Tag Archives: War

Iraqi forces push deeper into western Mosul as civilians flee

Iraqi security forces participate in a battle with Islamic State militants in west Mosul, Iraq February 25, 2017. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

By Isabel Coles

MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) – U.S.-backed Iraqi forces pushed deeper into western Mosul on Saturday, advancing in several populated southern districts after punching through the defences of Islamic State’s last major urban stronghold in Iraq a day earlier.

About 1,000 civilians also walked across the frontlines, the largest movement since the new offensive launched last week to deal the ultra-hardline Sunni Muslim group a decisive blow.

In the capital Baghdad, Saudi Foreign Minister Adel Al-Jubeir met Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi on Saturday in the first such visit in more than a decade between Sunni Muslim-ruled Saudi Arabia and Shi’ite-led Iraq.

The new push in Mosul comes after government forces and their allies finished clearing Islamic State from the east of the northern Iraqi city last month, confining the insurgents to the western sector on the other side of the Tigris river.

Commanders expect the battle in western Mosul to be more difficult, in part because tanks and armored vehicles cannot pass through the narrow alleyways that crisscross ancient districts there.

But Iraqi forces have so far made quick advances on multiple fronts, capturing the northern city’s airport on Thursday, which they plan to use as a support zone, and breaching a three-meter high berm and trench set up by Islamic State.

The advancing forces are less than three kilometers (two miles) from the mosque in the old city where Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared a caliphate spanning Iraq and Syria in 2014, sparking an international military campaign to defeat the group.

Losing Mosul would likely deal a hammer blow to the militants’ dream of statehood, but they still control swathes of territory in Syria and patches of northern and western Iraq from where they could fight a guerrilla-style insurgency in Iraq, and plot attacks on the West.

Federal police and an elite Interior Ministry unit known as Rapid Response have recaptured Hawi al-Josaq along the river and begun clearing the Tayyaran district north of the airport, said Brigadier General Hisham Abdul Kadhim.

Islamic State resisted with snipers and roadside bombs, he said. A Reuters correspondent saw the corpses of two militants outside a mosque in Josaq.

FOREIGN FIGHTERS

Counter-terrorism forces were also advancing on two fronts toward Wadi Hajr and Mamoun districts, said Lieutenant General Abdelwahab al-Saadi, a senior commander.

“Clearing operations are ongoing and our forces have entered those areas,” he told Reuters on a hill overlooking the battle. Saadi said a suicide car bomb had been destroyed before reaching its target.

A Mamoun resident reached by phone said militant fighters had flooded the area in recent days while moving their families to relative safety in other districts.

Islamic State was broadcasting messages via mosque loudspeakers across the west of the city encouraging locals to resist the “infidels’ attack”, according to several residents.

Several thousand militants, including many who traveled from Western countries to join up, are believed to be holed up in the city with practically nowhere to go, which could lead to a fierce standoff amid a population of 750,000.

Ziyad, a 16-year-old living in Hawi al-Josaq, told a Reuters correspondent he had seen foreign IS militants withdraw as Iraqi forces advanced, leaving only local fighters behind.

“They were really scared,” he said. “They were calling to each other and saying, ‘Let’s go’.”

Abu Laith, 49, said he overheard disagreements between local and foreign fighters.

“(The locals) said, ‘Tomorrow you will withdraw and we will be under the hammer’. (The foreigners) said, ‘That’s your problem. We are not in charge, the order is from the caliph’.”

Iraq’s counter-terrorism service put a statement online last week offering leniency to local fighters who killed foreigners, though the legal framework for such a deal was unclear.

A police spokesman said a Russian member of Islamic State had been captured on Wednesday near Mosul airport.

The Iraqi campaign involves a 100,000-strong force of Iraqi troops, Shi’ite militias and Sunni tribal fighters backed by a U.S.-led coalition that provides vital air support as well as on-the-ground guidance and training.

Western advisors are increasingly present close to the frontline, helping coordinate air strikes and advising Iraqi forces as the battle unfolds.

CIVILIANS START TO FLEE

About a thousand civilians, mostly women and children, walked out of southwestern parts of Mosul on Saturday and climbed into military trucks taking them to camps further south.

The United Nations says up to 400,000 people may have to leave their homes during the new offensive as food and fuel runs out in western Mosul. Aid groups warned on Friday that the most dangerous phase of the offensive was about to begin.

Some of the people fleeing the Mamoun area said they were originally from Hammam al-Alil, south of Mosul, but were forced to move as Islamic State retreated north into the city four months ago.

“They began shelling us arbitrarily, so we hid in the bathrooms. When the security forces came, they yelled to us so we fled to them,” said civilian Mahmoud Nawwaf.

The government is encouraging residents to stay in their homes whenever possible, as they did in eastern Mosul where fewer people fled than expected.

