The Iraqi army pushed into a town near the Islamic State-held city of Mosul on Saturday, a day after dozens of IS militants stormed into the northern city of Kirkuk, setting off two days of clashes and killing at least 80 people, mostly security forces.

U.S. Defence Secretary Ash Carter meanwhile met with Iraq’s prime minister and commanders in Baghdad to discuss the offensive to retake Mosul, which the U.S. is supporting with airstrikes and advisers on the ground.

The Iraqi army said the 9th Division has pushed into the town of Hamdaniyah, also known as Qaraqosh and Bakhdida, and raised the flag over its government compound, but the troops were likely still facing resistance in and around the town. Similar past announcements have often proved premature.

The town is around 20 kilometres (12 miles) from Mosul. Iraqi forces launched a wide-scale offensive earlier this week aimed at retaking Mosul, the country’s second largest city, which fell to IS in 2014.

Hamdaniyah is believed to be largely uninhabited. IS has heavily mined the approaches to Mosul, and Iraqi forces have had to contend with roadside bombs, snipers and suicide truck bombs as they move closer to the city.

IS said it foiled an attack on Hamdaniyah and seized vehicles and weapons left by retreating Shiite militiamen. The claim, carried by the extremist group’s Aamaq news agency, could not be confirmed.

An Iraqi television station says one of its reporters was shot dead near Mosul, the second journalist in as many days to be killed while covering the conflict.

Alsumaria TV says cameraman Ali Risan was shot in the chest by a sniper Saturday during a battle in the al-Shura area. Journalist Ahmet Haceroglu of Turkmeneli TV was shot dead by a militant sniper Friday, while covering the IS assault on Kirkuk.

Iraqi forces retook the town of Bartella, around 15 kilometres (nine miles) east of Mosul, earlier this week, but are still facing pockets of resistance in the area. Inside the town, a road extending more than 100 metres (yards) was completely demolished, with all the homes on either side reduced to rubble.

In Kirkuk, meanwhile, some fighting continued a day after the IS assault on the city, some 170 kilometres (100 miles) southeast of Mosul. The wave of attacks in and around Kirkuk appeared to be an attempt to divert attention from Mosul.

Brig. Gen. Khattab Omer of the Kirkuk police said at least 80 people were killed in the assault, mainly Kurdish security forces. Another 170 were wounded, he said, adding that a sundown curfew has been imposed on the city.

Omer said Kurdish security forces recovered the bodies of 56 militants who took part in the attack. The Kurds assumed control of Mosul in 2014, when the Iraqi army and police crumbled in the face of a lightning IS advance across northern Iraq.

Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said the Kirkuk assault was a terrorist attack and not a military breach.

“Nearly all the terrorists who entered Kirkuk have been eliminated, and we have full control, except for maybe one area where they are being flushed out,” he said after meeting with Carter.

As the assault on Kirkuk was underway, an airstrike hit a funeral procession in the town of Daquq to the south, killing 17 people, mainly women and children, and wounding another 50, said Daquq Mayor Amir Khodakram. He said it was not clear who carried out the airstrike and that officials have launched an investigation.

The Russian Defence Ministry blamed the strike on the U.S.-led coalition, saying it had “all the signs of a war crime.” Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov, the spokesman for the ministry, said two jets were involved in the raid, and apparently mistook the procession for a gathering of militants.

The U.S. military in Baghdad could not immediately be reached for comment.

Iraq launched a long-awaited operation on Monday aimed at retaking Mosul, its second largest city, which fell to IS in 2014. It is the largest operation undertaken by Iraqi forces since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and is expected to take weeks, if not months.

Carter’s visit comes two days after a U.S. service member was killed outside Mosul, underscoring the risk that American troops are taking as they advise Iraqi forces in the fight.

More than 4,800 U.S. troops are in Iraq and there are more than 100 U.S. special operations forces operating with Iraqi units. Hundreds more American troops are playing a support role in staging bases farther from the front lines.

