Iraqi security sources are warning of an ISIS revival in the country, which coincides all too neatly with the spike in Iraqi resistance operations against U.S. bases in Iraq and Syria, and with widening regional instability caused by Israel’s military assault on Gaza.

More than six years after declaring victory over the terrorist organization, Iraqi intelligence reports now indicate that thousands of ISIS fighters are emerging unscathed, under the protection of U.S. forces in two regions of western Iraq.