ISIS executes 100+ over 3 days
Mosul (IraqiNews.com) Islamic State militants have executed over 100 civilians for attempting to flee areas under their control in western Mosul since last Friday, according to security sources and a human rights group.
Col. Khodeir Saleh, from the Iraqi Joint Operations Command, told BasNews Tuesday that IS executed 20 Iraqi young men from Mosul for attempting to escape areas under their control towards others recaptured by security forces.
Also on Tuesday, Cap. Yunus Zanon, from the Nineveh police service, told DPA that a mass grave containing 24 decomposed corpses of women and young men was found by Federal Police forces inside al-Zahraa mosque in western Mosul. The officer said the dead bodies bore signs of torture, and that no IDs were found to identify the victims.
Meanwhile, the Iraqi Observatory for Human Rights said in a statement that Islamic State militants massacred more than 100 people in western Mosul last Friday.
It quoted local sources from central Mosul’s Old City on Sunday saying that IS massacred 22 families from the Mekkawi area after 22 young men belonging to those families tried to escape with the help of a Syrian smuggler. The smuggler reached the smuggling deal with the young men two months earlier, but the plan was delayed when Iraqi security forces invaded the region. IS members, finding out about the scheme, executed the young men, their families and the smuggler’s family.
According to IOHR, the executions were carried out inside popular bath houses in Mekkawi, with 106 corpses left for 14 hours before civilian-owned vehicles came to carry them for burial.
The organization quoted refugees from Orouba and Tanak district saying that tens of their relatives and friends died of hunger at Zanjili, Tanak and al-Refaie districts.
“My two little nephews, aged 3 and 4, died last month in Refaie region due to hunger…we have learned that their mom, too, was in bad condition due to starvation,” IOHR quoted a citizen from Orouba saying.
The observatory urged the Iraqi government to open airlifts to drop down foodstuff for civilians stranded at IS-held areas.
6 civilians die in chemical shelling in Mosul
Mosul (IraqiNews.com) Thirty-five civilians, including women and children, were killed and injured as Islamic State militants fired bombs loaded with toxic gases, west of Mosul.
“IS fighters shelled bombs of toxic gases in Rajm al-Hadid area in western Mosul, which was completely freed by by security troops earlier this week, targeting civilians,” a security source told Dijlah TV on Tuesday.
The shelling left six civilians killed and 29 injured including eight children and four women in serious conditions.
Iraqi forces recaptured the eastern side of Mosul in January and launched another phase of operations in February to capture the west. During operations in the east, and upon storming the Mosul University campus, Iraqi field generals were quoted saying they saw evidence IS was using the university’s labs to manufacture chemical weapons.
Last month, the United Nations said 12 people, including women and children, had been treated for possible exposure to chemical weapons agents in Mosul since March 1.
In February, CIA director John Brennan said that IS fighters used chemical munitions, including mustard and chlorine agents, on a number of occasions in Iraq and Syria.
Last year, Kurdish military sources disclosed the Islamic State use of chemical weapons against Peshmerga troops in several areas, which caused injury of several personnel.