Elsewhere in Iraq, a burning sulfur plant south of Mosul that was torched by the Islamic State group is releasing large amounts of noxious gas into the atmosphere, draping towns in the area in toxic smoke.

The air has turned a greyish colour as it mixes with smoke from earlier oil well fires set by the militants. The fumes make breathing difficult, with residents saying they are suffering from coughing, headaches and nosebleeds from as far as 30 kilometres (18 miles) away.

“The smoke is from sulfur that was lit by Daesh,” said Alaa Abdullah Khaled, a resident in the nearby village of Awsaja, referring to IS by its Arabic acronym. “It is causing suffocation among the children and it gives them nosebleeds.”

Two U.S. military officials said that while the fire was set two days ago, the winds shifted earlier Saturday, sending the smoke south toward Qayara West air field, a staging area for the Mosul offensive. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

They said troops at the base were wearing protective masks because of the breathing concerns, and estimated it could take two to three days to put the fire out.</s>Islamic State militants have allegedly executed at least 284 men and boys in the Iraqi city of Mosul and nearby villages. Jihadists, who had used them as human shields, dumped the victims’ bodies in a mass grave, according to a report.

The victims, children among them, were all shot dead on Thursday and Friday, an Iraqi intelligence source, who asked to remain anonymous, told CNN.

Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) seized Mosul in June of 2014, when it was Iraq’s second-largest city. The terrorist group’s leader then turned it into a major military stronghold, and it is believed that between 4,000 and 8,000 IS militants are currently entrenched there, according to Reuters. An estimated 1.5 million people remain in the city.

On Friday, Islamic State militants took some 550 families from the villages around Mosul, holding them as human shields close to jihadist positions, Ravina Shamdasani, a spokeswoman for the UN human rights office said. Citing “corroborated information,” she said the office was also investigating reports that they had killed 40 civilians in one village, Reuters reported.

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The battle for Mosul, the jihadists’ last major stronghold in Iraq, began on Sunday, and has since gained momentum. The Iraqi military and US-led coalition said that the operation to retake the strategically important city may take weeks or even months.

Earlier this week, the International Organization for Migration (IOM) sounded the alarm amid the carnage surrounding the new offensive, warning that IS militants may unleash chemical attacks and use tens of thousands as human shields.

“Tens of thousands of people may be forcibly expelled, they will be getting trapped between fighting lines under siege, they may even be held as human shields,” IOM’s chief of mission for Iraq, Thomas Weiss, told Reuters.

The UN says the aftermath of the Mosul campaign could require the “largest and most complex” humanitarian relief operation in the world, as up to one million people may be forced from their homes.

IS attack on Kirkuk

With Iraqi and Kurdish forces pushing to seize territory around Mosul, the jihadists launched an attack on government buildings in the Iraqi city of Kirkuk. On Friday, Islamic State militants reportedly entered houses and mosques in the city, which is located some 174 kilometers (108 miles) from Mosul, and took civilians as hostages. They also broke into a kindergarten building, according to a Rudaw news agency report citing the city’s police chief.

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A curfew was reportedly imposed amid ongoing clashes on Friday. Jihadist terrorists entered Kirkuk’s Asfra Mafqudin quarter in two cars at dawn and knocked on doors, telling people they were “fighters from Islamic State,” according to one eyewitness, who said that the locals were forced to take up arms to defend themselves.

At least 12 IS militants were killed by security and police forces in Kirkuk on Friday, Rudaw reported.

The city, which had been home to about half a million people before the outbreak of hostilities, has taken in some 700,000 displaced people from the country’s central and southern provinces since Islamic State took control of one-third of Iraq in mid-2014, according to Rudaw.

The oil-rich city is claimed by both the Iraqi government and the Kurds in the region. Kurdish forces assumed full control of the city in the summer of 2014, as the Iraqi army crumbled before an IS advance.</s>Islamic State launched a major attack on the city of Kirkuk on Friday as Iraqi and Kurdish forces pursued operations to seize territory around Mosul in preparation for an offensive on the jihadists’ last major stronghold in Iraq.

