Thu Jun 23, 2016 17:36:42
Iraq’s armed forces pressed on with their offensive to retake the city of Fallujah from Islamic State (ISIS / Daesh / ISIL) on Wednesday, Al-Alam News Network reports.
Fighting to recapture the Iraqi city longest held by Islamic State, now in its fifth week, has forced more than 85,000 residents to flee to overwhelmed government-run camps.
Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said last week that the recapture of Fallujah would pave the way for the military to march on Mosul, Islamic State’s de facto capital.
The Iraqi army is also pressing on with an offensive to dislodge the militants from farmlands located on the western bank of the Euphrates, opposite the built-up area of Fallujah that the militants use as a base for snipers and mortar attacks.
A Pentagon spokesman in Washington said on Tuesday that about a third of the city had been cleared of Islamic State (ISIS / Daesh / ISIL) forces and the US-led coalition had carried out 85 air strikes on the city in the past four weeks.
Government troops launched the operation on May 23 to retake Fallujah, a bastion of the Sunni Muslim insurgency against US forces that toppled Saddam Hussein, a Sunni, in 2003, and later against Shia-led governments.
Islamic State militants seized Fallujah in January 2014, six months before they declared a “caliphate” over part of Syria and Iraq.
S/SH 11
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