A Reuters correspondent near the airport saw nine families living in a house where residents with full beards served trays of tea to security forces. Some said Islamic State had forced them to move from Samarra, 250 km (160 miles) south of Mosul.

Abu Naba, 37, said he was surprised at how quickly the militants had been driven out.

“We could hear their voices outside and 15 minutes later they were gone,” he said.

A woman with a baby wrapped in a blanket on her lap said she had given birth in the house 22 days ago because it was too dangerous to reach a hospital.

(Additional reporting by Reuters TV south of Mosul; writing by Stephen Kalin; editing by David Clarke)

Egypt’s Christians flee Sinai amid Islamic State killing spree

Christian families who left from Al-Arish in the North Sinai Governorate after the escalation of a campaign targeting Christians by Islamic State militants last week, arrive at the Evangelical Church in Ismailia, Egypt February 24, 2017. REUTERS/Ahmed Aboulenein

By Ahmed Aboulenein

ISMAILIA, Egypt (Reuters) – Christian families and students fled Egypt’s North Sinai province in droves on Friday after Islamic State killed the seventh member of their community in just three weeks.

A Reuters reporter saw 25 families gathered with their belongings in the Suez Canal city of Ismailia’s Evangelical Church and church officials said 100 families, out of around 160 in North Sinai, were fleeing. More than 200 students studying in Arish, the province’s capital, have also left.

Seven Christians have been killed in Arish between Jan. 30 and Thursday. Islamic State, which is waging an insurgency there, claimed responsibility for the killings, five of which were shootings. One man was beheaded and another set on fire.

“I am not going to wait for death,” Rami Mina, who left Arish on Friday morning, said by telephone. “I shut down my restaurant and got out of there. These people are ruthless.”

Sectarian attacks occur often in Egypt but are usually confined to home burning, crop razing, attacks on churches, and forced displacement.

Arish residents said militants circulated death lists online and on the streets, warning Christians to leave or die.

“My father is the second name on their list; anyone Christian they put on the list” Munir Adel, a vegetable seller who fled on Friday, said as he huddled with four family members at the Evangelical Church, waiting for church officials to find them a place to stay.

Adel’s parents did not leave Arish because of their old age, he said. “They could be killed at any moment.”

VIDEO THREAT

Islamic State released a video on Sunday threatening Egypt’s Christians and vowing to escalate a campaign against them after it bombed a chapel adjoining Cairo’s St Mark’s Cathedral, the seat of the Coptic papacy, in December, killing 28 people.

“Oh crusaders in Egypt, this attack that struck you in your temple is just the first with many more to come, God willing,” said a masked man in battle-dress the group said blew himself up in the chapel.

Orthodox Copts, who comprise about 10 percent of Egypt’s 90 million people, are the Middle East’s largest Christian community. They have long complained of persecution.

The Coptic Orthodox Church denounced “the recurring terrorist incidents in North Sinai targeting Christian citizens” in a statement on Friday.

President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi told military and police chiefs “to completely eradicate terrorism in northern Sinai and defeat any attempts to target civilians or to undermine the unity of the national fabric”, in reference to the killings, his office said on Thursday.

Egypt is battling an insurgency that gained pace in 2013 after its military, led by Sisi, overthrew President Mohamed Mursi of the Muslim Brotherhood. Hundreds of soldiers and police have been killed.

Major General Mostafa al-Razaz, North Sinai’s deputy police chief, said security forces were capable of handling the “crisis” and that they added more patrols and checkpoints.

But Sinai’s Christians say security forces on the ground are unable to protect them and are overwhelmed by the militants.

“The government does nothing. There is no security in Sinai, they can’t even protect themselves,” said Adel.

“It was an officer who told us to leave.”

(This story has been refiled to delete extraneous word “was” in paragraph 11)

(Additional reporting by Ahmed Mohamed Hassan, Ali Abdelaty, and Mostafa Hashem in Cairo; Editing by Alison Williams)

One question at U.N. Syria talks: What does Russia want?

Members of opposition delegation for the Geneva IV conference on Syria arrive at the United Nations office in Geneva, Switzerland, February 24, 2017. REUTERS/Pierre Albouy

By John Irish, Stephanie Nebehay and Tom Miles

GENEVA (Reuters) – The first U.N.-led Syria peace talks in almost a year are in danger of getting lost in procedure, as officials obsess about who will meet whom, but behind the scenes diplomats say it’s largely up to Russia to call the tune.

Russia and the United States were the prime movers behind the last peace talks, which halted as the war heated up.

With the United States now taking a diplomatic back seat, Russia – whose military intervention turned the tide of Syria’s war and helped President Bashar al-Assad recapture Aleppo – is potentially a kingmaker.

But its endgame is unclear.

“Our task is only to stabilize the legitimate authorities and deliver a final blow against international terrorism,” Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday at a military ceremony as the Geneva talks began.

