As harvest time begins in Makhmour, ISIS again burns cropland

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Kazim Sofi, a farmer from Makhmour, had been due to harvest his crops in just a few days – a bumper harvest after good winter rainfall. But in this disputed territory of northern Iraq where Islamic State (ISIS) militants roam freely, his livelihood is under constant threat. 

On Tuesday morning, as Sofi was tending to his land, the familiar smell of smoke began to drift across the fields. 

“If the fire had not been brought under control, it would now all be burned,” Sofi told Rudaw on Thursday, examining a large area of cropland which has been reduced to ashes.

Luckily, the flames were doused before they could swallow the entire harvest, but Sofi estimates the 50 acres lost to the blaze could have yielded 25 million dinars ($21,000).

“A total of [87.5 acres of] land belonging to us and our neighbors were torched by Daesh,” Sofi said, using the Arabic acronym for ISIS.

"Now the farmers’ biggest problem is how to control fires because the Iraqi army does not allow firefighting vehicles to reach us to put out blazes because they consider our place a war-zone,” he added.

This year, around 2,000 local farmers have planted 87,500 acres of land with wheat and 6,250 acres with barley around Makhmour. 

Ahmed Jamil, another local farmer, says agricultural workers are bearing the brunt of the rivalry between the Kurdish Peshmerga and the Iraqi army, who refuse to coordinate on security to eliminate the ISIS threat.

“In the past there were just 500 Peshmerga in Makhmour and it was very safe,” Jamil said. “But now it is not safe even with 5,000 Iraqi army soldiers.” 

ISIS targeted cropland across northern Iraq in early 2019, disrupting the local economy, placing a strain on food security, and intimidating the population.

Komar Wali has planted 10,000 acres of wheat. Although the crop is not quite ready, he will begin the harvest in 10 days. He doesn’t want to risk his months of hard labor turning to ash.

“I just cannot harvest my crop now because it has not completely ripened,” Wali said. “I have to harvest it in 10 days or it will be burned.”

Makhmour’s farmers are tired of living in constant fear and want Baghdad to compensate them for lost income.

Relevant: ISIS burns crop fields in Makhmour after farmers refuse to pay tax 

“There is not yet a decision on whether to compensate farmers,” Jawdat Abdulrahman, spokesperson for the Iraqi Civil Defense, told Rudaw. “But we call upon farmers to strictly follow our instructions, which say they must have fire extinguishers.”

Abdulrahman also pointed out that not every fire is started by militants. “Some of the factors are natural and others are related to terror in places that are not safe,” he said.

In 2019, 325 acres of cropland were burned by ISIS in Makhmour, Abdulrahman said. 

Related: Is ISIS winning hearts and minds in Iraq’s Makhmour? 

In its weekly al-Nabaa newspaper, published on messaging app Telegram last week, ISIS claimed responsibility for a recent spate of arson attacks in Diyala province.

Several similar incidents have been reported by local media outlets in the past week. State media reported the burning of crops in Najaf on Tuesday, but said it was the result of an electrical fault.

The Iraqi government is stepping up plans to protect the country’s agricultural land as summer approaches, Muhammed Amin Faris, a member of the parliament’s Agricultural and Water Resources committee, told Rudaw on Tuesday.

“This is something that happens every year during summer,” Faris said. 

“The Agricultural and Water Resources Committee in the Iraqi parliament has already sent a letter to the ministries of interior and defense, as well as to the provinces, urging them to protect the agricultural fields and crops from burning,” he added.

ISIS militants seized Makhmour and surrounding villages in 2014 before they were quickly routed in a combined operation led by the Peshmerga, Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) guerillas, and Coalition forces.

Although the jihadist group was declared defeated in Iraq in December 2017, its remnants have retreated into Iraq’s deserts and mountains, where they have resumed earlier hit-and-run tactics of kidnap, ambush, bombing, and execution, aided by highly sophisticated sleeper cells in the cities and hinterland.

In the aftermath of the Kurdistan independence referendum of September 2017, Iraqi forces launched an offensive against Peshmerga forces in the oil-rich province of Kirkuk and other areas considered disputed between Erbil and Baghdad.

In Makhmour, a combined force of Iraqi Army troops and Hashd al-Shaabi attacked the Peshmerga and PKK, forcing them out of the town and into the mountains.

The Peshmerga’s carefully cultivated human intelligence network in Makhmour collapsed. The predominantly Shiite forces which took their place failed to imitate its success.

By Farhad Dolamari