At dawn on 6 June 2014, convoys of pickup trucks advanced across the desert that straddles Iraq's western border with Syria. Hundreds of Islamic State (IS) militants in the vehicles shot their way through checkpoints run by the Iraqi security forces into the city of Mosul in the east. Within three days, the militants, led by seasoned officers who had fought in the Iraqi army under former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein, captured Iraq's second-largest city in collaboration with sleeper cells hidden within the city after thousands of Iraqi soldiers abandoned millions of dollars' worth of weapons and equipment and left the city's population to the mercy of the brutal organisation. In the blitz-like assault that involved local Sunni rebels, the group pushed south and east to take control of more Sunni-dominated towns and threaten Baghdad. They captured Iraq's largest oil refinery of Baiji and Tikrit, Saddam's hometown, which became the second provincial capital in Iraq to fall to them in two days. The loss of Mosul triggered a series of events that still continue to reshape Iraq more than a year-and-a-half later. The conflict could easily last another year, or more, and only end when Iraq's warring factions, the international community, and neighbouring powers decide to establish an agenda for the country's future. In the aftermath of its capture, the picture that emerges from inside Mosul is immeasurably sad and also immeasurably daunting, because the inhabitants, mostly well-educated residents of a sophisticated city, have been subjected to the draconian rule of the IS “caliphate” while the future of their city, which hosts the historic capital of the ancient Assyrian Empire, remains elusive. While the Iraqi security forces, Kurdish Peshmergas and Shia militias have succeeded in recapturing large swathes of land seized by IS in other parts of Iraq, military experts agree that retaking the sprawling city of some three million people will be a difficult feat. At the moment, there are few signs of preparations by Iraqi forces to regain control of Mosul, which would deal a heavy blow to the IS extremists. In addition to being a major, cultural, economic and religious centre, Mosul is an important city with its historic monuments and wonderful natural scenery. Established some 2,500 years ago, Mosul is an important centre of civilisation, its gripping history interwoven with the rest of Mesopotamia, or ancient Iraq. Mosul is one of the oldest continuously inhabited cities in Iraq. It was built near the site of the flourishing ancient Assyrian capital of Nineveh located across the Tigris River after the ancient city was taken over by the Medes and Persians in 612 BCE. It later succeeded Nineveh as a bridgehead on the road that linked Syria, Anatolia and the Caucasus with northern Iraq. Mosul fell under the Persian Sassanid Empire in 225 BCE until it was conquered by Arab Muslims in 641 during the period of the caliph Omar bin Al-Khattab. Under the Umayyad Dynasty in the 8th century, Mosul became a major trade and military hub and during the Abbassid era the city flourished as an important trading centre because of its strategic location astride the Silk Roads trade routes. It was the Arabs who gave Mosul its name, which broadly translates as “connection” as it lies on the road between the caliphate and other territories to the east and north. Another explanation for the name is that it was built on the site of “Mépsila”, a small town which dates back to the Assyrian era. Mosul changed hands again with the rise of the Seljuks in the 11th century. In 1107, the city fell to the ruling Seljuk Dynasty which was to play a decisive role on the Muslim side against the Crusaders in the following decades. Like Cairo under the Mamelukes, it played a decisive role in organising the resistance of the Muslims to the European invaders of the Holy Land. In the 18th century, Mosul fell into the grip of regional conflicts when it became the centre of the Turkic-Persian wars over the dominance of the Middle East. In 1743, the army of Nader Shah of the Persian Afsharid Dynasty besieged Mosul for 40 days before being forced to retreat amid heroic resistance by the Mosulis under their local leader Haj Hussein Al-Jalali. In the wake of the First World War, Mosul witnessed one of the most striking historical events in the Middle East's modern history. British troops entered the city four days after the end of the war with the Ottoman Empire which had ruled Mosul for centuries as one of its wilayets (governorates). The city was not given back to the Ottomans or the Turkish Republic which inherited the Empire. After the signing of the Treaty of Lausanne in July 1923 which settled the conflict between the Ottomans and the allies, the Mosul wilayet became officially part of the newly established state of Iraq. However, Kurdish