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Purging what's left of Daesh in Iraq

Dozens of residents of Rfaila, young and old, had flocked to watch the house of their former neighbour Abu Maitham be blown up, filming the spectacle on phones to the sound of patriotic music blaring from a parked car.

The mood was festive as seven men each carried a bomb into a house on the edge of a village in northern Iraq.
Dozens of residents of Rfaila, young and old, had flocked to watch the house of their former neighbour Abu Maitham be blown up, filming the spectacle on phones to the sound of patriotic music blaring from a parked car.
They said Abu Maitham joined Daesh militants who ruled over hundreds of towns and villages like Rfaila for more than two years, subjecting the local population to a life of violence and privation.
Abu Maitham had already fled when Iraqi forces drove the militants from the area last year as they advanced north towards Mosul, Daesh's largest urban stronghold. The city's eastern half was cleared by January and the start of an assault on the western side was declared on Sunday.
Local people are purging every last vestige of Daesh presence: demolishing militants' homes and even digging up their graves. The campaign points to a wider reckoning within Iraq's Sunni Muslim community, part of which sided with Daesh militants who overran around one third of Iraq in 2014.
Inside the house in Rfaila, about 45 km south of Mosul, Ayad Jasim arranged the tubs of explosives in a circle on the floor and connected them to a wire leading out to a battery pack. "It soothes the soul," said Jasim, as he prepared to detonate the house - his 79th since security forces regained control of the area. "There are still many left."
Jasim's motives are both patriotic and personal. His own home in another village nearby was blown up by Daesh, and 27 members of his extended family have disappeared or been killed by the group including a 10-year-old boy. Jasim has US forces to thank for his skills: they taught him and other select soldiers how to handle explosives after invading Iraq in 2003.
As for the bombs - tubs of C4 weighing about 2kg each - they were made by Daesh and designed to kill or maim Iraqi security forces, but have been dug up for reuse by the militants' enemies.
The first blast destroyed only the back of the house, so two more bombs were brought to finish the job. The second explosion ripped down the rest of the building with a flash followed by a shockwave.
The audience surged towards the pile of concrete where a house had stood moments before, clambering onto the collapsed roof and firing celebratory shots into the air as the dust settled.
Almost everyone in the area has friends and family members who were killed by Daesh, many of them in the security forces. In Rfaila alone, seven officers were executed by Daesh and several dozen policemen and soldiers were taken away, presumably to their deaths, according to residents.
Many members of the security forces who fled when Daesh overran the area have now returned, joining government-backed Sunni militia and seeking revenge. "This village suffered a lot," said 26-year-old resident Ammar Ibrahim, who used to be in the security forces, but is now in a Sunni militia. "They (Daesh) blew up our houses so we are blowing up theirs. No trace of them will remain."
In some cases, local people have dug up the graves of Daesh militants who were buried locally.
One resident of Rfaila described how the remains of a militant known as Abu Taha had recently been exhumed, attached to the back of a vehicle and dragged through the streets until the bones flew apart, leaving nothing behind. Several children listening to him laughed gleefully.
Photographs of the episode are posted on the Facebook page of another Rfaila resident, a member of the elite Counter Terrorism Service, urging anyone with information about other militants' grave sites to contact him "so we can purify the land from these filthy germs".
Abu Maitham was an employee of the Iraqi oil ministry before Daesh took over, and had been involved in the insurgency against US forces since 2003 along with his brother. Residents of Rfaila said Abu Maitham and other militants from the village had left with their families as security forces closed in last year, heading north towards Mosul.
But some individuals who helped Daesh maintain control by informing on those who broke the group's rules are still present. Those people must go, residents said, but it is difficult to prove their guilt in a court because they did not formally swear allegiance to Daesh, take up arms, or wear the group's uniform. "There is no evidence so the court releases them," said Ammar Abu Rami, a brother and bodyguard of the mayor of Mosul.
Instead, some residents are taking matters into their own hands, throwing grenades at the homes of people they accuse of supporting Daesh. "They don't kill them: just frighten them," Abu Rami said.
Abu Maitham's house had already been torched. Scratched onto the charred wall were the words: "No bargaining with the blood of our martyrs. The time for dialogue is over."
Reuters