ISIL militants advance on Iraqi border areas, approaches Saudi Arabia

Alsumaria network quoted security forces as saying that fierce clashes have taken place between the militants from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and armed groups including Naqshbandiyyah, Jaish Ansar al-Sunna, and al-Jaysh al-Islami, in Salahudin province.

Based on the reports, the nomads in Iraqi provinces of Ziqar and al-Muthanna which border the Saudi Arabia have formed a force including 1,500 fighters tasked with providing security in desserts. The force has been formed in coordination with the Prime Minister Maliki’s office.

According to a separate report by Al-Quds al-Arabi newspaper, as many as 5,000 Turkmens in Tuz Khurmatu region near Tikrit in Salahudin province have volunteered to confront the ISIL-affiliated terrorists.

The report adds that Turkmen ranger forces along with Peshmerga forces are fully prepared for any possible attacks by the ISIL on Tuz Khurmatu region which is home to some 15,000 Turkmens.

Around 1.5 million Iraqis have already volunteered to join battles against the militants of the al-Qaeda-linked Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL).

The senior cleric in Iraq the Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani’s religious decree (Fatwa) -which had called on the Iraqis to take up arms against the extremist terrorists- was welcomed even by Sunnis and since then hundreds of thousands of people from all walks of life and from different parts of Iraq have joined Iraqi armed forces to fight the terrorists.