Moscow has sought to revive diplomacy since its air force helped the Syrian army and allied militias defeat rebels in Aleppo in December, Assad’s biggest victory in six years of war.

Russia joined with Turkey and Iran to convene intra-Syrian negotiations in the Kazakh capital Astana to reinforce a shaky ceasefire and tried to expand their remit to political aspects, even making public a proposed Moscow-drafted constitution.

With Astana handling the ceasefire, Geneva is left with the political conundrum and a U.N. mandate to discuss a new constitution, U.N.-supervised elections and transparent and accountable governance.

There is leeway for different interpretations, and it is unclear to what extent Russia is willing to put pressure on the Syrian government to reach a political deal with the opposition.

Russia supports the creation of a government of national unity, which a senior European diplomat disparagingly said meant bringing in a few dissidents to run the ministry of sports and leaving Assad’s power unchecked.

“If they really wanted to move things along, they could hand Assad his boarding card and pack him off to Caracas,” he said.

RUSSIAN LEVERAGE

The opposition wants Assad, who has ruled Syria for 17 years, to relinquish power. Russia’s ambassador in Geneva, Alexei Borodavkin, has called such demands absurd.

European powers that back the rebels hope that Russia will be swayed by the prospect of the European Union helping with the bill for Syria’s reconstruction – expected to run to tens of billions of dollars – if all sides can seal a political agreement to end the conflict.

Borodavkin dismissed the argument, saying Russia had given huge aid to Syria and that by supporting Assad’s military successes, it had saved Europe from a fresh exodus of 7 million Syrians.

Russia’s military support may give it leverage over Assad, but it is not clear whether it will try to halt his military campaigns or back him to the hilt.

A ceasefire exists, at least nominally, across most of Syria, but it doesn’t cover U.N.-designated terrorist groups, nor – says Russia – their affiliates. Many see that as giving Assad an open season on his opponents.

Despite Russia’s call for the government to “silence the skies” ahead of the talks, the fighting has continued, with Syrian jets bombing rebel-held areas of Aleppo, Deraa and Hama provinces and insurgents firing rockets at government targets.

“We have no choice but to play Russia’s games and try to resist attempts for a full-out military victory and try to bring them back to Geneva and hope something can be achieved here,” said a senior Western diplomat.

“It is still an open question if and what an agreement would look like that Russia could accept.”

Questions also remain over whether Russia has any influence with Assad’s other ally, Iran, and the militias it backs, or whether it is merely turning a blind eye as they look to cement recent gains on the ground.

“The (Syrian) regime and Hezbollah want to clear areas around Damascus which are still a threat to the capital,” said the same diplomat. “After that either they go towards Idlib or Deraa in the south.”

So far, there is little evidence of Moscow pressuring the government delegation. The Russian-drafted proposed constitution alludes to Assad continuing for several seven-year terms.

“The Russians don’t have any position concerning Assad himself,” said Vasily Kuznetsov, an expert at the Russian International Affairs Council.

Syria’s fate was up to Syrians, he said, and the Russian government was prepared to live with the outcome of the U.N.-supervised elections.

(Editing by Dominic Evans)

Islamic State car bomb kills more than 50 in northwest Syria

A still image taken from a video posted on social media uploaded on February 24, 2017, shows a pool of blood amid damaged motorcycles at a site of an Islamic State car bomb explosion, said to be in Sousian village near al-Bab, Syria. Social Media/ via REUTERS TV

By Angus McDowall and Humeyra Pamuk

BEIRUT/ISTANBUL (Reuters) – An Islamic State car bomb killed more than 50 people on Friday in a Syrian village held by rebels, a war monitor said, a day after the jihadist group was driven from its last stronghold in the area.

The blast in the village of Sousian hit a security checkpoint controlled by rebels fighting under the Free Syrian Army (FSA) banner.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a monitor of the war based in Britain, said more than 50 people died including over 30 civilians. Two rebels contacted by Reuters put the total death toll at least 40.

One of the two, a fighter with the Sultan Murad Brigade near al-Bab, said: “It was done on a checkpoint but there were a lot of families there gathered and waiting to get back to al-Bab. Therefore we have many civilian casualties.”

The Turkey-backed rebels drove Islamic State from the town of al-Bab on Thursday, following weeks of street battles near where Ankara wants to establish a safe zone for civilians.

Turkey’s military said on Friday that Syrian rebels had taken full control of all of al-Bab, and that work to clear mines and unexploded ordnance was under way.

Sousian is behind rebel lines about 8 km (5 miles) northwest of al-Bab, around which Ankara has long supported the formation of a security zone it says would help to stem a wave of migration via Turkey into Europe.

A second blast took place 2 km south of Sousian later on Friday, but it was unclear whether it was from a vehicle bomb or a planted device such as a mine. There were reports of casualties but no immediate details, the Observatory said.

