Iraqi forces foil IS attempt to retake liberated areas in western Mosul
Mosul (IraqiNews.com) Iraqi forces repelled on Tuesday an attempt by Islamic State militants to retake areas under security control in western Mosul as forces moved deeper in the group’s last enclave.
A security source told Shafaq News that Iraqi warplanes killed 23 IS members who were trying to sneak into al-Dindan district, south of the Old City, IS’s last enclave in Mosul. The source added that the militants were planning to take over government buildings including the courthouse and the local police department.
Iraqi forces took over Dindan district in March.
A few hundred IS fighters are believed to be entrenching in the Old City, seeking protection in the middle of 100.000 civilians who are believed to be used as human shields and shot dead once trying to escape.
Three officers injured as Islamic State launch 10th chemical attack in Mosul: Agency
Mosul (IraqiNews.com) Three Iraqi officers were wounded as Islamic State militants launched a chemical attack from western Mosul’s Old City to hinder the advancing government troops, Sputnik agency reported Tuesday.
It quoted its reporter saying that the mortar missile was launched a day earlier, landing near an elite squad from the army’s Counter-Terrorism Service. Three officers sustained intense vomiting and rashes from the missile which, the agency said, contained a poisonous gas, probably mustard.
The affected personnel were taken late Monday to a makeshift hospital run by the squad, according to Sputnik, which said the attack was the tenth by IS militants since operations launched to retake Mosul in October.
Instances of chemical weapons use have been recurrently reported since an inventory of chemical arms was discovered by Iraqi forces inside laboratories of Mosul University in the eastern side of Mosul, which government troops took over from IS in January.
Mosul council deports IS fighters families, cites need for rehabilitation
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In a statement, the council said it will no longer allow receiving migrant Islamic State fighters families arriving from other provinces. The existing families are to be deported and sheltered in camps where they will be “psychologically and ideologically rehabilitated and integrated with society once they prove responsive to that process.”
The council’s plan also involves a ban on internal migration in Mosul, and to ensure that migrant families are returned to the very same residences they occupied before June 2014 except those who had lost their dwelling. Official IDs will be reviewed to verify that migrants are truelly original Mosul residents, according to the statement.
Over 700 civilians flee Mosul’s Old City
Mosul (IraqiNews.com) More than 700 civilians fled the last IS-held district in western Mosul over the past 24 hours, an Iraqi military source said.
Speaking to Anadolu Agency, Cap. Jabbar Hassan said troops of the ninth armored division of the Iraqi army and Federal Police troops transferred the fleeing civilians, most of whom were women and children, to outside the Old City without naming it.
In related news, Lt. Gen. Shaker Jawdat, head of the Federal Police, said in a statement that 32 IS militants were killed in battlefields in the Old City.
Several areas inside and around the Old City have been recaptured putting the area under full siege.
A statement by Defense Ministry’s War Media Cell, quoted Nineveh Operations Commander Abdulamir Yarallah earlier on Tuesday, as saying that 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.