Iraqi govt. forces make fresh gains in militant-held Mosul

Iraqi army soldiers, backed by fighters from allied Popular Mobilization Units, have made further advances into Mosul as they seek to drive out Daesh Takfiri terrorists from their last urban stronghold in the violence-wracked Arab country.

Commander of Nineveh Liberation Operation General Abdul Amir Rashid Yarallah said the 71st Brigade of the 15th Division together with the 76th Brigade of the 166th Division in the Iraqi army managed to liberate dozens of housing units in Mosul’s northern neighborhood of  al-Hodaba from the grip of Daesh on Friday noon, Arabic-language al-Sumaria television network reported.

The high-ranking Iraqi military figure put the number of retaken apartments at 168.

Army soldiers and allied Popular Mobilization Units fighters – commonly known by the Arabic world Hashd al-Sha’abi, also drove back Daesh extremists from Muthanna district in eastern Mosul.

Separately, Iraqi government soldiers and their allies recaptured a northern village from Daesh, hours after the extremist militants seized it in a surprise attack.

 A local security official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said  the Iraqi forces, backed by helicopters, dislodged Daesh terrorists from the village of Abu Dalf in the northern province of Salahuddin.

Eight government troops, including two senior officers, lost their lives in the fighting. “Six Daesh elements were also killed,” the official added.

Moreover, Hashd al-Sha’abi fighters retook the villages of Sahl Ahmad and Malah southwest of Mosul from Daesh on Friday.

Iraqi army soldiers, supported by Hashd al-Sha’abi and Kurdish Peshmerga forces, launched a joint operation on October 17 to retake Mosul from Daesh terrorists.

A total of 129,642 civilians have been displaced from Mosul and neighboring areas since the start of the operations, according to figures released by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) on Tuesday.

Daesh commander slain in drone strike

The Iraqi Defense Ministry also announced in a statement on Friday that the self-proclaimed Daesh air defense commander had been killed in an airstrike carried out by a CASC Rainbow operated by the country’s Air Force.

The statement added that Abdullah Yassin Suleiman al-Jubouri, better known by the nom de guerre Abu Saher, was killed when the unmanned aerial vehicle targeted Wadi al-Akab district in western Mosul.

Meanwhile, Federal Police forces freed an Izadi woman, who had been held captive by Takfiri Daesh terrorists in the eastern Mosul district of Sumer.

Commander of Federal Police Forces Lieutenant General Raed Shaker Jawdat identified the woman as Hadiyeh Barakat in a post published on his official Facebook page.

In August 2014, Daesh terrorists overran the town of Sinjar northwest of the capital Baghdad, and systematically massacred, captured and enslaved thousands of Izadis. The UN says about 5,000 Izadi men were killed and thousands more, mostly women and children, were taken into captivity.  

Over the past few months, several mass graves containing bodies of people, including members of the Izadi minority group, have been uncovered in Iraq and neighboring Syria.

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