Islamic State said in a social media posting that it was behind the Sousian attack, having acknowledged on Thursday it had lost control of al-Bab.

Syria’s main conflict pits President Bashar al-Assad, backed by Russia, Iran and Shi’ite militias, against rebels that include groups supported by Turkey, the United States and Gulf monarchies.

However, both those sides, as well as a group of militias led by Kurdish forces and supported by the U.S., are also fighting Islamic State, which holds large parts of northern and eastern Syria.

MINES AND CELLS

As mines laid in and around al-Bab claimed lives for a second day, the Sultan Murad Brigade fighter said many IS cells were still operating there.

“It is very dangerous. Our search and clear operation is still under way,” he said.

Two Turkish soldiers were killed on Friday while clearing mines in the town of Tadef south of al-Bab, Turkey’s military said in a statement. On Thursday, several Turkey-backed rebels were killed by a mine in al-Bab, the Observatory said.

Turkey directly intervened in Syria in August in support of rebel factions under the FSA banner to drive Islamic State from its border. It also wants to stop Kurdish groups gaining control of the region.

After taking al-Bab on Thursday, Turkish forces shelled Islamic State in Tadef, the Observatory reported.

The area immediately to the south of Tadef is held by the Syrian army and its allies, which have in recent weeks pushed into Islamic State territory in that area from Aleppo and advanced towards the Euphrates river.

Further east, the Syrian Democratic Forces, Kurdish-led militias backed by the United States, have in recent weeks taken dozens of villages from Islamic State as they close in on the group’s Syrian capital of Raqqa.

(Reporting By Angus McDowall and Humeyra Pamuk, additional reporting by John Davison in Beirut and Tulay Karadeniz in Ankara, editing by Ralph Boulton, John Stonestreet and Toby Davis)

Iraqi forces push into first districts of western Mosul

Rapid Response forces members cross farm land during a battle with Islamic State's militants south west of Mosul, Iraq February 24, 2017. REUTERS/Zohra Bensemra

By Stephen Kalin and Isabel Coles

SOUTH OF MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) – U.S.-backed Iraqi security forces advanced deeper into the western half of Mosul on Friday one day after launching attacks on several fronts toward Islamic State’s last main stronghold in the city.

Troops had recaptured Mosul airport on Thursday, an important prize in the battle to end the jihadists’ control of territory in Iraq.

Counter-terrorism forces managed on Friday to fully control the Ghozlani army base, pushing deeper toward the southwestern districts of Tal al-Rumman and al-Mamoun, a military spokesman said.

Federal police and an elite Interior Ministry unit known as Rapid Response are clearing the airport of roadside bombs and booby traps left by Islamic State militants who retreated from their positions there on Thursday.

Iraqi government forces plan to repair the airport and use it as a base from which to drive the militants from Mosul’s western districts, where about 750,000 people are believed to be trapped.

Government forces pushed the insurgents out of eastern Mosul last month but the IS still holds the western sector of the city, divided by the Tigris river.

“Our forces are fighting Daesh terrorists in Tal al-Rumman and al-Mamoun. We will eliminate them soon and take control over the two districts,” Counter Terrorism Services (CTS) spokesman Sabah al-Numan said.

Islamic State militants used suicide car bomb attacks and drones carrying small bombs to disrupt the CTS units from further advancing.

“There is a resistance there. The drones are particularly annoying today,” Major General Sami al-Aridi, a senior CTS commander, told Reuters in the southwestern front of Mosul.

Rapid response forces are trying to advance beyond the airport to breach Islamic State defenses around districts on the southern edge of Mosul.

“We are now fighting Daesh at the southern edge of the city. We are trying to breach trenches and high berm they used as defensive line,” Colonel Falah al-Wabdan told Reuters.

Losing Mosul could spell the end of the Iraqi section of the militants’ self-styled caliphate spanning Iraq and Syria.

Iraqi commanders expect the battle in western Mosul to be more difficult than the east, however, in part because tanks and armored vehicles cannot pass through narrow alleyways that crisscross the city’s ancient western districts.

(Reporting by Stephen Kalin and Isabel Coles, Writing by Ahmed Rasheed; Editing by Angus MacSwan)

Iraqi forces storm Mosul airport, military base

Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) fires towards Islamic State militants during a battle with Islamic State militants, west of Mosul,Iraq February 22, 2017. REUTERS/Stringer

By Isabel Coles and Stephen Kalin

SOUTH OF MOSUL (Reuters) – U.S.-backed Iraqi security forces captured Mosul airport on Thursday, state television said, in a major gain in operations to drive Islamic State from the western half of the city.

Elite Counter Terrorism forces advanced from the southwestern side and entered the Ghozlani army base along with the southwestern districts of Tal al-Rumman and al-Mamoun.

Losing Mosul could spell the end of the Iraqi side of militants’ self-styled caliphate in Iraq and Syria, which Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared from the city after sweeping through vast areas of Iraq in 2014.

