978-1-4222-3442-6

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I RAQ ’ S P LACE IN THE W ORLD

Kurdish militias, known as peshmerga, have defended cities like Kirkuk and Erbil from the Islamic State invasion when the Arab-dominated Iraqi Army abandoned their posts. That has led to concerns that the Kurdistan region may break away from Iraq and form an independent state—a prospect that would be unpalatable to neighboring Turkey, which has its own restive Kurdish population.

Muslims, Sunni Muslims, and Kurds. The rise of ISIL presents the Kurds with both opportunity and risk. As ISIL forces captured Iraqi cities and villages during 2014, the soldiers of the Iraqi Army fled, setting off a military collapse through the region. Kurdish fighters, known as peshmerga, recov- ered and by engaging with ISIL managed to prevent Iraq from dis- integrating completely. But in the process the Kurds claimed con- trol of lands that had ben claimed by both Kurdistan and the gov- ernment in Baghdad. As the fighting continued, the leader of Kurdistan’s regional government, Masoud Barzani, told the local