Property belonging to Shiite Muslims and Shabaks, some of whom are Sunni Muslims, has also been confiscated by the group. This real estate is mainly in the Atshanah, Karamah, Quds, Nour, Bab Shams and Nour neighbourhoods.
Property owned by individuals that the IS group considered their enemies – such as Iraqi army and police, government officials, politicians, judges and public prosecutors – has also been seized. And recently the group decided they should also own the property belonging to specialists in certain fields, such as doctors.
It is also well known that the IS group has seized any revenue coming to the Sunni Muslim endowment in Ninawa. This is the body tasked with running local Sunni Muslim mosques and shrines and any property belonging to them. The local endowment is thought to own hundreds of individual homes and buildings as well as commercial property in different parts of the city and on its outskirts.
The result of all this property: another huge source of funding for the extremist group, possibly amounting to more than the money it makes from selling oil and oil derivatives on the black market here.
Sources, who must remain anonymous for security reasons, inside the city say that the IS group is now planning to auction off some of the real estate. In fact, those same sources inside the city told NIQASH that members of the IS group have already inventoried all the properties and matched them against official records.
A lot of people have been talking about these auctions, one local realtor, who wished only to be known as Abu Harun, says. However, he said, many of his colleagues in the business are not going to take part in these public auctions because the properties were taken using force. Their religious beliefs tell them that to participate in the sale of stolen property would not be the right thing to do.
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