Iraqi forces hope to use the airport as a launchpad for their campaign to drive the militants from Iraq’s second largest city.

A Reuters correspondent saw more than 100 civilians fleeing towards Iraqi security forces from the district of al-Mamoun. Some of them were wounded.

“Daesh fled when counter terrorism Humvees reached al-Mamoun. We were afraid and we decided to escape towards the Humvees,” said Ahmed Atiya, one of the escaped civilians said, referring to Islamic State by its Arabic name.

“We were afraid from the shelling,” he added.

Federal police and an elite interior ministry unit known as Rapid Response had battled their way into the airport as Islamic State fighters fought back using suicide car bombs, a Reuters correspondent in the area south of Mosul airport said.

Police officers said the militants had also deployed bomb-carrying drones against the Iraqi Counter Terrorism Forces advancing from the southwestern side of the city.

“We are attacking Daesh (Islamic State) from multiple fronts to distract them and prevent them regrouping,” said federal police captain Amir Abdul Kareem, whose units are fighting near Ghozlani military base. “It’s the best way to knock them down quickly.”

NARROW ALLEYWAYS

Western advisers supporting Iraqi forces were seen some 2 km (one mile) away from the frontline to the southwest of Mosul, a Reuters correspondent said.

Iraqi forces last month ousted Islamic State from eastern Mosul and embarked on a new offensive against the militant group in densely-populated western Mosul this week.

The campaign involves a 100,000-strong force of Iraqi troops, Kurdish fighters and Shi’ite militias and has made rapid advances since the start of the year, aided by new tactics and improved coordination.

U.S. special forces in armored vehicles on Thursday positioned near Mosul airport looked on as Iraqi troops advanced and a helicopter strafed suspected Islamic State positions.

Counter-terrorism service (CTS) troops fought their way inside the nearby Ghozlani base, which includes barracks and training grounds close to the Baghdad-Mosul highway, a CTS spokesman told Reuters.

The airport and the base, captured by Islamic State fighters when they overran Mosul in June 2014, have been heavily damaged by U.S.-led air strikes intended to wear down the militants ahead of the offensive, a senior Iraqi official said.

The U.S. military commander in Iraq has said he believes U.S.-backed forces will retake both of Islamic State’s urban bastions – the other is the Syrian city of Raqqa – within the next six months, which would end the jihadists’ ambitions to rule and govern significant territory.

Iraqi commanders expect the battle to be more difficult than in the east of Mosul, however, in part because tanks and armored vehicles cannot pass through narrow alleyways that crisscross the city’s ancient western districts.

Militants have developed a network of passageways and tunnels to enable them to hide and fight among civilians, melt away after hit-and-run operations and track government troop movements, according to inhabitants.

(Additional reporting by Ahmed Rasheed; Writing by Tom Finn and Sami Aboudi; Editing by Ralph Boulton and Dominic Evans)

Syrian army takes district near Aleppo: monitor, media unit

A view shows the damage in the Old City of Aleppo as seen from the city's ancient citadel, Syria January 31, 2017. REUTERS/Omar Sanadiki

BEIRUT (Reuters) – The Syrian army and its allies took a small district on the outskirts of Aleppo from rebels on Wednesday, a war monitor and a military media unit run by Damascus ally Hezbollah said.

The advance was the army’s first from its lines in Aleppo city since rebels departed their enclave there in December, and came as government and opposition delegations arrived in Geneva for peace talks sponsored by the United Nations.

“The Syrian army and its allies control Souq al-Jibs, west of Assad suburb in southwest Aleppo,” said the Hezbollah military media unit in a message. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights also said the army had taken the district.

Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad has relied closely on allies such as Russia, Iran and Shi’ite militias, including Hezbollah, to make steady gains against rebels in western parts of the country and drive them from Aleppo in December.

Rebel forces in the area, which include both jihadist and nationalist groups, have periodically shelled parts of government-held Aleppo from positions in the western countryside nearby since the fighting inside the city stopped.

Clashes on the western side of Aleppo and its surroundings as the army and its allies advanced were accompanied by heavy shelling and aerial bombardment, said the Observatory, a Britain-based war monitor.

After the rebels were driven from their Aleppo enclave in December, Russia and Turkey – important foreign backers for the opposing sides in the war – sponsored a ceasefire aimed at being a prelude to peace talks.

However, although the intensity of fighting has calmed somewhat, violence continues across the country.

(Reporting by Angus McDowall; Editing by Tom Heneghan)

Exclusive: CIA-backed aid for Syrian rebels frozen after Islamist attack – sources

Free Syrian Army fighters carry their weapons as they stand on the outskirts of the Islamic State-controlled northern Syrian town of al-Bab, Syria February 4, 2017. REUTERS/Khalil Ashawi

By Tom Perry, Suleiman Al-Khalidi and John Walcott

BEIRUT/AMMAN/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – CIA-coordinated military aid for rebels in northwest Syria has been frozen since they came under major Islamist attack last month, rebel sources said, raising doubts about foreign support key to their war against President Bashar al-Assad.

