Daesh’s terrorism transforms “mosques” into a battlefield

Written by Shaima Hafezi

Mosques have been protected in times of war. However, this rule has been replaced during military operations against the Daesh organization as bombing has become the only way to eliminate its members. That is because these terrorists turned mosques into military barracks.

The mosque is used in a European country or an area where there are no followers. They use it as a means to promote their ideas and thus attract new fighters. If they are in a city with opponents, they target and kill the worshipers.

In a study entitled “The Persuasive Methods of Organizing the Recruitment of Individuals,” Dr. Ahmed Abdelmajid, assistant professor at Baghdad University, said: “The organization uses preachers, mosque imams, and community professors to recruit and teach them how to belong to it through sermons, lectures and ideological activities.”

About a year ago, the organization targeted a mosque in the Bir al-Abed area of Ruwaida in the Egyptian Sinai, in what was then described as a shift in thought to mosques with mosques supposed to be outside the war zones.

Over the past few days, US-led coalition forces have launched raids against members and leaders of the Daesh organization who were holed up in mosques.

Although the Land War Act (Internationally Recognized Rules Governing the Conduct of War) requires combatants to protect religious buildings, shrines and other holy sites, US forces believe that any mosques Daesh deliberately chooses as control centers are without “the legal status to protect them.

“The forces launched two attacks on Daesh in a week,” said Pentagon spokesman Colonel Rob Manning. “The misuse of the mosque violates the law of the land war and makes these mosques military targets.”

“Our in-depth monitoring of Daesh made us aware of when the organization’s fighters are only there … we are investigating all the credible allegations of civilian casualties,” he said. “They have no problem at all in endangering civilians. They also endanger the targets protected by the Earth War Act. ”

According to the statement of the International Alliance Against Terrorism, the alliance carried out an attack on October 18 in Sousse, Syria, in which 12 Daesh fighters were killed by an air strike in a mosque. It said that the terrorist organization “repeatedly planned to coordinate the attacks on the coalition forces and their local Syrian allies from that site.

The coalition also launched another attack last Monday, an attack that destroyed many of the buildings used by Daesh against partners of the Syrian democratic forces in Sousse, Syria.