Kataib Rouh Allah Issa Ibn Miriam ( ar, كتائب روح الله عيسى بن مريم; lit. ''The Brigade of the Spirit of God

Jesus Jesus, likely from he, יֵשׁוּעַ, translit=Yēšūaʿ, label= Hebrew/ Aramaic ( AD 30 or 33), also referred to as Jesus Christ or Jesus of Nazareth (among other names and titles), was a first-century Jewish preacher and religiou ...

Son of

Mary Mary may refer to: People * Mary (name), a feminine given name (includes a list of people with the name) Religious contexts * New Testament people named Mary, overview article linking to many of those below * Mary, mother of Jesus, also calle ...

'') is a

militia A militia () is generally an army or some other fighting organization of non-professional soldiers, citizens of a country, or subjects of a state, who may perform military service during a time of need, as opposed to a professional force of r ...

composed of Christian Assyrians, trained and supplied by an Iraqi

Shi'ite Shīʿa Islam or Shīʿīsm is the second-largest branch of Islam. It holds that the Islamic prophet Muhammad designated ʿAlī ibn Abī Ṭālib as his successor (''khalīfa'') and the Imam (spiritual and political leader) after him, most ...

militia as a subgroup in the fight against

ISIL An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic term ...

Formation and activities

Kataib Rouh was formed in December 2014 as a Christian subgroup of the Kataib al-Imam Ali ( Brigade of Imam Ali), itself the armed wing of Harakat al-Iraq al-Islamiyah (Movement of the Islamic Iraq).Matthew Levitt & Phillip Smyth
Kataib al-Imam Ali: Portrait of an Iraqi Shiite Militant Group Fighting ISIS

Washington Institute for Near East Policy The Washington Institute for Near East Policy (WINEP or TWI, also known simply as The Washington Institute) is a pro-Israel American think tank based in Washington, D.C., focused on the foreign policy of the United States in the Near East. WIN ...

, January 5, 2015. Kataib al-Imam Ali entered the war against ISIL in June 2014 with uniformed, well-armed members. It has been quite active in Amerli, Tuz, and Diyala fighting alongside other Iraqi Shiite militias, all of them backed by Iranian IRGC. In

Saladin Governorate The Saladin or Salah Al-Din Governorate ( ar, محافظة صلاح الدين) is one of Iraq's 19 governorates, north of Baghdad. It has an area of , with an estimated population of 1,042,200 people in 2003. It is made up of 8 districts, with ...

, fighters from the group posed in

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s with the

severed heads Severed Heads were an Australian electronic music group founded in 1979 as Mr and Mrs No Smoking Sign. The original members were Richard Fielding and Andrew Wright, who were soon joined by Tom Ellard. Fielding and Wright had both left the band b ...

of their slain enemies. In late December 2014, the group set about training Christians for a subgroup called Kataib Rouh wing.

References

Christian organizations Syriac Christianity 2014 establishments in Iraq Anti-ISIL factions in Iraq War in Iraq (2013–2017) Military units and formations established in 2014 Paramilitary forces of Iraq Popular Mobilization Forces Rebel groups in Iraq Christianity in Iraq {{Iraq-mil-stub