Besieged jihadists strike back
Iraq widens the fight against Isis as the battle for Mosul enters a tougher phase.
As Iraqi ground troops push into western Mosul, the country’s air force is attacking Islamic State group targets inside Syria for the first time, in response to recent bombings in Baghdad claimed by the militants.
Meanwhile, at least 60 people were killed yesterday in Isis attacks near a key northern Syrian town captured only a day earlier from the extremists by Turkish forces and their Syrian opposition allies.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider alAbadi announced the Iraqi air strikes in Syria, saying the border towns of Boukamal and Husseibah were targeted in response to recent bombings in Baghdad linked to Isis operations there.
Iraqi forces closely supported by the United States-led international coalition pushed into the first neighbourhood of western Mosul yesterday and took full control of the city’s international airport and a sprawling military base on the southwestern edge of the city, according to Iraqi officials.
The territorial gains are the most significant yet in the battle, now in its seventh day, to drive Isis militants out of the western half of Iraq’s second-largest city.
As Iraqi warplanes struck Isis targets across the border, militants in northern Syria staged a suicide car bomb attack outside a security office operated by the Syrian opposition in the village of Sousian, north of al-Bab, killing at least 60 people. The town had been controlled by Isis since late 2013, but the militants finally retreated on Friday after more than two months of intense fighting.
Most of those killed in Sousian were civilians awaiting permits and an escort to return to al-Bab, a Syrian military commander in the city said.
Hours after the first explosion in Sousian, another car bomb attack was reported in the village, killing at least eight people, according to activist groups.
An additional explosion was reported south of al-Bab, where two Turkish soldiers were killed when an explosive device went off as they were removing land mines, Turkey’s military said. Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim, however, called the explosion a ‘‘suicide attack’’. It was not immediately possible to reconcile the accounts.
In Mosul, meanwhile, Iraqi forces pushed into the Mamun neighbourhood and engaged in intense clashes with Isis militants, according to an Iraqi special forces officer on the ground, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Federal police Major General Haider al-Maturi said his forces pushed through concrete roadblocks and earth berms set up by Isis and succeeded in capturing around 30 per cent of the Aviation District, the first district entering Mosul’s western perimeter from the south.
There were fierce clashes. We faced car bombs, suicide attackers and mortar shelling. Federal police Major General Haider al-Maturi
‘‘There were fierce clashes. We faced car bombs, suicide attackers and mortar shelling,’’ al-Maturi said. ‘‘The battle ahead will be difficult and complicated because of the civilians around. It’ll be street fights.’’
Al-Maturi said six Iraqi troops were wounded, including two officers. However, an AP team near the front line saw at least four wounded special forces troops and the bodies of three soldiers, suggesting more intense fighting.
The spokesman for the Joint Military Operation Command, Brigadier General Yahya Rasool, said Iraqi forces had also recaptured the military base adjacent to the airport.
The advances came a day after special forces joined the fight for western Mosul.
Both the Ghazlani military base and the airport will be key to the next steps in the daunting battle, and will serve as a base of operations as Iraqi forces launch subsequent pushes into western Mosul, which is divided by the Tigris River into two halves.
Iraqi authorities declared the city’s eastern half ‘‘fully liberated’’ from the Sunni militants in January, three months after launching the operation to take back Mosul.
The United Nations estimates that about 750,000 civilians are trapped in western Mosul, but Iraqi forces have yet to push into the sector’s dense urban neighbourhoods, with narrower streets that will likely complicate the already difficult urban combat ahead.