News Digest

Death toll from Islamic State massacre of Sunni tribe in Anbar surges

Iraqi officials upped the death toll of a massacre of Sunni Arab tribesmen by the self-styled Islamic State today to 322, making it among the largest massacres of civilians carried out by the group so far in its campaign to terrify Iraqi civilians and security forces from opposing the group. Iraqi officials originally said that about 50 captive men and women from the Albu Nimr tribe were murdered by IS militants on Friday north of Ramadi, the provincial capital of Anbar province, as punishment for resisting the militants’ takeover of their hometown of Hit. Today, Iraqi officials upped the death toll. The Islamic State has used tactics so brutal that many Iraqis have compared the group to Hulagu Khan, the grandson of Ghengis Khan who sacked Baghdad in 1258, killing tens of thousands of residents as punishment for the city’s defiance and emptying so many of Baghdad’s famed libraries into the Tigris River that legend had it a man or horse could walk across on them.

They were handcuffed and blindfolded. Some were wearing tracksuits and others were wearing dish-dash robes.

An anonymous eyewitness to Reuters

Gen. Martin Dempsey, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, addressed the lack of government support for Sunni tribes in Anbar, overwhelmingly Sunni Arab and just west of Baghdad, last week. He said U.S. military advisers working alongside local tribes could do a lot of good in the fight against IS in the province, which the jihadist group currently has free reign in, but that Baghdad so far is standing in the way.