Islamic State’s assault on Kirkuk, which lies in an oil- producing region, killed 18 members of the security forces and workers at a power station outside the city, including two Iranians, a hospital source said.

Crude oil production facilities were not targeted and the power supply continued uninterrupted in the city. Kirkuk is located east of Hawija, a pocket still under control of Islamic State that lies between Baghdad and Mosul.

With air and ground support from the U.S.-led coalition, Iraqi government forces captured eight villages south and southeast of Mosul. Kurdish forces attacking from the north and east also captured several villages, according to statements from their respective military commands overnight.

The offensive that started on Monday to capture Mosul is expected to become the biggest battle fought in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.

U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter said on Friday Turkey and Iraq had reached an agreement in principle that could allow a Turkish role in the Mosul campaign.

Speaking in Ankara after talks with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, Carter said the details still needed to be hammered out. NATO member Turkey sees Mosul as firmly within its sphere of influence, but Iraq views Turkish military moves on its territory with apprehension.

The United Nations says Mosul could require the biggest humanitarian relief operation in the world, with worst-case scenario forecasts of up to a million people being uprooted.

About 1.5 million residents are still believed to be inside Mosul. Islamic State has taken 550 families from villages around Mosul and is holding them close to IS locations in the city, probably as human shields, a spokeswoman for the U.N. human rights office said in Geneva.

The fighting has forced 5,640 people to flee their homes so far from the vicinity of the city, the International Organization for Migration said late on Thursday.

The Turkish Red Crescent said it was sending aid trucks to northern Iraq with food and humanitarian supplies for 10,000 people displaced by fighting around Mosul.

A U.S. service member died on Thursday from wounds sustained in an improvised explosive device blast near the city.

Roughly 5,000 U.S. forces are in Iraq. More than 100 of them are embedded with Iraqi and Kurdish Peshmerga forces, advising commanders and helping them ensure coalition air power hits the right targets, officials say.

However, the Kurdish military command complained that air support wasn’t enough on Thursday.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haidar al-Abadi, addressing anti-Islamic State coalition allies meeting in Paris via video link, said the offensive was advancing more quickly than planned.

A senior Kurdish military official told Reuters the offensive by the Iraqi and Kurdish forces was moving steadily as they push into villages on the outskirts of Mosul.

But he expected the offensive to slow as they approach the city, where Islamic State has built trenches and dug tunnels.

“I believe it will be more clear within the coming weeks ... how quickly this war will end. If they (Islamic State) decide to defend the actual city then the process will slow down.”

Once inside Mosul, Iraqi special forces would have to move painstakingly from street to street to clear explosives and booby traps, the official said.

Islamic State denied that government forces had advanced. Under the headline “The crusade on Nineveh gets a lousy start,” the group’s weekly online magazine Al-Nabaa said it repelled assaults on all fronts, killing dozens in ambushes and suicide attacks and destroying dozens of vehicles including tanks.

In online statements, Islamic State said it launched a series of counter-attacks and four suicide bombings to take back villages that fell on Thursday to the army and the Kurds and that it had blocked all their fresh offensives.

In Kirkuk, Islamic State attacked several police buildings and a power station in the early hours of Friday and some of the attackers remained holed up in a mosque and an abandoned hotel.

The militants also cut the road between the city and the power station 30 km (20 miles) to the north.

Several dozen took part in the assault, according to security sources who couldn’t confirm a claim by Islamic State that it had taken a Kurdish police officer hostage.

The assailants in Kirkuk came from outside the city, said the head of Iraq’s Special Forces, Lieutenant General Talib Shaghati, speaking on a frontline east of Mosul.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Ghasemi described the killing of the Iranian citizens in Kirkuk as “the last breath of terrorists in Iraq”.

At least eight militants were killed, either by blowing themselves up or in clashes with the security forces, the security sources said. Kurdish forces had dislodged the militants from all the police and public buildings they had seized before dawn, they said.

