Cowards! ISIS jihadis throw themselves into river to escape battlefield as they LOSE Mosul
ISLAMIC State (ISIS) have been defeated in Mosul, the prime minister of Iraq has declared.
By KATIE MANSFIELD
Express.co.uk
Sun, Jul 9, 2017
Fighting has gripped the Iraqi city for eight months but today Haider al-Abadi announced “victory”.
He has arrived in the liberated city to congratulate Iragi government forces.
Without Mosul – by far the largest city to fall under ISIS’s control – the terror group’s territory in Iraq will be reduced to mainly rural, desert areas west and south of the city where tens of thousands of people live.
It is almost exactly three years since ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi proclaimed a “caliphate” spanning Syria and Iraq from the pulpit of the medieval Grand al-Nuri mosque.
The Prime Minister’s office said in a statement: “The commander in chief of the armed forces Haider al-Abadi arrived in the liberated city of Mosul and congratulated the heroic fighters and the Iraqi people for the great victory.”
French President Emmanuel Macron, whose country is part of an international coalition which backed the campaign with airstrikes, training and assistance on the battlefield, welcomed the defeat in Mosul of the group also known as ISIS.
He tweeted: “Mosul liberated from ISIS: France pays homage to all those, who alongside our troops, contributed to this victory.”
After eight months of combat the battle has ruined parts of the city, killed thousands of civilians and displaced nearly one million people.
ISIS militants threw themselves into the River Tigris on Sunday, trying to flee the battlefield as they faced imminent defeat by Iraqi forces fighting to dislodge them from their last pocket in the city.
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