Rebel officials said that no official explanation had been given for the move this month following the jihadist assault, though several said they believed the main objective was to prevent arms and cash falling into Islamist militant hands. But they said they expected the aid freeze to be temporary.

The halt in assistance, which has included salaries, training, ammunition and in some cases guided anti-tank missiles, is a response to jihadist attacks and has nothing to do with U.S. President Donald Trump replacing Barack Obama in January, two U.S. officials familiar with the CIA-led program said.

The freeze reflects the troubles facing Free Syrian Army (FSA) rebels in the almost six-year-old revolt against Assad, who now appears militarily unassailable in his core western region largely thanks to direct intervention on his side by Russia and Iran.

“The reality is that you have changes in the area, and these changes inevitably have repercussions,” said an official with one of the affected FSA rebel groups. He said no military assistance could “enter at present until matters are organized. There is a new arrangement but nothing has crystallized yet”.

The support funneled to vetted FSA factions has included contributions from Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia – states that have opposed Assad. It is one of several foreign aid channels to rebels. Others still function.

The CIA declined comment on the reported freeze in support. A Qatari official said his government had nothing to say on the matter. Turkish officials said only they could not discuss “operational details”. There was no word from Saudi Arabia.

Reuters confirmed the freeze with officials from five of the FSA groups that have been recipients of financial and military support from the so-called “MOM operations room”. It was also confirmed by two other senior FSA figures briefed on the matter.

They spoke on condition of anonymity given the covert nature of the CIA-backed program and the sensitivity of the subject.

Several rebels believed the aid halt was temporary, with new arrangements expected, but there was no clarity yet. Confirming the freeze, two senior FSA sources said donor states were aiming to send the aid to one, unified fighting force – a coherence that has eluded rebels throughout Syria’s civil war.

One of the FSA officials said he did not expect the rebels to be abandoned as they represent the best hope for blocking a further expansion of Sunni jihadist influence in Syria, and to fight back against the growing role of Iran there.

DECLINING REBEL FORTUNES

Idlib and nearby areas of Aleppo, Hama and Latakia provinces are among the last footholds of the anti-Assad insurgency in western Syria – the part of the country where he has shored up his rule by holding onto the main cities and the coast.

Islamists have long been seen as the more formidable insurgent force in the northwestern Idlib area though a dozen or more U.S.-vetted FSA groups have also operated there and nearby.

Last month’s militant assault on the FSA groups was launched by a group formerly known as the Nusra Front, al Qaeda’s official affiliate in the war until last year when it formally cut ties and renamed itself Jabhat Fateh al-Sham.

The jihadist onslaught led several FSA groups to merge with the powerful Islamist faction Ahrar al-Sham, widely believed to be backed by Assad’s foreign adversaries in the region.

That will likely give pause to foreign donors: Ahrar al-Sham is set apart from the FSA factions by a strongly Sunni Islamist ideology and it has previously fought alongside the Nusra Front.

Military aid to rebel groups has ebbed and flowed throughout the life of the program, U.S. officials said, as Washington and its allies have kept a close eye on any leakage to more militant factions, something one official called “a constant problem”.

TRUMP’S SYRIA POLICY NOT YET CLEAR

Before assuming office, Trump suggested he could end support for FSA groups and give priority to the fight against Islamic State (IS), whose well-armed jihadists hold large tracts of eastern and central Syria.

But Trump’s administration has yet to declare a firm policy towards Syria and Iraq, despite his repeated vows to eradicate IS, so it has been “business as usual” with covert and overt training and military support programs, one U.S. official said.

Some FSA groups hope Trump’s animosity towards Iran could yet result in enhanced U.S. support.

Jihadist forces attacked while FSA envoys attended Russian-backed Syria peace talks in Kazakhstan, accusing the rebels of conspiring with Moscow and Washington against Jabhat Fateh al-Sham. The United States has carried out a deadly series of air strikes against Fateh al-Sham in Idlib this year.

MOM-backed rebels had suffered a heavy blow in December when Syrian government forces ousted them from eastern Aleppo with decisive help from the Russian air force and Iranian-backed militias. Eastern Aleppo had been seen as an FSA stronghold.

An official with an FSA group that has received MOM aid said none came this month “and there are no signals”. Another said a regular meeting of the MOM had been canceled this month.

“I expect a reorganization,” he said, adding that there were still around 15,000 combatants with FSA groups in the northwest.

The CIA-backed program has regulated aid to the rebels after a period of unchecked support early in the war – especially from Gulf states – helped give rise to an array of insurgent groups, many of them strongly Islamist in ideology.

