Iraqi joint forces kill ten extremists in Salahuldin

Iraqi joint forces killed ten elements from ISIS extremist groups  in the northern area of Salahuldin province, as the security forces managed to kill an extremist affiliating to the extremist group during the battles on the left bank of Iraqi city of Mousl.

Meanwhile, Iraqi parliamentarian Forat Al Tamimi said that most of suicide attacks that targeted Diyala province have been carried out by ISIS young militants. He added that ISIS extremist group attempts to repeat the experience of Qaeda that turned to recruit the children and to turn them into time bombs to kill innocents.

He added, “Some of the suicide bombers are not from Diyala and they come from strongholds, both in Hawija and in the north and east of Salah Al-Din. Hawija is still a direct threat to the security of Diyala, in addition to other areas adjacent to the borders of the province with Salah al-Din, which calls for the quick clearance and termination of the organization.”

Iraqi government forces recaptured on Tuesday several areas inside and around the Islamic State-held Old City, putting the area under full siege, and killed doze of militants as operations continue to clear the group’s last enclave in Mosul.

Col. Khodeir Saleh, from Nineveh police service, told BasNews that Federal Police forces invaded Deka Baraka and Bab Lakash in the Old City, killing 30 militants, including a Russian national. Iraqi warplanes, Saleh said, also killed Islamic State’s so-designated “media minister”, Udai hamdoun. But seven civilians were also killed by mistake when fighter jets pounded al-Maydan area in central Mosul, he said.

The Defense Ministry’s War Media Cell, quoting operations chief Abdulamir Yarallah, also said troops from the 9th division of the Iraqi army recaptured the southern part of al-Shifa district, a home to several major health facilities north of the Old City.

The forces took over the ancient Bash Tabia Castle, a juvenile offenders’ prison, the Nineveh Health Department, the Marie Church and the fifth of Mosul’s five bridges linking both sides of Mosul, said the statement.

Operations in al-Shifa have been running simultaneously with advances towards the Old City, Islamic State’s last bastion in Mosul and the place where it first proclaimed its rule in 2014. The development puts the Old City under full siege.

A few hundred militants are thought to be entrenching in the Old City, holding at least 100.000 who are reportedly used as human shields.

The recapture of Mosul would signal and end to the “Islamic Caliphate” proclaimed by IS in 2014. There remains a few, but smaller, enclaves held by IS which the government would charge at after the end of the campaign in Mosul.

Islamic State militants have forcibly confiscated tens of civilian-owned vehicles to build fortifications in the town of Tal Afar, west of Mosul, a local source said Tuesday. The source told Alsumaria News that the cars blocked the streets of the town, forming walls against possible offensives.

Islamic State have been holding Tal Afar since 2014, with the area becoming one of its most significant bastions in Nineveh province. So far, offensives by the pro-government Popular Mobilization have isolated the town from the Syrian borders and from Mosul, and recaptured a main military base there.

Troops are currently besieging IS militants in central Mosul’s Old City, where they group declared its rule in Iraq in 2014. The issue of Tal Afar’s invasion has been controversial since Iraqi government forces, backed by a U.S.-led coalition, launched an offensive in October to retake areas occupied by the Islamic State in Nineveh, most notably the city of Mosul.

The Shia-led Popular Mobilization has occasionally said its fighters were awaiting orders from Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to invade the mostly-Sunni Turkmen town. But regional Sunni powers, especially Turkey, had opposed the notion fearing sectarian consequences, obliging Abadi’s government to reassure that only the official forces would take up the mission.