AMERLI, Iraq — Thick black smoke rose from some of the houses in the distance. The rocket and bullet casings lying by the side of the highway attested to the fight for control over the area. Young Shiite men armed with a variety of weapons, including rocket-propelled grenades, manned makeshift checkpoints along the road to the “liberated” town of Amerli. Such was the scene that greeted visitors arriving in the vicinity of Amerli and Sulaiman Bag, in the northern part of Salahuddin province, some 180 kilometers (112 miles) north of Baghdad.

At the entrance to Amerli, children waved Shiite flags at the vehicles entering their dilapidated town. It was a genuine expression of joy at having survived what would have surely been a brutal fate if the fighters of the Islamic State (IS) had succeeded in setting foot in this town populated by Shiite Turkmen.

Armed men affiliated with a number of Shiite groups — some wearing camouflaged military uniforms and others black fatigues — roamed the streets hoisting the flags of their respective organizations on their vehicles, many of which did not have license plates. Among the groups that helped take Amerli were the Badr Brigades, the League of the Righteous, Hezbollah Battalions and Peace Brigades. It was at times difficult to tell who was who. Military humvees provided by the US government to the Iraqi army carried Iraqi and armed groups’ flags. 

Fighters from the Hezbollah Battalions set up base at a building formerly used by the government's office of agriculture. The group, whose flag bears striking similarities to Lebanese Hezbollah's banner, once fought both the US military and Iraqi security forces, but has joined forces with the army and other Shiite armed factions to fight their common enemy: Sunni extremists. The men, visibly tired by the fight, rejoiced in their victory over IS, a rare occurrence in the bloody conflict between the Sunni jihadists and the Iraqi army and allied Shiite forces.