nationalist groups, seeking independence, continued to dispute the integration of Kurdish-populated parts of the area, now present-day Kurdistan, into Iraq. For IS, the conquest of Mosul represented a major victory, and all the more so when its plan was to declare an Islamic caliphate in both Iraq and Syria where its militants had seized some 50 per cent of the land in the two countries. The swift IS capture of Mosul knocked the Iraqi security forces off balance and gave confidence to Iraq's Sunnis. For Iraq, however, the fall of Mosul was not only the beginning of the city's tragedy, but also another dark chapter in the nation's post-US invasion history and possibly a major milestone on the long, yet expected, path towards dismemberment. Before IS jihadists advanced into the city, there were reports that the group was advancing from Syria where it had established a strong presence after the popular uprising against the regime of Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad started in 2011. The city was on a knife edge following an uprising in Sunni-dominated cities in protest against their exclusion by the government of former Iraqi prime minister Nuri Al-Maliki. Many people in Mosul possessed abundant grievances about heavy-handed treatment by Shia-led security forces and corruption, which generated sympathy for the militants. In August, a parliamentary inquiry found that the IS militants' capture of Mosul might have been avoided if senior officers and officials had performed competently and had acted on multiple intelligence reports warning of the attack. A report by the commission concluded that top officials had ignored ample warnings of an impending attack on Mosul and had grossly mismanaged the crisis that saw the jihadists seize it. The report named a number of top officials, including Al-Maliki, as being responsible for the fall of the city to IS jihadists. Soon after its fall, black horror was unleashed on the city as IS started to implement its rules which impose throat-slitting, stoning, hands being chopped off and whipping as punishments for a range of “crimes” that include violations of the dress code or neglect of prayer. Non-Muslims like Christians and Yazidis were subjected to even harsher treatment, such as mass executions, forced evictions and enslavement. Non-Muslims who wanted to avoid the abhorrent retribution were given the choice of either converting to Islam or fleeing Mosul. One of the most tragic consequences of the religious cleansing by IS has been that the city, renowned as the episcopal seat of the Nestorian Christian faith in the 6th century, is now empty of its Christian population. Right after the fall of Mosul, the question on many pundits' lips was how life would be under IS rule and how those in the population who had remained in Mosul, mostly Arab Sunnis, would react to the rule of the ultra-radical group. News began emerging that Mosul's Sunnis have been terrified of the IS fighters' behaviour. Even if there are no signs of rebellion or public opposition to IS, the rejection of their radical message is believed to be running high in what amounts to passive resistance. People in Mosul who have been obliged to pledge allegiance to IS have been forced to comply with the rules imposed by group, such as closing down shops and halting any business activities during the call to prayer when all shops are shut. Men have to grow their beards, and women have to wear the niqab, or full head-to-toe black dress, while the penalty for more serious violations such as adultery is either stoning or lashes. However, for many in Mosul the city is better off under IS. Some residents have been talking to the media about how services, such as health, electricity, water, municipal administration and traffic, which were in short supply under the Baghdad government, are now run normally under IS. Such positive assessments seem to reflect the opinion of people in Mosul who have endured a great deal under Shia governments since the US occupation but also their feelings of bewilderment at the future of their city. What started as an onslaught by IS militants pursuing their own strategic interests against the Iraqi Shia-led government in Baghdad has now ended in a global crisis of immense magnitude. With world powers and regional heavyweights rapidly being enmeshed in the war against IS after its global outreach, Mosul risks being engulfed by multiple concurrent forces: the Shia-led government in Baghdad, the Kurds in Iraq and Syria, and Turkey, Iran, Russia and the US-led international coalition all assembling for the fight against IS. As international efforts to take down IS gear up following the attacks in Paris on 13 November and the downing of the Russian military plane by Turkey earlier this month, Mosul seems destined to be heading towards another rendez-vous with history.
