By Walid Shoebat (Shoebat Exclusive)

Without a doubt, one of the biggest and most disturbing surprises of the past week was the seeming ease with which ISIS fighters defeated Kurdish Peshmerga forces, seizing several towns in northern Iraq, the Mosul Dam, and even threatening to advance on Erbil, the capital of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG). All of this has conveyed an impression of Kurdish weakness very much contrary to the accepted wisdom that the Peshmerga were more than capable of defending their lands.

When ISIS strikes out into Kurdish, Shia Arab or Iraqi minority areas with the intent of massacring or ethnically cleansing populations, threatening U.S. personnel in Baghdad or Erbil, or strategic infrastructure (dams, refineries, oil fields), the U.S., in principle, will strike from the air and provide advisory and intelligence support and weapons to our on-the-ground local allies.

The Kurds had this to show of massive U.S. air strikes in Makhmour which the Kurds was able to retake:

Another video Shoebat.com obtained from recaptured Makhmour shows the removal of the ISIS flag:

Notice, the Kurds will not desecrate the black flag as it is rare that such a flag is desecrated by even the most ardent enemies of the ISIS since “There is No God But Allah” is written on the flag and it would be sacrilege to desecrate it. If Christians think that the Kurds are their “friends” think again. Just study what the Kurds did to the Armenians in recent history and you will soon realize that in the Muslim world, our friends today are our enemies tomorrow.

Another video surfaced with countless bodies of ISIS terrorists killed by the Peshmerga:

ISIS has lost the element of surprise, the Kurds are now fighting for land they consider their own—including defending their capital—and the Peshmerga have, presumably, deployed some of their own heavy weaponry against the principal ISIS axes of advance. The fact that the ISIS offensive has been halted for now is consistent with the notion that it was these three factors that brought ISIS its success last week.

Can all this lead to ISIS’s final defeat? Not directly, but stopping its attacks is important for tactical and humanitarian reasons. It also demoralizes ISIS personnel and encourages our ‘temporary’ local allies.

The fact that the ISIS offensive appears to have been halted already (at least for the moment) and that Kurdish forces have been able to counterattack and retake Makhmur and Gawar, lends some weight to the notion that these three factors played a significant role in its initial success.

In the meanwhile, Rescue Christians has established an NGO in Erbil through working with Iraqi Christians on the ground. We have sent financial aid and will be reporting on our progress as soon as our partner team gets to work. We want to thank all our contributors, donors and partners in this great effort.

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