Iraqi forces push into IS-held neighborhoods

MOSUL, Iraq — Iraqi forces battling Islamic State pushed into four neighborhoods on Sunday amid heavy clashes in Mosul, the Iraqi military said.

Special forces from the Counter-Terrorism Service carried out a dawn attack in al-Uraybi and Rifai and broke the militants’ defensive lines, the Joint Operations Command said in a statement.

At the same time, the army’s 9th Armored Division and the elite forces of the federal police, known as Rapid Response, pushed deeper into the battleground neighborhood of al-Iqtisadiyn as well as the southern part of the adjacent 17th July neighborhood, which is one of the main IS strongholds in Mosul, the statement said.

The new push was aimed at helping the CTS and federal police of the interior ministry, who are making slow progress in the southern part of Mosul’s western side because of the stiff resistance of the militants in the densely-populated areas of the old city center, where roughly 400,000 residents are believed to still be trapped under IS rule.

The troops are now pushing to seize the remaining neighborhoods in the north and northwest of the city center to tighten the noose around IS, especially in Mosul’s old city center.