Eight members of a family, including three women, were killed in a bomb blast followed by armed attack in a village of Diyala province.
The attack took place on Monday at night against the relatives of Sheikh Mustaf Tamimi, the chief of the Tamimi tribe in Sharaban district of Diyala.
Adnan Tamimi, a prominent figure of the Tamim tribe and former chairman of the Sharaban local council, told KirkukNow that a bomb planted in a vehicle of the family exploded and then an armed attack killed eight members of one family of their tribe.
“Three of them are women. Two other members of the same family were injured," he added.
The incident took place in the village of Hazina Shakha in Sharaban district. Sharaban is a district in Diyala province and a disputed area between the federal government in Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government KRG, according to the Iraqi constitution.
Diyala province is a majority Sunni Arab province, east of Baghdad, on the border with Iran, and home to 1.2 million people.
"Sheikh Mustaf's daughter, brother and family members were among the victims," Tamimi said.
Three of the dead were women, Warda Mustaf Tamimi, Hayat Jassim Tamimi and Zeina Ismail Tamimi.
The other dead were Maysam Ismail Mahmoud, Ahmad Aasi Mahmoud, Abdul Amir Tamim Mahmoud, Ismail Jassim and Ali Mohammed.
The Iraqi security forces ISF have been on alert in Sharaban since last night and have not yet announced any information about the perpetrators.
"We don't know who is behind this incident. We are waiting for the security forces to investigate," Tamimi added.
This is the second bloody incident in the district, after October 2021 as a result of attacks by ISIS and retaliation acts, 23 civilians were killed in two villages of Sharaban.
Diyala province is a majority Sunni Arab province, east of Baghdad, on the border with Iran, and home to 1.2 million people.
Back in 2014, the extremist militants of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria ISIS took over almost one third of Iraqi territories. End of 2017, the Iraqi government declared victory and defeat of IS yet a report by the United Nations UN published in 2021 estimated around 10,000 Daesh fighters remain active across Iraq and Syria
IS militants are regrouping in the rural areas of the disputed territories between Baghdad and Erbil. They are targeting Iraqi forces and civilians in the suburbs of Diyla, Kirkuk Ninawa, Salahaddin and Erbil, leaving tens of casualties and causing material damage to power towers, oil wells, houses, cattle, orchards and vehicles of the villagers.
