Washington DC – Ed Royce, chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee in the US Congress, on Thursday questioned President Barack Obama’s strategy to counter the Islamic State (ISIS) after the group seized control of two cities in Iraq and Syria since Sunday.
“How is it that ISIS is seizing territory on two fronts, 10 months after US airstrikes began?” Royce asked, referring to the ISIS victories this week.
The militant group overran the city of Ramadi in Iraq last Sunday and seized control over the Syrian city of Palmyra, which sits on Hellenistic and Roman ruins that date back more than 2,000 years.
“It’s dreadfully obvious that we aren’t working well enough to defeat ISIS and protect the people of Palmyra and its precious relics of our shared history,” charged Royce, a Republican from California.
The latest ISIS advances have called into question Obama’s strategy to “degrade and defeat ISIS.”
Pentagon officials have called ISIS’s victory in Ramadi “tactical,” saying that coalition forces have strategic advantage over the extremist group.
There are fears that the militants could destroy the ancient city in Syria, as they did in Iraq, destroying museums, statues and artifacts in Nineveh province.
Royce warned of a potential massacre of civilians in Palmyra, saying: “Palmyra residents now face the same terrorists who slaughtered men, women and children as they overran Ramadi.”
Republicans and some of the Obama’s own Democrats have turned up their rhetoric about the ineffectiveness of the president’s strategy to defeat ISIS.
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