A mother-of-two sobs as she carries her young son down a street in war-torn Mosul following heavy clashes today between the Iraqi Army and ISIS.
Iraqi forces have taken more territory in the west of the city from the jihadists as the number of people fleeing the city reaches 45,000.
Since launching an offensive on February 19 Iraqi soldiers have seized much of western Mosul but their pace has slowed as bad weather has muddied streets and made air support more difficult.
If ISIS loses Mosul then the only city left in its grasp would be Raqqa in Syria, which is why it is fighting tooth and nail for the city.
The fall of west Mosul would effectively mark the end of ISIS’s dream of a ‘caliphate’ across the Iraq/Syria border, which its leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi announced from a mosque in the city in 2014.
Black smoke billowed over west Mosul today as Iraqi forces battled ISIS in a fight marked by explosions and continual automatic weapons fire.
In the course of the fighting, security forces targeted an approaching ISIS car bomb, detonating it and sending a fireball rising over the area, and also fired on a jihadist drone flying overhead.
Lieutenant Colonel Abdulamir al-Mohammedawi said: ‘Rapid Response forces are moving toward important governmental buildings such as the governorate building and the police directorate.’
He said ISIS were using snipers, mortars and bombs planted in streets and houses.
Among the districts attacked by Iraqi forces today was al-Dawasa, which includes the Nineveh province governor’s headquarters, and al-Dindan.
Other Iraqi units are moving into the neighbourhoods of al-Sumood and Tal al-Rumnan.
The Iraqi Army’s 9th Armoured Division is advancing through the desert surrounding the city, aiming to cut if off from ISIS-held Tal Afar, to the west.
More than 45,000 people have fled west Mosul since the push to retake it began, while over 200,000 are currently displaced as a result of the battle to retake the city, which was launched on October 17, according to the International Organization for Migration.
The UN, which has been providing shelter, food and other assistance to Iraqis who have fled Mosul during the nearly five-month-long battle, said it is working as fast as possible to help those displaced.
‘The top priority for humanitarians is to make sure that there is sufficient capacity at emergency sites to deal with the number of civilians who are fleeing western Mosul,’ said Lise Grande, the UN’s humanitarian coordinator in Iraq.
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