A top commander of the Sunni insurgency in Iraq has told The Telegraph how his men are fighting alongside the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham to take back Baghdad, even if it means pushing the country to civil war.

Sheikh Ahmed al-Dabash, 47, a founder of the Islamic Army of Iraq, who fought the allied invasion in 2003, has told how thousands of his men are participating in the Isis-led insurgency that swept across northern Iraq, and which now threatens the gates of the capital.

The Islamic Army, however, does not share the same extremist ideology of Isis, Mr Dabash said in an exclusive interview with The Telegraph, and raised the prospect of his faction one day turning its guns on their jihadist comrades.

“If Maliki [the Iraqi prime minister] does not step down, then there is no doubt that we are moving on Baghdad,” said Mr Dabash. “We will go all the way.”

For over a decade, Mr Dabash has been a mastermind of the Sunni insurgency that fought the United States led occupation of Iraq in 2003.

Then an influential imam in Baghdad and a leading figure in the Batawi family, one of the country’s largest Sunni tribes, Mr Dabash mobilised tens of thousands of men, forming the Islamic Army of Iraq.

David Fuller's view

This is turning into a new civil war in Iraq between Sunnis and Shiites, creating an oil price risk for the rest of us, particularly if this conflict spills over further within the Middle East as it easily could.  

Moreover, somewhat higher oil prices will suit may producers in the Middle East and elsewhere.  They know that the cost of energy will fall over the lengthy medium term, due to a combination of fracking, the relentless development of renewables led by solar, and lastly, new nuclear power.  Therefore, they will milk this current Sunnis versus Shiites conflict for all it is worth.  

It is a risky strategy but I do not think that the Saudis and other oil producers will have much incentive to rein in major civil wars in their region until or unless the price of crude rises sufficiently to choke off demand from oil-importing countries.