ISIS launched a series of attacks Monday on Iraqi military interests, claiming its suicide bombers were responsible for the deaths of dozens of soldiers from Anbar province to northern Iraq. In some of the attacks, the Iraqi military said its troops responded and managed to kill ISIS militants.
Several of the terrorist attacks took place near the town of Albaghdadi, about 10 miles north of the large al-Asad military base in Anbar province.
According to ISIS, five suicide vehicle bombers attacked an Iraqi military barracks near the town, killing more than 60 Iraqi soldiers. ISIS named the five attackers, and the names indicated three of them were foreign: from France, Jordan and Turkey.
Separately, ISIS said a British suicide bomber named Abu Musa al-Britani detonated his car bomb as an Iraqi military convoy was leaving the al-Asad base, killing 30 Iraqi forces and destroying 11 military vehicles.
In all, ISIS claimed it carried out eight suicide operations Monday in Anbar province, killing more than 100 soldiers. There was no independent confirmation of the ISIS claims.
The Iraqi Joint Operations Command told CNN that the Iraqi army, backed by the Iraqi air force, repulsed an attempted ISIS attack in eastern Albaghdadi town, destroying eight suicide car bombs and two gun trucks, and killing more than 30 militants.
More attacks took place along the road connecting Haditha to Baiji. ISIS said four of its militants carried out suicide vehicle bombings against 25 barracks belonging to the Iraqi military and popular mobilization units, which are predominantly Shiite militias allied with the government.
The group posted still pictures it said showed ISIS units moving out in that operation, and seizing weapons and ammunition left behind by the Iraqi forces.
Iraq’s Joint Operations Command acknowledged ISIS launched a ground assault on the military and popular mobilization units, saying it happened near Seneia town, just east of Baiji.
Militants struck with “two suicide car bombs, a number of mortars and medium machine guns,” Iraqi officials said in a statement. “The Iraqi force destroyed all of them and blew up the suicide car bombs before they reached the Iraqi forces’ position.”
Three members of the Iraqi forces were wounded, officials said.
The Iraqi army also foiled an attack near its front line in Makhmur, in northern Iraq, the Joint Operations Command said. Soldiers killed five suicide bombers as they approached the troops, the statement said, without providing details.
The United States said Monday that a group of about 10 ISIS fighters attacked a U.S.-Iraqi installation at Makhmur at the same time they fired on a nearby U.S. military firebase. No U.S. personnel were killed, and at least two ISIS fighters were killed as they attacked the base, known as Firebase Bell, Army Col. Steve Warren, the coalition spokesman, said.
ISIS launched another attack on Iraqi forces’ barracks Monday, this time with two suicide operations in the Hamidiyah area north of Fallujah, ISIS said. The group said 22 Iraqi soldiers were killed and six Humvees destroyed.
