IS loses ground as coalition closes in

With around 1.5 million people still living in Mosul, the International Organisation for Migration (IMO) said it was preparing gas masks in case of chemical attack by the jihadists, who had used such weapons previously against Iraqi Kurdish forces. Tens of thousands of civilians could be forcibly expelled, trapped between fighting lines or used as human shields, said the IOM, one of many aid organisations to sound the alarm. The fall of Mosul would signal the defeat of the ultra-hardline Sunni jihadists in Iraq but could also lead to land grabs and sectarian bloodletting between groups which fought one another after the 2003 overthrow of Saddam Hussein. 

Hoshiyar Zebari, a senior Kurdish official, said initial operations succeeded due to close cooperation between the Iraqi government and Kurdish peshmerga fighters, allowing them to clear Islamic State from 9 or 10 villages east of Mosul. A total of 20 villages were taken from the militants east, south and southeast of Mosul by early Tuesday, according to statements from the two forces, fighting alongside one another for the first time.

Iraqi and Kurdish commanders on Tuesday said they paused their advance on Mosul, a day after the start of a massive operation to retake the Islamic State-held city, which is expected to take weeks, if not months. 

The front lines to the east of Mosul were largely quiet, a day after Iraqi Kurdish forces advanced amid a barrage of US-led airstrikes and heavy artillery. Brig Gen Haider Fadhil said his men had planned to move at dawn, but postponed the operation. The Iraqi Army’s 9th Division meanwhile reached the outskirts of the town of al-Hamdaniyah, south of Mosul, but stopped advancing because of snipers and suicide bombers, according to a military officer. The Federal Police reached al-Houd village to the east, another officer said. Both spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorised to brief the media.

Bangladeshi police said on Tuesday they had identified three people as the main providers of finance for an attack on a cafe in which 22 people were killed, mostly foreigners, and said one had left for Syria to join Islamic State. Police identified one of the three as a doctor who left Bangladesh with his family for Syria to join Islamic State. He provided $100,000 for a faction of Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB), known as New JMB, counter-terrorism police chief Monirul Islam said.