Kurdish NRT TV footage showed machine gun fire hitting a drab two-floor building that used to be a hotel, and cars burning in a nearby street.

Islamic State claimed the attacks in online statements, and authorities declared a curfew in the city where Kurdish forces were getting reinforcements.

Kurdish Peshmerga fighters took control of Kirkuk in 2014, after the Iraqi army withdrew from the region, fleeing an Islamic State advance through northern and western Iraq.

On the frontline south of Mosul, thick black smoke lingered from oil wells that Islamic State torched to evade air surveillance, in the region of Qayyara.

The army and the U.S.-led coalition took back this region in August and are using its air base as a hub to support the offensive on Mosul.

“Long live Iraq, death to Daesh,” was painted on a wall near an army checkpoint there. Daesh is an Arabic acronym for Islamic State.

The army Humvees at the checkpoint carried Shi’ite flags, revealing that the soldiers of this unit belonged to Iraq’s majority religious community.

Flying Shi’ite flags in the predominantly Sunni Muslim region and the participation of the Popular Mobilization Force - a coalition of mostly Iranian-trained militias - in a support role to the army has raised concerns of sectarian violence and revenge killings during or after the battle.

“All those who are participating in the battle have to respect the humanitarian principles and refrain from seeking vengeance,” said a sermon delivered in Sistani’s name in the holy Shi’ite city of Kerbala by one of his representatives.</s>BARTELLA, Iraq (AP) — The Iraqi army pushed into a town near the Islamic State-held city of Mosul on Saturday, a day after dozens of IS militants stormed into the northern city of Kirkuk, setting off two days of clashes and killing at least 80 people, mostly security forces.

U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter meanwhile met with Iraqi commanders in Baghdad to discuss the offensive to retake Mosul, which the U.S. is supporting with airstrikes and advisers on the ground.

The Iraqi army said the 9th Division has pushed into the town of Hamdaniyah, also known as Qaraqosh and Bakhdida, and raised the flag over its government compound, but the troops were likely still facing resistance in and around the town. Similar past announcements have often proved premature.

The town is around 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Mosul. Iraqi forces launched a wide-scale offensive earlier this week aimed at retaking Mosul, the country’s second largest city, which fell to IS in 2014.

Hamdaniyah is believed to be largely uninhabited. IS has heavily mined the approaches to Mosul, and Iraqi forces have had to contend with roadside bombs, snipers and suicide truck bombs as they move closer to the city.

IS said it foiled an attack on Hamdaniyah and seized vehicles and weapons left by retreating Shiite militiamen. The claim, carried by the extremist group’s Aamaq news agency, could not be confirmed.

An Iraqi television station says one of its reporters was shot dead near Mosul, the second journalist in as many days to be killed while covering the conflict.

Alsumaria TV says cameraman Ali Risan was shot in the chest by a sniper Saturday during a battle in the al-Shura area. Journalist Ahmet Haceroglu of Turkmeneli TV was shot dead by a militant sniper Friday, while covering the IS assault on Kirkuk.

Iraqi forces retook the town of Bartella, around 15 kilometers (nine miles) east of Mosul, earlier this week, but are still facing pockets of resistance in the area.

Inside Bartella, a road extending more than 100 meters (yards) was completely demolished, with all the homes on either side reduced to rubble. IS graffiti was scrawled across the walls, and the militants appeared to have renamed streets and neighborhoods after famous fighters during the more than two years they controlled the area.

In Kirkuk, meanwhile, some fighting continued a day after the IS assault on the city, some 170 kilometers (100 miles) southeast of Mosul. The wave of attacks in and around Kirkuk appeared to be an attempt to divert attention from Mosul.

The area around the provincial headquarters, where the fighting was heaviest on Friday, was quiet. But witnesses and police reported fighting in other parts of the city.

Brig. Gen. Khattab Omer of the Kirkuk police said at least 80 people were killed in the assault, mainly Kurdish security forces. Another 170 were wounded, he said, adding that a sundown curfew has been imposed on the city.

