Jihadists face growing pressure as US mulls strategy

Elite Iraqi troops backed by US jets battled jihadists just south of Baghdad today as Washington devised a strategy for expanded operations against the Islamic State group.
President Barack Obama prepared to meet with US commanders to decide how to turn the tide on the most powerful and brutal jihadist group in recent history while keeping a promise not to drag America into another military quagmire.
The White House scrambled to play down a suggestion by the top US officer that deploying ground forces was an option but expanded air strikes were already turning up the heat on the Islamic State (IS) group.

According to Iraqi military and tribal leaders, US jets struck three IS targets in an area south of Baghdad which has been dubbed the "triangle of death", killing at least four militants.
A leader of the Janabi tribe in the flashpoint region of Jurf al-Sakhr, less than 50 km south of Baghdad, said Iraqi soldiers had fought IS militants until early today.
"The main focus was an area of Jurf al-Sakhr called Fadhiliya. They fought deep into the night but the Iraqi army was not able to enter the place," a leader from the local Janabi tribe told AFP.

The US military issued a statement yesterday that spoke of three air strikes southwest of Baghdad but did not specify where.

The Jurf al-Sakhr region is seen as a key area because it sits on the Euphrates River between the major Sunni insurgent bastion of Fallujah, west of Baghdad, and the country's most revered Shiite holy sites south of the capital.
The tribal leader and an army lieutenant said the push was led by the Golden Brigade, which is widely recognised as the best force in the country.
Critics say it may be the only credible fighting force in what is sometimes derided as "a checkpoint army".
The brigade, which spearheaded an offensive the retake the country's largest dam north of Mosul last month, has been hopping from one key frontline to another.

The US administration has said that its strategy in Iraq would involve helping to revamp an army it had not finished training when the eight-year occupation ended in 2011.
General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, said yesterday that US military advisers could "provide close-combat advising".
But the White House insisted the idea of US troops in battle was a "purely hypothetical scenario.