almost any other aspect of the organization,” he said.
“That’s because it’s so important to them, it’s a way for them to weather losses, to embed themselves in people’s mind even if their territorial hold is tenuous.”
Among the ashes of the villa’s contents was one untouched box outside by a window. It contained hundreds of square covers for use with CDs distributed by IS.
Winter said the remaining contents of the house suggested it could have been used to produce materials to be distributed at “media kiosks,” which IS set up in areas under its control to disseminate propaganda touting its achievements.
But he suggested the villa, in a residential neighborhood where everyone knew the building was a media hub, would not have been a major part of Daesh propaganda output.
“I’d be very surprised if they made any of the videos, did any of the post-production or kept any of the narrators in a place as public as that,” he said.
“I think that would be somewhere very, very secret.”
Iraqi forces began an operation to capture west Mosul on February 19, after pushing Daesh out of the city’s east bank.
The operation is progressing slowly but steadily, with the urban setting making fighting more difficult and dangerous for troops.
Among villas in Iraq’s Mosul, Daesh media center
Among villas in Iraq’s Mosul, Daesh media center
MPs, parties welcome Lebanon’s decision to ban Hezbollah’s military wing
- Lebanese judiciary issues arrest warrants to pursue those who fired rockets at Haifa
- Bilal Al-Houshaymi: It (Lebanon) is either a fully sovereign state with a single decision-making authority, or it will continue its downward slide into greater danger and collapse
BEIRUT: Lebanon’s Cabinet decisions were described by political parties and parliamentarians as the boldest measures taken against Hezbollah to date, with ministers from the Amal Movement, the group’s key ally, joining in a show of government solidarity.
In an unprecedented move, Lebanon’s Cabinet on Monday declared Hezbollah’s military activities illegal and demanded the immediate handover of its weapons, following Israeli strikes that killed more than 40 people and wounded dozens across Beirut’s southern suburbs, southern Lebanon and the Bekaa Valley.
The Israeli strikes came after rockets and drones were fired from Lebanese territory toward northern Israel — an assault Hezbollah said was carried out in retaliation for the killing of Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. Among those killed were several Hezbollah officials.
Independent MP Ibrahim Mneimneh affirmed his support for the government’s decisions “at this sensitive stage” as he said they consolidate the sovereignty of the state and the confinement of security and military decision-making to its legitimate institutions.
“The protection of Lebanon requires the firm application of the law, without making any exceptions, and providing support for the army and security forces in carrying out their duties in order to safeguard stability and civil peace,” he added.
Beqaa MP Bilal Al-Houshaymi said Lebanon cannot withstand new experiments or further adventures. “It is either a fully sovereign state with a single decision-making authority, or it will continue its downward slide into greater danger and collapse.”
Lebanese Forces party leader Samir Geagea said in a statement that the cabinet had taken an additional step toward the establishment of a functioning state.
“The ball is now in the court of the Lebanese Armed Forces, the Internal Security Forces, General Security, State Security and the competent judicial authorities. It is their chance to begin implementing the government’s decision seriously and decisively as of this moment,” he added.
The party’s two ministers remained alone in their defense of what they called the “resistance.” This stance was articulated by Health Minister Rakan Nassereddine, whom Hezbollah named to represent it in the government, as he said after the session that “no one holds their resistance accountable as we have held ours accountable.” He questioned whether “the Israelis can be trusted.”
Lebanese President Joseph Aoun held those who launched the rockets responsible for their actions, noting that the Lebanese people should not bear responsibility “for a reckless operation.”
Aoun said Hezbollah’s morning strike was “not a defense of Lebanon nor a protection of the Lebanese; it is not acceptable in any way whatsoever, and it gives Israel a pretext to destroy what is left.”
The cabinet asked the Lebanese Army Command to immediately and firmly begin implementing the plan to restrict weapons north of the Litani River, announcing that Lebanon is ready to resume negotiations with Israel.
The cabinet decisions, read out by Prime Minister Nawaf Salam in an address, announced that the government had formally rejected any military or security operations carried out from Lebanese territory outside the authority of the state, reaffirming that the decision of war and peace rests solely with the government.
The measures include an immediate ban on all Hezbollah military and security activities deemed unlawful, a requirement that the group hand over its weapons to the state, and a restriction of its role to political activity within constitutional and legal frameworks — a step aimed at ensuring the monopoly of arms remains exclusively with the state and reinforcing full sovereignty over Lebanese territory.
Salam said that the government does not seek confrontation with Hezbollah. “But we cannot in any way accept the launching of rockets from Lebanon nor the threat of civil war.”
In parallel with the political move, the Lebanese judiciary moved to pursue those who fired rockets at Haifa from Lebanese territory. The military judiciary issued warrants to arrest all those responsible for launching rockets at the Israeli city.
Government Commissioner to the Military Court Claude Ghanem requested that the security agencies identify those who took part in directing the rockets, arrest them immediately and refer them to the military public prosecution.
A judicial source confirmed that the security agencies verified that the rocket-launching operation took place from an area of valleys and forests located north of the Litani River.
A statement bearing the signature of Hezbollah’s Military Media had been issued at dawn claiming responsibility for the operation of bombarding the Mishmar site south of the city of Haifa with a salvo of rockets and drones, as “revenge for the blood of the Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei.”
While Hezbollah has not issued any official statement tallying its human losses as a result of direct Israeli strikes, Lebanese and Israeli field reports cited the assassination of Mohammad Raad, head of Hezbollah’s parliamentary bloc, who in recent months had coordinated between the state and the party on the issue of restricting weapons; Sheikh Ali Daamoush, the head of Hezbollah’s Executive Council; and Hussein Moukalled, the head of Hezbollah’s intelligence services in the southern suburb.
The reports also mentioned the killing of Mohammad Rida Fadlallah, brother of the late scholar Sayyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah, along with his wife; and Sheikh Abdullah Shaito, a Ja‘fari Sharia judge, with his son and daughter.
Amid the strikes, citizens evacuated Beirut’s southern suburb, more than 53 southern villages and dozens of villages in the Beqaa region.
Many fled at night, remaining in their cars or along the roadsides in Beirut, amid successive warnings issued by the Israeli army urging civilians to leave their villages and homes ahead of strikes on Hezbollah targets, according to its claims.
As hotels reached full capacity, many turned to furnished apartments. Although the state opened a number of public schools to shelter the displaced, the hastily opened and prepared facilities were insufficient to accommodate tens of thousands of people.
Meanwhile, a military source suggested that the evacuation of the villages could be a prelude to a ground invasion.
Israel announced the mobilization of about 100,000 reservists along the border with Lebanon in preparation for expanding the war. Israeli army spokesperson Avichay Adraee posted on social media that “all options are on the table,” adding that “Hezbollah chose to launch this campaign, and will pay a heavy price for it.”
Israeli Chief of Staff Eyal Zamir warned of “many days of fighting ahead,” while Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz said that “Hezbollah chief Naim Qassem is now a ‘target for elimination,’ and Hezbollah will pay a heavy price for launching missiles toward Israel.”
