Special forces to change tactics in western Mosul given bad weather
Nineveh (IraqiNews.com) Special forces from the Iraqi Interior Ministry will change tactics on Saturday and turn to defense in its battles against Islamic State militants due to bad weather conditions, according to a senior commander. Maj. Thamer Ismail, commander of the Rapid Response forces, one of the elite forces leading the operations against IS in western Mosul, said combat missions for Saturday will rely on air and artillery strikes due to bad weather conditions in the city.
“Security forces will take the defense line today due to worsening weather conditions in Mosul..targets will be concentrated and (handled) via aircraft and artillery to exhaust Daesh (Islamic State),” Alghad Press quoted him saying.
Ismail said forces shall proceed towards liberating the remaining regions of western Mosul once the weather gets better.
Iraqi government forces took over eastern Mosul in January after three months of fighting with IS, and have entered a third week of operations to clear the western region from militants. The troops have become closer to the central Mosul’s Old City, having recaptured major government facilities, a military base and the city’s airport.
Weather conditions had been one reason behind occasional operation slowdowns during battles at the east of the city.
Ministry: foreign IS experts killed in Mosul blitz, including former Mercedes executive
Baghdad (IraqiNews.com) Some of Islamic State’s senior foreign experts were killed in an airstrike in western Mosul last Thursday, according to a statement released by the Iraqi Ministry of Defense on Saturday. The airstrikes, which targeted the 17th of July district in western Mosul, were carried out upon receiving intelligence tips, destroyed an IS headquarter and killed several outstanding foreign experts operating within the extremist group, the ministry said in its statement which did only referred to the killed militants by their nicknames.
Those, according to the ministry’s statement, included “Abu Omar al-Faransi”, a Tunisian-French who the ministry said was a former executive at automaker giant Mercedes. Al-Faransi (understandably his nom de guerre) was an automation specialist. Another one was “Abu Aesha”, also a nickname, who was a booby-trapping specialist who, according to the ministry, innovated the weaponisation of the group’s drones. A third expert killed in the strike was “Abu Mohamed al-Rusi”, a Russian, who worked as an aircraft engineer.
Islamic State has attracted thousands of foreign nationals since it took over large parts of Iraq and Syria to establish a so-called “Islamic Caliphate”.
Commander: police arrest 40 IS members in Mosul’s recaptured areas
Nineveh (IraqiNews.com) Iraqi Federal Police forces have detained 40 Islamic State members in Mosul areas which security forces had taken over, according to a senior operations commander.
Lt. Gen. Najm al-Jubouri, commander of the Nineveh Operations, said in statements Saturday that Federal Police forces arrested 40 during searches in the southern region of western Mosul. Those, he said, included Arab and foreign nationals. The arrests were made after residents of those areas tipped off police about the suspects, according to Jubouri who revealed that police intelligence offices were opened in liberated areas to receive civilians’ information about IS vestiges.
The commander said the forces, carrying out the searches at the southern area, had found three underground tunnels used by the extremist group, adding that those tunnels, which extended beneath houses previously occupied by the militants, led to the western town of Tal Afar.
Iraqi forces invade Mosul’s Old City, a major target of operations against IS
Nineveh (IraqiNews.com) Iraqi forces stormed Saturday the Old City region in western Mosul, a major target on the combat list as operations continue to drive out Islamic State militants out of the region.
Shafaaq website quoted security sources saying that Counter-Terrorism Forces and the Federal Police invaded Bab al-Toub, the first district of the Old City, from three directions. The CTF also announced it took over al-Resala, another neighborhood, after invading it earlier in the morning.
Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said in a recent seminar in Sulaimaniyah province that his security command was avoiding engagement in a major street battle in the Old City given the region’s density.
Islamic State frees Mosul prisoners as grip on last major city slips
(Reuters) Islamic State has released dozens of prisoners held in jails in the districts of the northern Iraqi city of Mosul that remain under its control, residents said on Saturday. The release of the prisoners on Friday is another sign that the militants are being overwhelmed by the U.S.-backed Iraqi offensive that started on Oct. 17 to dislodge them from Mosul, their last major city stronghold in Iraq.
Among those released were people who had been caught selling cigarettes, violating a smoking ban, or in possession of a mobile phone and therefore suspected of communicating with the outside world, the residents said.
Iraqi forces dislodged Islamic State from the eastern side of Mosul in January, and on Feb. 19 launched the offensive on the districts located west of the Tigris river.
State-run TV on Friday said about half western Mosul has been taken back from the militants who are besieged in the old city center and districts to the north.
One of the men released on Friday said two militants got him out of a basement where he was held captive with other people, blindfolded the group and drove them away in a bus.
“After driving a distance, we stopped and they told us to remove the blindfolds and then they said ‘go, you are free,'” he said by phone, adding that about 25 prisoners were on the bus.
The man, who requested not to be identified, indicated that he had spent two weeks in prison for selling cigarettes.
One Mosul resident said his brother had suddenly reappeared at the house on Friday after spending a month in captivity for possessing a mobile phone.
Iraqi forces storm Abar area, recapture 2 others near Mosul
Nineveh (IraqiNews.com) A Federal Police Officer announced on Saturday, that Iraqi security forces liberated two areas, and stormed another, south of Mosul. Captain Tarek Jassim said in a press statement, “Security forces liberated the areas of Bab al-Bayd and al-Farouq, after fierce battles with the Islamic State group.”
“The battles resulted in the killing of 28 members of the Islamic State, including 4 suicide bombers and a sniper,” Jassim added.
Jassim also pointed out that the security forces started to storm al-Abar area, south of Mosul, to liberate it from the control of the terrorist group.
Iraqi forces capture village, major water station near western Mosul’s Tigris bank
Nineveh (IraqiNews.com) Iraqi forces on Saturday became in control over a major water station and a village near the western bank of the Tigris River as fights rage on against Islamic State in the western side of Mosul. Lt. Gen. Abdul-Amir Yarallah, commander of the Joint Operations Command’s battles in Nineveh, said the army’s 16th division liberated the Khawaja Khalil village as well as the “grand water project” which feeds the eastern region which the government recaptured in January.
