ISIL puts women on frontlines in Mosul

Female fighters blow themselves up when they run out of bullets, or attack Iraqi troops after mingling with fleeing families

MOSUL // Besieged ISIL is using its women as human bombs and soldiers as its hold on western Mosul weakens.

Iraqi troops say women are increasingly common on the frontlines and they expect to see many more as they enter the old town in their final push for the city. “Daesh is surrounded and have nowhere to run,” said Saif Saad, a sergeant with the Iraqi Special Operations Forces. “They are desperate and even use women to fight us.

“We will see more women suicide bombers when we enter the old town.

“They fight with Kalashnikovs and sniper rifles, and blow themselves up if they run out of ammunition.”

As the campaign to liberate the city from the terrorist group entered its ninth month yesterday, Iraqi forces are poised to launch their assault on the old town.

Special operations troops are leading the assault into the warren of narrow streets and sturdy stone buildings.

Sgt Saad said they first faced female ISIL fighters a month ago in the Zinjili neighbourhood in north-west Mosul.

He said his unit encountered a group of five in a house in the area two weeks ago. Some of the women were shot when they attacked a Humvee, while the rest blew themselves up. Until recently, women had been kept away from the front line but months of fighting have depleted Iraqi forces and the insurgents.

While the Iraqis are able to bolster their ranks with more recruits, ISIL’s manpower is shrinking fast, so the extremists are allowing women to ignore their traditional roles enshrined in the hardline ideology.

Many of the extremists killed in battle have left behind wives fanatically committed to the terrorist group, who replace their men at the front, Iraqi soldiers say.

Female combatants are also beginning to appear in ISIL’s online propaganda.

The group’s latest video from Mosul shows a woman donning a headscarf and wearing combat fatigues, a rifle leaning against her shoulder as she smiles into the camera.

While some women fight with the men, others try to make it through the Iraqi lines with civilians escaping the battle.

Fully covered in burqas, they are easily able to hide explosives or weapons.

If undetected, they can detonate their belts or open fire on the military.

Despite the danger, Iraqi soldiers are reluctant to conduct physical searches on women.

“They come out with the families and we can’t search them,” said Maj Hishar, an officer with Iraq’s 15th Division, which encountered female soldiers while advancing through the Shifaa neighbourhood next to the old town.

When the frontline troops set up a corridor to funnel civilians out of a combat zone, those at the rear have been attacked by female suicide bombers who have mixed in with families.

The Federal Police, a paramilitary outfit that often holds the ground in the liberated areas in west Mosul, has been very hard hit, the special operations troops say.

The military has set up mustering points a short distance behind the front lines, from where lorries ferry civilians to displacement camps and where initial screenings are often conducted. These points are vulnerable to the female suicide bombers, soldiers say. The troops are caught between the instinct to help and the need to protect themselves against suicide attacks.

“When civilians come towards us and we see a woman walking by herself, we keep our guns trained on her,” said Sgt Maj Amad.