Baghdad on High Alert following Recent Bombings

Moreover, some attributed the security deterioration in the capital to poor intelligence efforts and the security forces’ recklessness in handling the obtained intelligence information. Others believe that IS seeks to distract attention from its defeats by targeting Baghdad with bombings.

In this context, IS is expected to conduct a new series of bombings. Unidentified intelligence sources at the Iraqi Federal Police said May 17 that “information indicates that IS intends to carry out more bombings in Baghdad in the coming days.”

The sources added, “There were instructions that security forces be on red alert and deploy additional staff in the capital’s neighborhoods in anticipation of any terrorist act.”

Saad al-Matlabi, deputy head of Baghdad’s provincial council’s security committee, told Al-Monitor, “There are sleeper cells in the capital and Baghdad Belt, which pose a threat to the capital. This is because they are always thinking and planning how to target civilians in the bombings, which are conducted to disrupt the security situation and distract attention from [IS] defeats on the battlefronts.”

He added, “Intelligence efforts must be activated and pre-emptive operations need to be conducted against IS before it carries out any terrorist acts.”

A source at Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s office told Al-Monitor that Abadi intends to make “changes among security leaders in charge of protecting the capital and to announce that new security officials have been delegated.”