Sectarian violence continues apace across Iraq and the ISIS war escalates. The latest incident comes in the village of Khamissiya, in the southern part of the Babil Province, where 53 blindfolded, handcuffed corpses were unceremoniously dumped by the roadside overnight.
So far the victims have not been identified, nor is it clear if they were Shi’ites or Sunnis. Still, their dumping in the largely Shi’ite village seems a sign of another mass execution from one faction or another.
That’s bad news for Iraq wherever it happens, but Khamissiya is in an area that had previously been outside of the warzone, southeast of Baghdad. If it turns out to be an ISIS-related incident, that would suggest they are encircling the capital even faster than noted.
The Babil Provincial capital of al-Hillah was the site of a previous mass execution by Iraqi police, who summarily executed a number of Sunni detainees who they had been ordered to transfer, on the grounds that if they ever escaped they might conceivably be ISIS sympathizers.