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Iraqi Shiite leaders called on their supporters to be ready to take up arms, as US President Barack Obama said he's weighing how the US can aid the fight against militants who have seized several northern towns.
Ammar al-Hakim, head of the Shiite Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq, appeared in a video aired by al-Sharqiya television late on Friday, in a military uniform and surrounded by followers, saying he volunteered to fight. Earlier, a spokesman for Iraq's top Shiite religious leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali Al Sistani, also called on Iraqis to combat "terror," and Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's Dawa party said citizens should be ready to "shoulder the burden" and join the fight.
Hassan Rouhani, president of neighbouring Iran, a Shiiite ally of Iraq, said at a televised news conference today that the Islamic Republic stands ready to help should the Iraqi government ask for assistance.
In Washington, Obama said he'll consider over the next several days military options to help Iraqi forces reverse the advance of Islamist fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant. ISIL seized Mosul, the largest city in northern Iraq, earlier this week. They extended their gains yesterday, entering two northeastern towns as government forces withdrew.
The onslaught of the Sunni militants has raised the risk of a collapse of Iraq's central authorities, and a reversion to the sectarian bloodshed that engulfed the country in the years after the ouster of Saddam Hussein by a US-led invasion in 2003.
Maliki visit
Obama said the problems in Iraq aren't "solely, or even primarily, a military challenge," and called on Iraq's leaders to unite in the face of the Islamist threat. Maliki's Shiite-led government, in power since 2006, has been criticised by Iraq's Sunnis for disregarding their interests.
"This should be a wakeup call; Iraq's leaders have to demonstrate a willingness to make hard decisions and compromises on behalf of the Iraqi people in order to bring the country together," Obama said. "We can't do it for them."
Maliki on Friday visited a Shiite shrine in Samarra, which has also come under attack by ISIL fighters this week. The site has only recently been repaired after Sunni militants blew it up in 2006, an event that sparked Iraq's earlier civil war. The premier attended a religious event in the city, about 75 miles (120 km) north of Baghdad, before returning to the capital, his spokesman Ali al-Musawi said by phone. The spokesman denied rumours circulating on social media that there'd been an attack on Maliki during the visit.
Sheikh Abdel-Qader al-Nayel, a tribal leader in the predominantly Sunni city of Ramadi, said that former officers from the Saddam-era army and other Sunni groups are working with the ISIL militants. The insurgents' ultimate aim is to advance to Baghdad, "demolish the current political process and form a national salvation government," he said by phone.
Towns fall
Iraq's official security forces left the towns of Jalulah and Saaiydiyah after militants called on them to give up their weapons and abandon their posts, Al Jazeera reported, citing residents of the towns. The Interior Ministry started to prepare a new plan to defend Baghdad against an attack by ISIL, Al Arabiya reported, citing a ministry spokesman.
Fighters from ISIL and other Sunni groups are in control of Tikrit, Saddam's hometown about 80 miles north of Baghdad, Dawould Salman, a local resident, said by phone yesterday.
Iraq's military carried out air raids on ISIL positions around Tikrit and Baiji, farther to the north, Turkey's Sabah newspaper reported, citing tribal leaders.
Iran will provide support to Maliki's government to combat an "extremist, terrorist group that is acting savagely," Rouhani said on June 12. The Wall Street Journal reported that two battalions of elite Quds Forces from Iran are backing up Iraqi troops.
Oil markets
The violence is rattling oil future markets. West Texas Intermediate crude posted the biggest weekly advance since December and Brent crude also gained. In Kirkuk, where the largest northern Iraqi oil fields are located, Kurdish forces have moved in to replace the Iraqi army in providing security, further weakening the Baghdad government's grip on the country
Part of the pipeline that exports oil from Kirkuk to Turkey has fallen under the control of ISIL, and repair work on it has been halted. Iraq pumped 3.3 million barrels a day last month, making it OPEC's second-biggest producer, data compiled by Bloomberg show.
ISIL issued a document in which it declares plans to impose Islamic law in Mosul, several Iraqi news outlets, including al-Mada Press, reported on Friday. The document said drugs, alcohol and cigarettes will be banned and women should dress conservatively and leave their homes only when necessary. It was not possible to verify the authenticity of the document.
Sunnis are a majority in Anbar province to the west and in areas to the north of Baghdad. The Kurds control a section of the north, while Shiites account for the majority in the south, where 60 per cent of the country's oil wealth resides, and have close religious and political ties to Iran.
