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From Tehran to Beirut: Shia militias aim to firm up Iran’s arc of influence

The town of Ba’aj is deserted and broken. Its streets are blocked by overturned cars, its shops are shuttered and the iron gates of its ravaged homes groan in a scorching wind. Amid the wreckage, though, are the signs of new arrivals – forces who less than a week earlier chased Islamic State (Isis) from […]

Martin Chulov writes for The Guardian:

The town of Ba’aj is deserted and broken. Its streets are blocked by overturned cars, its shops are shuttered and the iron gates of its ravaged homes groan in a scorching wind.

Amid the wreckage, though, are the signs of new arrivals – forces who less than a week earlier chased Islamic State (Isis) from one of its most important territories in northern Iraq.

Spraying graffiti and planting their battle colours, they have wasted little time in staking their claim to a place that had mattered little in the sweep of Iraq’s modern history, but which is set to be pivotal from this moment on.