Prior to the IS invasion, Qaim had an estimated population of 150,000 and was long seen as a major entry point for foreign fighters into Iraq from Syria during prior insurgency movements.
Shortly after the city’s liberation Nov. 3, IS drones dropped a bomb on a local Sunni force fighting alongside the Iraqi army, killing one fighter as he was getting out of an armored vehicle and injuring several others.
Fendi told Al-Monitor on Nov. 6 that eight IS drones had attacked the Iraqi joint forces but that international coalition forces had managed to thwart subsequent attempts by conducting surveillance and destroying the drones via airstrikes in Syria.
In the nearby Obeidi district, mostly inhabited by the Albu Mahal tribe and located farther east along the road toward the now-besieged and IS-held town of Rawa and the recently liberated city of Anah, Col. Ali al-Jabouri told Al-Monitor that four suicide bombers had been discovered Nov. 6 just as they were about to carry out attacks. Three were reportedly killed and one was injured.
An officer who had been in charge of Qaim and the surrounding area in 2006, when there was a heavy al-Qaeda presence, told Al-Monitor in an interview in September that the Obeidi district was the most difficult for his forces to deal with.
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