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Another Mass Grave Dug by ISIS in Iraq, and a Ghastly Ritual Renewed

With every mile of territory the Iraqi security forces retake from the Islamic State, it seems another mass grave is uncovered. It has become nearly ritual, and despairingly regular. The legacy of the mass grave in Iraq is long, stretching back further than the Islamic State to the times of Saddam Hussein’s industrial-scale killings. It […]

Tim Arango writes for The New York Times:

With every mile of territory the Iraqi security forces retake from the Islamic State, it seems another mass grave is uncovered. It has become nearly ritual, and despairingly regular.

The legacy of the mass grave in Iraq is long, stretching back further than the Islamic State to the times of Saddam Hussein’s industrial-scale killings. It is the horrible symbol of what has been for decades a gut-wrenching constant of Iraqi life: the disappearance of loved ones into the machinery of despotism.

For Iraqis, the Islamic State, for which the mass grave is as much a part of the group’s infrastructure as makeshift prisons and slaveholding houses, is just a new form of tyranny with direct links to Mr. Hussein’s regime. Many former Baathist officers from Mr. Hussein’s security forces populate the top ranks of the Islamic State, mimicking the former dictator’s tactics.