Iraq forces gain ground in Mosul despite resistance

MOSUL - Agence France-Presse

REUTERS photo

Iraqi forces battled jihadists inside Mosul for the third day running yesterday while civilians risked their lives dodging bombs and snipers to slip out of the city.

The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL)put up fierce resistance to defend the city it seized more than two years ago and also claimed responsibility for deadly suicide attacks further south.

The elite Counter-Terrorism Service has been spearheading the attack on the eastern front of the three-week-old offensive on Mosul, Iraq’s largest military operation in years.

“Our forces are continuing to clear neighborhoods including Al-Samah, Karkukli, Al-Malayeen and Shaqaq al-Khadra,” CTS Staff Lieutenant General Abdelghani al-Assadi told AFP.

The jihadists have given up some of its bastions in Iraq and Syria with barely a fight in recent months but its men began the defence of their last Iraqi hub with anger.

“Resistance is very heavy and they have suffered major losses,” Assadi said of ISIL.

Soldiers from the army’s 9th armored division also battled jihadists in the southeastern neighborhood of Intisar, an AFP correspondent reported, as forces attempted to increase their footprint in eastern Mosul.

They first entered the streets of Mosul on Nov. 4 and were met with what one officer described as stiffer than expected resistance from ISIL jihadists.

The assault allowed some civilians to flee the city, most of whose million-plus residents remained trapped inside, sheltering both from their jihadist rulers and incoming fire from government forces and U.S.-led coalition aircraft.

Some of the first civilians to manage to escape the city proper arrived at a camp near Khazir in Kurdish-controlled territory on Saturday.

Abu Sara dodged gunfire, bombs, mortar rounds and coalition strikes to flee his neighborhood of Al-Samah, such was his desperation to leave what many civilians who escaped IS rule describe as an open-air prison.

“We walked several miles, taking with us only the clothes we were wearing and white flags we waved the entire way,” said the 34-year-old, wearing a brown fake leather jacket.

While the corridors called for by aid groups to allow the safe passage of civilians have yet to materialize, arrivals in the displacement camps dotting the area have increased markedly.

The government said it had taken in 9,000 displaced people in the past two days.

The International Organization for Migration said a total of about 34,000 people had been displaced since the start of rhe offensive on October 17.

Relief organizations were fighting the clock to build up their shelter capacity ahead of the feared mass exodus from Mosul.