MOSUL: Iraqi forces battled militants in west Mosul on Sunday, aiming to build a floating bridge across the Tigris to establish an important supply route linked to the recaptured east bank.
A week into a major push on the western side of the city, where an estimated 2,000 holdout militants and 750,000 civilians are trapped, government forces made steady progress.
But after relatively easy gains on the city’s outskirts, they encountered increasingly stiff resistance from the Daesh defending its emblematic stronghold.
“We had an important operation this morning to move toward the bridge,” Col. Falah Al-Wabdan, from the Interior Ministry’s Rapid Response units that have spearheaded the breach into west Mosul, told AFP in the Jawsaq neighborhood.
“We have moved past a large berm constructed by Daesh with tunnels underneath,” he said, adding that the area was heavily mined and that his forces had killed 44 militants on Sunday alone.
Wabdan was referring to what is known as “the fourth bridge,” the southernmost of five bridges — all of which are damaged and unusable — across the Tigris River that divides the northern Iraqi city.
Government forces retook the east bank from Daesh a month ago, completing a key phase in an offensive on Mosul that began on Oct. 17 and has involved tens of thousands of fighters.
Wabdan said that securing the bank area near the fourth bridge would allow engineering units to extend a ribbon bridge to the other side and further pile pressure on the militants.
“It is very important because if we take it, engineering units... will be able to throw a bridge across from the left bank so we can move supplies and ammunition from the battle field,” he said.
Bridging operations under fire are complex and perilous but Iraqi forces have been trained by the US military and successfully used that strategy before in the fight against Daesh.
A ribbon bridge assembled with US assistance over the Euphrates River was considered a turning point in the battle that eventually saw Iraqi forces retake the western stronghold of Ramadi from the militants a year ago.
The elite Counter-Terrorism Service that has done most of the fighting against Daesh in Mosul so far entered the western neighborhood of Al-Maamun on Friday.
Troops from the US-led coalition assisting Iraq in its efforts to claw back the swathes of territory it lost to Daesh in 2014 have stepped up their involvement on the ground in recent weeks.
They are officially deployed in Iraq as trainers and advisers but have increasingly been drawn into combat and been more visible than ever on the front lines since the push on west Mosul was launched on Feb. 19.
The western side of the city is a little smaller than the east but more densely populated and home to some areas considered traditional militant strongholds.
It includes the Old City, where Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi made his only public appearance in July 2014, and several of Mosul’s key landmarks.
Around three quarters of a million people are virtually besieged there, in some cases used as human shields by the Daesh fighters preparing to defend their last major bastion in the country.
“With the battle to retake western Mosul now in its second week, we are extremely concerned about the 800,000 or so still trapped in some of the most dire conditions,” Karl Schembri, spokesman for the Norwegian Refugee Council, told AFP.
Food supplies have dwindled as fast as costs have soared, leaving many on barely a meal a day.
Residents and medical workers say that the combined effect of malnutrition and the shortage of drugs is starting to kill the weakest.
The UN has planned for an exodus of at least 250,000 people from west Mosul but, in the absence of humanitarian corridors, only a few hundred have been able to flee so far.
Iraq forces in west Mosul aim for key bridge
Iraq forces in west Mosul aim for key bridge
What we know about alleged strike on Iran school
- The New York Times has authenticated video uploaded by Iran’s semi-official Mehr News showing a US Tomahawk cruise missile striking a structure described as a clinic inside a Revolutionary Guards’ base next to the school
PARIS, France: A new investigation by the New York Times has shed more light on events surrounding a reported attack on a school in Iran at the start of the Middle East war.
Iran has accused Israel and the United States of conducting a strike on an elementary school in the southern city of Minab, which it said killed more than 150 people.
US President Donald Trump has blamed Iran, while the Pentagon has said it is investigating the incident.
AFP has been unable to access the location to independently verify the circumstances or the toll from any such incident.
Iranian authorities have to give explicit approval to foreign media organizations wishing to report outside Tehran.
- Tomahawk -
The New York Times has authenticated video uploaded by Iran’s semi-official Mehr News showing a US Tomahawk cruise missile striking a structure described as a clinic inside a Revolutionary Guards’ base next to the school.
According to the Times, in this war, the only military using Tomahawks is the United States.
The footage showed dust and smoke rising from the direction of the school, indicating at least one earlier explosion.
“A body of evidence assembled by The Times — including satellite imagery, social media posts and other verified videos — indicates that the SHajjarah Tayyebeh elementary school building was severely damaged by a precision strike that occurred at the same time as attacks on the naval base,” the paper said.
US Central Command has released footage of Tomahawk launches filmed on February 28, the day Minab was hit, while senior US officers briefed that early salvoes included Navy Tomahawks across Iran’s southern flank.
The Times had previously reported that US military statements indicating forces were attacking naval targets near the strategic Strait of Hormuz, where a Revolutionary Guards’ base is located, “suggest they were most likely to have carried out the strike.”
- Near strategic waterway -
Earlier footage filmed from a parking lot showed black smoke billowing from a damaged building adorned with murals featuring drawings of crayons, children and an apple.
AFP has geolocated the clip to a building in Minab, though it has not been able to independently verify the nature of the site.
AFP has confirmed the building was located in close proximity to two sites controlled by the Revolutionary Guards.
The Shahid Absalan clinic, under the supervision of the Guards navy’s medical command, lies 238 meters (780 feet) from the site, while the Seyed Al-Shohada IRGC cultural complex is 286 meters away.
AFP could not independently verify the date the footage from the car park was filmed.
- What Iran says -
Iran has said more than 150 people were killed in what President Masoud Pezeshkian described as US-Israeli strikes on the school.
According to state media, Iran held funerals for at least 165 people including students killed in the alleged attack.
State television carried images showing a large crowd of mourners weeping over what appeared to be bodies wrapped in white shrouds.
Other images released by state media showed individuals preparing coffins draped in the Iranian flag — some bearing photographs of children.
Another aerial image showed excavators digging out at least 100 graves at an unidentified mass burial site.
AFP has been unable to independently verify the date the images were taken or access the location to verify the circumstances surrounding the events.
- Trump blames Iran -
President Trump has blamed Iran.
“We think it was done by Iran. Because they are very inaccurate, as you know, with their munitions. They have no accuracy whatsoever,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on Saturday.
On Monday, Trump said the United States was investigating the strike “right now.”
“Whatever the report shows, I’m willing to live with that report,” Trump said, adding he did not “know enough about” the strike while also suggesting Iran may have used a Tomahawk missile — a weapon it does not possess — to hit the school itself.
US Secretary of State Marco Rubio last week said the United States would not intentionally target a school and said the Pentagon was investigating.
“The United States would not deliberately target a school. Our objectives are missiles, both the ability to manufacture them and the ability to launch them,” he told reporters.
US Democratic lawmakers on Monday urged the Pentagon to conduct an impartial probe into what happened.
- Israel not aware -
Israel’s military said it was not aware of any US or Israeli strike on a school.
“At this point not aware of an Israeli or an American strike there... We’re operating in an extremely accurate manner,” military spokesman Lt. Col. Nadav Shoshani told reporters.
- Human rights group -
Norway-based rights group Hengaw said the school was holding its morning session at the time of the reported attack and had about 170 students present.