A similar program continues to operate in southern Syria with Jordanian backing. Some of the FSA groups backed through the MOM in the north continue to receive Turkish support as they participate in the Turkey-led Euphrates Shield offensive against IS and Kurdish groups to the northeast of Aleppo.

FSA groups have long complained that the aid provided falls far short of what they need to confront the better armed Syrian army. Their demands for anti-aircraft missiles have been consistently rebuffed.

U.S. intelligence and military officials said the leakage, sale and capture of U.S.-supplied and other weapons from units of the FSA to Islamic State, the Nusra Front, and other splinter militant groups have been a concern since the CIA and U.S. military began arming and training a limited number of rebels.

From the start, said one of the officials, some U.S.-backed rebels have migrated from groups that were battered by Syrian government forces to others such as IS that were seizing and holding territory at the time. Aid has slowed or stopped in Idlib and nearby areas, officials said, amid fears the pattern may be continuing after rebels lost ground there.

Another U.S. official said FSA groups continue to mount significant challenges to Assad. “Despite the setbacks and no assistance in fighting back against a brutal Russian onslaught, the fact is they remain a viable fighting force,” the official said.

(This story has been refiled to remove repetitive words in 4th paragraph)

(Additional reporting by William Maclean in Dubai, Nick Tattersall, Humeyra Pamuk and Orhan Coskun in Turkey, Jonathan Landay in Washington; writing by Tom Perry; editing by Mark Heinrich)

Iraqi forces fighting Islamic State set to storm airport, clear way to western Mosul

Iraqi forces fire toward Islamic State in Mosul

By Isabel Coles and Maher Chmaytelli

SOUTH OF MOSUL, Iraq, BAGHDAD (Reuters) – U.S.-backed Iraqi forces closing in on the Islamic State-held western half of Mosul prepared on Tuesday to storm the airport and a nearby military base on its southern outskirts to create a bridgehead for a thrust into the city.

Since ousting IS from eastern Mosul last month, Iraqi forces have advanced in sparsely populated outlying areas but fighting will intensify as they near the teeming inner city of western Mosul and the risk to roughly 750,000 civilians there will rise.

The U.S. military commander in Iraq has said he believes

U.S.-backed forces will retake both of IS’s urban bastions – Mosul and Raqqa in neighboring Syria – within the next six months, which would end the jihadists’ ambitions to territorial rule three years after they declared a “caliphate”.

Iraqi federal police and elite interior ministry units known as Rapid Response have made rapid progress towards western Mosul in a sweep upwards through stony desert terrain from the south since launching the offensive’s second phase on Sunday.

After fighting their way with helicopter gunships, machine gun fire and rocket-propelled grenades to Albu Saif on Monday, Iraqi forces were building up their positions in the hilltop village that overlooks the airport and built-up western Mosul beyond, a Reuters correspondent reported from the area.

The corpse of an Islamic State insurgent with a missing leg lay in the street of Albu Saif village.

Iraqi forces reached the “vicinity” of Mosul’s international airport on Monday, the military said. A Rapid Response spokesman said the airport, once retaken, would be a close-support base for the onslaught into the west of Iraq’s second largest city.

Iraqi forces will also need to secure the Gozhlani military complex, which includes barracks and training grounds and sprawls across the area between the airport and the end of the Baghdad-Mosul highway.

A senior Iraqi official said the airport and Gozhlani base had been heavily damaged by U.S.-led air strikes to wear down IS militants ahead of the offensive. He said Iraqi forces did not anticipate much resistance at the airport or base especially as the area was exposed to air strikes and artillery bombardment.

“The next step, God willing, is to advance to the Ghozlani military base,” said Rapid Response Captain Mohammed Ali Mohsen, speaking inside a house where the IS slogan, “The Islamic State is Staying”, was scrawled in marker pen on the walls.

The Counter-Terrorism Service, Iraqi units that were trained by the United States for urban warfare and spearheaded the recapture of east Mosul, are now redeploying and are expected to surge into the city’s west once regular forces clear access points.

Iraqi commanders expect the battle to be more difficult than in the east of Mosul, however, in part because tanks and armored vehicles cannot pass through narrow alleyways that crisscross the city’s ancient western districts.

Militants have developed a network of passageways and

tunnels to enable them to hide and fight among civilians,

melt away after hit-and-run operations and track government

troop movements, according to inhabitants.

The U.S. commander in Iraq, Army Lieutenant General Stephen

Townsend, told a news conference in Baghdad on Monday he had

been placing U.S. military advisers closer to front lines in

Mosul.

Islamic State is essentially under siege in western Mosul,

after being driven out of city districts east of the River Tigris after 100 days of heavy fighting ending in January.

IS has prevented residents from leaving but in the first two months of the Mosul campaign, in October and November, it forced thousands of villagers to march alongside its fleeing militants as human shields against air strikes.