Omer said Kurdish security forces recovered the bodies of 56 militants who took part in the attack. The Kurds assumed control of Mosul in 2014, when the Iraqi army and police crumbled in the face of a lightning IS advance across northern Iraq.

Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said the Kirkuk assault was a terrorist attack and not a military breach.

“Nearly all the terrorists who entered Kirkuk have been eliminated, and we have full control, except for maybe one area where they are being flushed out,” he said after meeting with Carter.

Iraq launched a long-awaited operation on Monday aimed at retaking Mosul, its second largest city, which fell to IS in 2014. It is the largest operation undertaken by Iraqi forces since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion and is expected to take weeks, if not months.

Carter’s visit comes two days after a U.S. service member was killed outside Mosul, underscoring the risk that American troops are taking as they advise Iraqi forces in the fight.

More than 4,800 U.S. troops are in Iraq and there are more than 100 U.S. special operations forces operating with Iraqi units. Hundreds more American troops are playing a support role in staging bases farther from the front lines.

Elsewhere in Iraq, a burning sulfur plant south of Mosul that was torched by the Islamic State group is releasing large amounts of noxious gas into the atmosphere, draping towns in the area in toxic smoke.

The air has turned a greyish color as it mixes with smoke from earlier oil well fires set by the militants. The fumes make breathing difficult, with residents saying they are suffering from coughing, headaches and nosebleeds from as far as 30 kilometers (18 miles) away.

“The smoke is from sulfur that was lit by Daesh,” said Alaa Abdullah Khaled, a resident in the nearby village of Awsaja, referring to IS by its Arabic acronym. “It is causing suffocation among the children and it gives them nosebleeds.”

Two U.S. military officials said that while the fire was set two days ago in Mishraq, the winds shifted earlier Saturday, sending the smoke south toward Qayara West air field, a staging area for the Mosul offensive. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the matter publicly.

They said troops at the base were wearing protective masks because of the breathing concerns, and estimated it could take two to three days to put the fire out.

Matti reported from Kirkuk. Associated Press writers Lolita C. Baldor and Joseph Krauss in Baghdad, Adam Schreck and Balint Szlanko in Awsaja, Iraq, Salar Salim in Irbil, Iraq and Maamoun Youssef in Cairo contributed to this report.</s>Video: As Iraqi forces press on in Mosul, Islamic State launches Kirkuk counterattack

Suspected Islamic State militants killed 18 people in Kirkuk on Friday, four days after Iraqi and Kurdish forces started an offensive to take back control of Mosul</s>(CNN) ISIS rounded up and killed 284 men and boys as Iraqi-led coalition forces closed in on Mosul , the terror group's last major stronghold in Iraq, an Iraqi intelligence source told CNN.

Those killed Thursday and Friday were used as human shields against attacks forcing ISIS out of southern parts of Mosul, the source said.

ISIS dumped the corpses in a mass grave at the defunct College of Agriculture in northern Mosul, the intelligence source said.

The victims -- including children -- were all shot, said the source, who asked for anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media. CNN could not independently confirm the killings.

Latest developments

US Defense Secretary Ash Carter arrived in Erbil on Sunday, after commenting that the Mosul operation was going to plan

Peshmerga forces started an offensive from two fronts in Bashiqa, northeast of Mosul, the Peshmerga General Command said Sunday

Prime Minister Abadi reiterated his view that Iraq does not need Turkey's assistance in the battle

Kurdish officials accused Sunni Arabs in Kirkuk of supporting ISIS a day after attacks killed dozens

Iraqis displaced by the Mosul offensive are seeking shelter in camps, the UN refugee agency said

Freeing a Christian town

The Iraqi military intensified its offensive Saturday to retake Hamdaniya -- also known as Qaraqosh -- from ISIS, the Iraqi Joint Operations Command center said. Iraqi forces and a Christian paramilitary group entered the town Wednesday, but face fierce resistance from ISIS fighters, 200 of whom were killed in one day of clashes.

