It’s been three years since ISIS declared a caliphate,
and Iraqi forces have fought a grueling battle to take back its territory ever since.
In the last few months,
that fight has centered on the city of Mosul,
where ISIS maintains its last stronghold in the country.
But today,
Iraq’s prime minister announced a huge victory and said that the ISIS caliphate is dead—
after the military recaptured the al-Nuri Mosque,
a symbolically important site in the heart of the city.
Ben Anderson is in West Mosul,
where he’s been following the Iraqi Army’s painstaking attempts
to cut a line between two of ISIS’s last remaining positions:
one of them is a hospital,
which gives ISIS snipers a huge military advantage.
The other is the Old City,
where most of the remaining ISIS fighters are hiding among civilians
and making a brutal last stand.
— This is the Iraqi Army’s 9th Armored Division.
They’re trying to push through al-Shifa district
all the way to the Tigris River,
slicing the remaining ISIS-controlled territory in two.
— They’re saying this is a suicide bomb belt.
— The soldiers are clearing one building at a time,
but the streets in between remain exposed to well-trained and determined ISIS snipers.
And by clearing a line through the middle of ISIS territory,
they are exposed from both sides,
and spend as much time as possible behind walls.
— A small unit of soldiers tries to push forward.
But within minutes,
an ISIS sniper claims yet another victim.
They call in strikes from the air and ground,
targeting high buildings very nearby and the al-Imam Mohsin Mosque,
just next to the river, which marks their final objective.
— The snipers somehow avoid the nonstop barrage of strikes,
constantly re-appearing and attacking again
from over well-concealed firing positions.
— Civilians flee whenever they can,
also crossing streets that are open to the ISIS snipers.
The fighting never stops.
But the 9th Division needs to push forward,
and edge their way closer to the river that divides the city.
They send out coordinates for more strikes on the buildings they are running towards.
— They run into recently struck houses,
not knowing if ISIS fighters could still be inside or watching close by.
As soon the they make their way forward,
they’re told there’s a suicide bomber walking towards them from just a few houses away—
— The suicide bomber escaped.
After eight days of near constant airstrikes and ground fighting,
the Iraqi Army was able to enter the last few buildings just yards away from the river.
The 9th Division has finally liberated Al-Imam Mohsin Mosque,
and now control a sliver of land between ISIS’s most important remaining strongholds.
— But there was a church and a mosque side by side here?
— So this is the last building before the river?
— So, tactically, what does that mean,
now that you’ve managed to separate the hospital from the Old City?
— So this is the Tigris river just here.
There’s an Iraqi flag right in front of us,
another Iraqi flag right here,
so they’ve made it.
They’ve pushed all the way to the river,
and separated the hospital from the Old City,
which means however many fighters are left in the hospital
are now cut off and completely surrounded.
The next step is for other branches of the Iraqi security forces
to try to divide the Old City in four smaller pieces and just,
you know, push however many ISIS fighters are left
into smaller and smaller parcels until they’re all gone.
This took seven or eight days,
and in that time they probably cleared 10, 15 buildings.
So it’s taking much longer than everyone thought,
it’s much harder than everyone thought,
but very slowly,
bit by bit, building by building,
they’re taking Mosul.