BEIRUT: Lebanon’s Shia movement Hezbollah said on Friday that an Iranian elite unit commander led the anti-jihadist counter-attack in Iraq after the Islamic State group made major advances in June.

Major General Qassem Suleimani landed in Baghdad on June 10, hours after the IS overran the Iraqi city of Mosul, “leading a group of Lebanese and Iranian military experts”, according to the pro-Tehran group’s Al-Manar website.

It said Suleimani, who heads Iran’s elite Quds Force, had together with the Iraqi military and Shia militias worked out a strategy “to secure Baghdad and its surroundings”, when the jihadists appeared unstoppable.

“The first order he gave was to secure the road linking Baghdad to Samarra (to the north), and he successfully expelled the IS jihadists who had been occupying sections of this vital artery,” it said.

Published in Dawn, November 29th , 2014