Special forces advance deep into urban areas of the city but Isis fighters hit back by striking Abrams tank with rocket

Heavy fighting has erupted in the eastern neighbourhoods of Mosul as Iraqi special forces launched an assault deeper into the urban areas of the city and swung round to attack Islamic State militants from a second entry point, to the north-east.

Columns of armoured vehicles wound through open desert to open the new front, pushing through dirt berms, drawing heavy fire and calling in airstrikes to enter the middle class neighbourhoods of Tahrir and Zahara. The area was once named after former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein.

Lt Col Muhanad al-Timimi said three explosives-laden vehicles driven by militants were destroyed, including a bulldozer that was hit by an airstrike from the US-led coalition supporting the offensive.

Why is the battle for Mosul significant? Mosul is Islamic State's last urban stronghold in Iraq, and the assault is the most critical challenge yet to the group's caliphate. Since Isis leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared the establishment of a caliphate from the city in June 2014, Mosul has been central to the group’s ambitions to spread its ruthless interpretation of Islamic law throughout the Arab world and beyond. Victory over Isis appears very likely, but there are concerns about what comes next: how to provide for up to 1.3 million refugees and how to re-establish governance in a city brutalised by tyranny.

At least one solider was seriously wounded in the first hours of the new advance, which came under heavy fire from mortars, automatic weapons, snipers and anti-tank rockets. Commanders at the scene said his injury to the neck could have been the result of small arms fire or shrapnel from a mortar round.

Earlier, at the direct eastern approach to the city’s urban centre, militants holed up in a building fired a rocket at an Abrams tank, disabling it and sending its crew fleeing from the smoking vehicle, seemingly unharmed. The advance in that area then stalled.

Friday’s fighting has been the most intense urban combat in Mosul since the Iraqi offensive began over two weeks ago to drive Isis from the city, Iraq’s second-largest.

The early morning advance began with artillery and mortar strikes on the Aden, Tahrir, and Quds districts, west of special forces’ footholds in the Gogjali and Karama neighbourhoods, Timimi said. Both sides opened up with small arms and mortar fire after an artillery barrage by special forces before their advance.

The extremist group is fighting to hold Mosul as Iraqi forces and allied Kurdish troops squeeze in from all directions with US-led coalition support, mostly from airstrikes and reconnaissance.



Iraqi troops entered the city limits on Tuesday for the first time in more than two years and were gearing up for urban warfare expected to take weeks, if not months, as they work their way neighbourhood by neighbourhood, going through a warren of dense buildings prone to booby traps and ambushes.

More than 1 million civilians are stuck in the city, complicating the military’s efforts to advance without harming innocents. Isis militants have driven thousands of people deeper into the city’s built-up areas, reportedly for use as human shields, while hundreds of others have fled in the past days toward government-controlled territory despite the uncertainty of resettlement in displacement camps.