IRAQIS ADVANCE TO RESCUE MOSUL
Concerns rise for civilians inside Islamic State-held city as fight nears
A member of the Iraqi government force takes position on a vehicle as smoke rises about 35 miles south of Mosul. A U.S. service member was killed Thursday while assisting Iraq in retaking control of Mosul from Islamic State militants. The Iraqi prime minister says the operation is moving faster than anticipated.
Iraq’s prime minister struck an upbeat tone Thursday, saying the operation to recapture the city of Mosul from Islamic State fighters was moving ahead faster than anticipated.
“The forces are pushing toward the town more quickly than we thought and more quickly than we had programmed in our campaign plan,” Haider al-Abadi said via a video-link transmission to an international meeting in Paris about Iraq’s second-largest city.
The assault was forecast to take weeks, if not months, to complete. Al-Abadi did not address that timing in his comments to the gathering hosted by French President François Hollande. The conference is aimed at forming a stabilization plan for Mosul. His remarks came as Kurdish
peshmerga forces said they launched Thursday a large-scale operation to the east and north of Mosul to try to clear members of the Islamic State from villages in Ninewa province, about 12 miles from the city.
Mosul fell to militants in 2014. It is the Islamic State’s last urban stronghold in Iraq.
The peshmerga are part of a broad Iraqi military coalition descending on Mosul that also includes Iraqi soldiers and special forces, American advisers, Sunni Arab fighters, militia units of Christian and Yazidi minorities, and Shia Muslim paramilitaries. Air cover is being provided by U.S.-led coalition warplanes.
The majority of Mosul’s 1.5 million civilians are Sunni Muslims and there are concerns the Shia Muslim fighters may take part in reprisals against fleeing Sunni civilians. Al-Abadi vowed Thursday to protect any civilians in Mosul, no matter their background. “We will not allow any violations of human rights,” he said.
While Shia militias have pledged not to enter Mosul itself for fear of aggravating sectarian tensions, aid agencies are warning the offensive represents an impossible decision for families, including at least 600,000 children.
“If they stay inside Mosul, they risk being killed by heavy weapons and used as human shields by (the Islamic State), or being caught in cross-fire, shot by snipers or stepping on landmines if they try to flee,” Oxfam, Save the Children, the International Rescue Committee and the Norwegian Refugee Council said in a joint statement.
“Even if they reach safety, there is currently no guarantee that they will be able to get the shelter and the help they des- perately need,” the groups said.
A statement from Kurdish forces said Thursday’s operation would focus on “three fronts” and the objective would be to “clear” a number of villages near Mosul. The elite special forces separately deployed by Iraq advanced toward the town of Bartella, on Mosul’s eastern flank, where they encountered at least four car bombs.
There are around 6,000 Islamic State fighters inside Mosul, although France’s Hollande warned many were fleeing to Raqqa, the group’s stronghold in Syria. The whereabouts of the Islamic State’s secretive leader, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, are not known. He is behind the group’s self-styled caliphate in Iraq and Syria.
“The forces are pushing toward the town more quickly than ... we had programmed.” Haider al-Abadi, Iraqi prime minister