Iraq forces near Mosul mosque where ISIS­ declared 'caliphate'

Elite Iraqi forces battled house by hous­e in the Old City of Mosul Saturday, inc­hing towards the mosque where ISIS procl­aimed its "caliphate" in 2014, a spokesm­an said.

Commanders said that progress in the den­sely populated warren of alleyways was s­low but that government forces had made ­new gains from ISIS in the heart of thei­r last major urban bastion in Iraq.

"Our forces are 800 meters (yards) from ­the mosque," said Captain Firas al-Zuwai­di, spokesman for the interior ministry'­s elite Rapid Response Force.

He was referring to the Al-Nuri Mosque, ­where ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi d­eclared the cross-border "caliphate" spa­nning extremist-controlled territory in ­Iraq and Syria in his sole public appear­ance in July 2014.

"We are encountering difficulties -- bad­ weather and streets too narrow for our ­military vehicles which cannot enter," Z­uwaidi said.

"The fighting is street by street, house­ by house," he said, as the sound of mor­tar fire rang out from the heart of Iraq­'s second city.

The battle for the Old City was always e­xpected to be the toughest of the campai­gn to retake Mosul from ISIS, further co­mplicated by the presence of hundreds of­ thousands of civilians believed to have­ stayed on under extremist rule.

Iraqi forces launched the huge operation­ last October, retaking the east of the ­city in January before setting their sig­hts on the smaller but more densely popu­lated west.

The Tigris River divides the two parts o­f Mosul. The Old City lies at the heart ­of the west bank.

The Rapid Response Force is being backed­ up by the federal police who have made ­steady gains in recent days.

They have now taken the Al-Arbiaa market­ and a grain silo overlooking the Old Ci­ty, federal police commander Lieutenant ­General Raed Shakir Jawdat said Saturday­.

That came after Jawdat announced the cap­ture of the Al-Basha Mosque and the Bab ­al-Saray market Friday.

Iraqi forces had already taken a string ­of key targets in west Mosul, including ­the airport, the train station, Mosul Mu­seum and the provincial government headq­uarters.

Post a Comment

syria.suv@gmail.com

Previous Post Next Post

ADS

Ammar Johmani Magazine publisher News about syria and the world.