Tabnak - After a long period of heavy fighting, it was announced earlier this month that the Iraqi forces have managed to liberate nearly all parts of Mosul from ISIS terrorists. However, it seems that recapturing the last remaining parts has become a harder task to do.
Aljazeera reported yesterday that Iraqi government forces say they are closing in on the last remaining parts of western Mosul still held by the ISIS. The western part of Iraq's second city is ISIS’ last remaining Iraqi stronghold. This is while the latest phase of the battle for Mosul - launched last October - was announced on Saturday.
The fighting is focused on three western neighborhoods. Recapturing them will pave the way for Iraqi forces, backed by US-led coalition airstrikes, to begin a final push for the Old City. The fall of Mosul would end ISIL's so-called caliphate in Iraq.
Meanwhile, Radio Free Europe reported that US-backed Iraqi forces launched a broad attack on the final districts held by ISIS in west Mosul, military officials say.
The Joint Operations Command on May 27 said security forces are attacking "what remains of the unliberated areas" on the west bank of the Tigris River in the city.
The move came a day after the Iraqi Air Force dropped leaflets telling residents to flee crowded neighborhoods just north of the Old City, where most of the militant forces are clinging on as Iraqi forces encircle the district.
A day earlier, Reuters reported that Iraq's elite counter-terrorism units, the regular army and the federal police - supported by the air power of the US-led coalition - launched a new phase of their operation on Saturday.
"Army forces attacked al-Shifaa neighborhood and the Republican Hospital, federal police forces al-Zinjili neighborhood, and counter-terrorism forces attacked al-Saha al-Oula neighborhood," the Joint Operations Command said.
However, by the continuation of the battle, humanitarian concerns for the Mosul residents have been in the rise. The country's UN humanitarian relief coordinator said that civilians were being hit hardest as Iraq's military assault on Mosul enters its final phase,
Lise Grande told the BBC residents were in grave danger as ISIS was directly targeting families. Furthermore, many people in the city are already facing severe shortages of water and electricity. The air strikes pose an additional risk to civilians caught in the fighting in narrow, packed streets around the Old City.
In this regard, it’s reported that at least 20 Iraqi civilians have been killed in airstrikes conducted by the so-called US-led coalition in the northern parts of Mosul's Old City, a report says.
According to Arabic-language al-Forat news agency, the air raid, which was conducted on al-Farouq and Hazir al-Sadeh districts on Sunday, also injured 25 other people.
Also on Thursday, the Pentagon acknowledged that at least 105 civilians had lost their lives in a US airstrike on Mosul in March 17. Iraq's Kurdish-language Rudaw television network, however, raised the death toll to 237 at the time.
Mosul is Iraq's second-largest city after the capital Baghdad and was a key logistical and economic hub for IS when the extremists' footprint spanned much of Iraq's north and into neighboring Syria.
Iraq's prime minister had originally pledged Mosul would be retaken by the end of 2016, but it quickly became clear IS planned to draw out their inevitable defeat, leaving destruction and human suffering in their wake.
