The battle, which the Iraqi army was expected to win, revolved around preventing the militants from transforming the border region into safe havens and areas of concentration that it could use to alter the military situation and allow fighters free passage between the Iraqi and Syrian wings of the organization. With the help of US weaponry and intelligence, the army succeeded in destroying some border encampments, indicating that the balance of power there was shifting toward the Iraqi military.
Around this time, however, Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki ordered the dispersal of the Sunni protesters, who included leaders of Sunni clans. Then, on Dec. 28, 2013, security forces raided the home of Alwani, the MP and leader of the Abu al-Alwan clan and prominent supporter of the protests, killing a sibling and bodyguards in a firefight. Alwani was taken to Baghdad, and photos and video clips of him were leaked.
At that moment, attention in Anbar shifted from the desert operation to Alwani, whose arrest raised the ire of the Sunni clans. The rhetoric grew tougher on Dec. 28, when Sunni clergyman Abdel Malak al-Saadi issued a statement condemning the arrest and appealing for Alwani’s release, rejecting Maliki’s demands to cease all protests and calling on clans to forcefully respond to any attempt to disperse the demonstrations.
The issue then became the manner in which the government would choose to deal with the tensions caused by the arrest of Alwani, and the determination of clansmen and clergy to maintain the protests, which had begun Dec. 21, 2012. The security option won out. Iraqi forces stormed the site of the protests in Ramadi on Dec. 30, 2013, and forcibly dispersed the demonstrators, leading to widespread confrontations with clan militants, followed by mass resignations of Sunni representatives from parliament and calls for people to take up arms against the army.
The other controversial security decision was the order for Iraqi army troops to withdraw from Anbar cities on Dec. 31. The decision, meant to placate the clans, was immediately followed by the widespread appearance of al-Qaeda gunmen inside these same cities. Some of them, according to a videotape posted on Dec. 29, 2013, arrived from Syria, led by the notorious ISIS field commander Shaker Waheeb, who, it was later claimed, died in battle in Anbar.
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