“GRIM CHOICE FOR CHILDREN”

“This is the grim choice for children in western Mosul right now: bombs, crossfire and hunger if they stay – or execution and snipers if they try to run,” the Save the Children humanitarian agency said in a statement. It added that children comprise about half the population in the city’s western sector.

Up to 400,000 civilians could be displaced by the offensive,

with western Mosul suffering food and fuel shortages and

markets closed, according to the United Nations.

Western Mosul contains the old city center, with its ancient

souks, government administration buildings and the mosque from

which Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi proclaimed his

self-styled caliphate over parts of Syria and Iraq after shock territorial advances by IS in 2014.

Mosul is the largest urban center captured by IS in either country. As in Syria’s Raqqa, IS imposed a radical version of sharia law in Mosul, banning cigarettes, televisions and radios, and forcing men to grow beards and women to cover from head to toe. Citizens who failed to comply risked death.

Townsend has said he believes U.S.-backed forces will

recapture both Mosul and Syria’s Raqqa in Syria by mid-2017.

But even without notable territorial holdings, the resilient militants are likely to keep up a campaign of suicide bombings and inspiring lone-wolf shooting and bomb attacks abroad.

Islamic State was thought to have up to 6,000 well-armed insurgents in Mosul when the government offensive started in mid-October. Of those, more than 1,000 have been killed, according to Iraqi military estimates.

The remainder now face a 100,000-strong force made up of

Iraqi armed forces, including elite paratroopers and police,

regional Kurdish peshmerga forces and Iranian-trained Shi’ite Muslim paramilitary groups.

The westward road that links Mosul to Syrian territory was cut in November by the Shi’ite paramilitary known as Popular

Mobilization forces. They are now trying to sever the route linking Mosul to Tal Afar, a town under IS control 60 km (40

miles) to the west near the Syrian border.

The United States, which has deployed more than 5,000 troops

in the fighting, leads an international coalition providing air

and ground support to the Iraqi and Kurdish forces.

About 160,000 civilians have been displaced from the Mosul area since the start of the offensive, U.N. officials say. Medical and humanitarian agencies estimate the total number of dead and wounded – civilian and military – at several thousand.

(Editing by Mark Heinrich)

Turkey sets out Raqqa operation plans to U.S.: report

Syrian Democratic Forces

ISTANBUL (Reuters) – Turkey has presented two proposals to the United States for how to carry out a joint military operation to drive Islamic State from its stronghold in the Syrian city of Raqqa, Turkish newspaper Hurriyet reported on Saturday.

Turkey has said repeatedly that the planned operation should be conducted by local Arab forces, possibly with support from Turkish troops, as opposed to the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Force (SDF) — an alliance dominated by Kurdish YPG militia.

Washington’s support for the SDF, which launched a campaign to encircle Raqqa in November, has caused tension with NATO-ally Turkey. Ankara views the Kurdish militia as an extension of militants fighting on its own soil.

It is not yet clear whether the new U.S. administration of President Donald Trump will provide weapons to the YPG despite Turkey’s objections. The U.S. says weapons provided to the SDF are so far limited to its Arab elements but Ankara says the arms are going to Kurdish militia and is asking for a halt.

In a meeting on Friday at Turkey’s Incirlik air base, a key hub for U.S.-led coalition against jihadists, Turkish military chief Hulusi Akar and his U.S. counterpart Joseph Dunford discussed the two Raqqa road maps, Hurriyet said, citing security sources.

Ankara’s preferred plan of action envisages Turkish and U.S. special forces, backed by commandoes and Turkey-backed Syrian rebels entering Syria through the border town of Tel Abyad, currently held by Kurdish YPG militia, the newspaper said.

The forces would effectively cut through YPG territory, before pushing on to Raqqa, which lies about 100 kilometers (60 miles) south.

Such a plan would require the United States to convince the Kurdish militia to grant the Turkey-backed forces a 20-kilometre (12-mile)-wide strip through YPG territory in order to push south, the paper said.

The SDF alliance, which includes Arab and other groups in Syria’s north as well as the YPG, controls swathes of territory along the Syria-Turkey border as they push back Islamic State.

With air strikes and special ground forces from the U.S.-led coalition, the SDF is in the middle of a multi-phased operation to surround Raqqa, Islamic State’s base of operations in Syria.

Hurriyet also said Ankara was betting on securing a Syrian and Arab force of about 9,000 to 10,000 troops for the Raqqa operation, with most coming from among the fighters being trained at two camps inside Turkey.

A second but less likely alternative outlined by Akar to Dunford was to push towards Raqqa via the Syrian town of Bab, Hurriyet reported, which Turkey-backed forces have been fighting to seize from Islamic State for the past two months.

But the long journey of 180 kilometres (about 110 miles) and mountainous terrain make that possibility less likely, it said.

(Reporting by Humeyra Pamuk; Editing by Helen Popper)