JUST WATCHED ISIS using drones in battle for Mosul Replay More Videos ... MUST WATCH ISIS using drones in battle for Mosul 02:43

The city is about 15 kilometers (nine miles) southeast of Mosul.

Iraqi security forces and Peshmerga -- as the Kurdish fighters are known -- have made progress and isolated Hamdaniya, a US military official said in Baghdad, speaking on background.

Iraqi troops on Saturday entered the al-Askary neighborhood and liberated the mayor's building and the main hospital, raising the Iraqi flag over those buildings, Lt. Gen. Qassim al-Maliky said.

At least 60 ISIS fighters have been killed since Friday when Iraqi security forces launched an attack on the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, Gov. Najmaldin Karim said.

"Life will be restored to normal in the next few hours" Karim said Sunday, adding that security checkpoints in the city would be reopened. He did not mention how many security forces and civilians were killed in the ISIS offensive.

Tal Kayf is next target

Iraqi troops are also advancing toward Tal Kayf and plan on storming the Chaldean town, the Iraqi Joint Operations Command said Saturday.

Iraqi army and militia forces arrive Thursday in Saleh village in the offensive to wrest Mosul from ISIS.

Tal Kayf is about 10 kilometers (six miles) north of Mosul.

It's the closest Iraqi security forces have come to Mosul, a CNN analysis indicates.

The US military official said US and coalition aircraft were providing air support as needed Saturday. The official said land forces were working through "a hard outer crust," and resistance would intensify as the offensive neared Mosul.

The official said ISIS fighters have infiltrated towns cleared earlier, including Bartella, requiring renewed efforts to combat them.

Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Members of the Iraqi federal police wave the country's flag as they celebrate in the Old City of Mosul on July 9, 2017. Iraq declared victory against ISIS forces in Mosul after a grueling monthslong campaign. The battle to reclaim Mosul, the last major ISIS stronghold in Iraq, has been underway since fall 2016. Hide Caption 1 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city This injured girl was found by Iraqi forces as they advanced against ISIS militants in the Old City of Mosul on Monday, July 3. She was carried away for medical assistance. Hide Caption 2 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A suspected ISIS fighter is held in a basement while Iraqi forces continue to push for control of the Old City of Mosul on Monday, July 3. Hide Caption 3 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi Special Forces soldier exchanges fire with ISIS militants in the Old City on Friday, June 30. Hide Caption 4 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A bomb explodes near the al-Nuri mosque complex on Thursday, June 29. Iraq's military has seized the remains of the Great Mosque of al-Nuri. Iraq and the United States have accused ISIS of blowing up the historic mosque. Hide Caption 5 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Members of the Iraqi Federal Police hold a position as US-led coalition forces advance through the Old City on Wednesday, June 28. Hide Caption 6 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city The remnants of Mosul's ancient leaning minaret are seen in the Old City on Sunday, June 25. ISIS' claim that US warplanes were responsible for the destruction of the minaret is "1,000% false," US officials told CNN. Hide Caption 7 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Two boys comfort each other after their home collapsed during fighting between Iraqi forces and militants in Mosul on Saturday, June 24. The boys, who are cousins, said some of their relatives were still under the rubble. Hide Caption 8 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi soldier helps transport a girl as residents flee their homes west of Mosul on Friday, May 26. Hide Caption 9 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Displaced Iraqis make their way through rubble after evacuating their homes in a neighborhood of west Mosul on Wednesday, May 17. Hide Caption 10 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi man tries to extinguish a burning car during fighting in Mosul's western Rifai neighborhood on Tuesday, May 16. Hide Caption 11 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A member of the Iraqi counterterrorism service secures a building as troops push toward Mosul's Al-Oraibi western district on Sunday, May 14. Hide Caption 12 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A smoke cloud rises on the front line as the Iraqi Emergency Response Division advances in west Mosul on Saturday, May 6. Hide Caption 13 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A wounded man is transported in western Mosul on Friday, April 21. Hide Caption 14 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi federal policeman smokes during a break from battle on Wednesday, April 12. Hide Caption 15 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A member of Iraq's security forces stands guard in eastern Mosul as smoke rises from the ISIS-controlled western section of the city on Friday, April 7. Hide Caption 16 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqis visit a bath house on the southern outskirts of Mosul on Wednesday, April 5. Hide Caption 17 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Flames billow from an explosion in Mosul during a clash between Iraqi forces and ISIS fighters on Sunday, March 5. Hide Caption 18 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Families are forced to evacuate as Iraqi forces advance in western Mosul on Thursday, March 2. The number of internally displaced people has surged as the offensive effort has intensified. Hide Caption 19 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Mosul residents cross a damaged bridge in the al-Sukkar neighborhood on Saturday, January 21. Hide Caption 20 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city French President Francois Hollande and French Defense Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian, right, view territory held by ISIS during a visit to a military outpost near Mosul on Monday, January 2. Hide Caption 21 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A young girl takes part in a Christmas Day Mass at a church in the predominantly Christian town of Qaraqosh. The area's churches were heavily damaged by ISIS militants before the town was freed by Iraqi forces during the Mosul offensive. Hide Caption 22 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi Shiite fighters ride through a desert area near the village of Al-Boutha al-Sharqiyah, west of Mosul, on Friday, December 2. Hide Caption 23 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Internally displaced Iraqis who fled the fighting in Mosul watch as a civilian drone films them at the al-Khazir camp on Thursday, December 1. Hide Caption 24 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi soldier searches a home for ISIS militants after Iraqi forces retook the village of Al-Qasr on Wednesday, November 30. Hide Caption 25 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi soldiers transport a comrade who was injured during a battle near the village of Haj Ali on Tuesday, November 29. Hide Caption 26 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A man mourns during the funeral of four Iraqi paramilitary fighters who were killed in battles in the town of Tal Afar. Hide Caption 27 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Displaced civilians return to the village of Tall Abtah on Friday, November 25, after Iraqi forces retook the village from ISIS. Hide Caption 28 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi civilians sit on the ground in Mosul on November 24. An Iraqi officer addressed the group, demanding to know the whereabouts of alleged ISIS militants who opened fire on troops a few days earlier. Hide Caption 29 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An injured baby receives treatment at a field hospital in Mosul on November 15. Hide Caption 30 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A woman cries Sunday, November 13, after seeing the St. Addai church that was damaged by ISIS fighters during their occupation of the Keramlis village. Hide Caption 31 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi special forces soldier prays next to a Humvee before troops pushed toward Mosul's Karkukli neighborhood on November 13. Hide Caption 32 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A Kurdish Peshmerga fighter holds part of a defused bomb planted by ISIS militants in Bashiqa, Iraq, on Friday, November 11. Hide Caption 33 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A member of Iraq's special forces guards two suspected ISIS fighters found hiding in a house in Mosul on November 11. Hide Caption 34 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi woman displaced by war holds her cat near a checkpoint in the Iraqi village of Shaqouli, east of Mosul, on November 10. Hide Caption 35 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi troops watch a broadcast of Donald Trump's acceptance speech in a house in Arbid, on the outskirts of Mosul, on Wednesday, November 9. Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi congratulated Trump on his win and said he hoped for continued support in the war on ISIS. Hide Caption 36 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city US Marines install equipment at a coalition base in Qayyara on November 9. Hide Caption 37 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi forces member investigates a mass grave that was discovered after coalition forces recaptured the area of Hamam al-Alil on Monday, November 7. Hide Caption 38 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi children witness a man being interrogated by a member of the Iraqi army at a base next to the Al-Intissar neighborhood of Mosul on November 7. Hide Caption 39 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A civilian man who fled the fighting trims his beard after reaching an Iraqi army position in Mosul on November 7. Hide Caption 40 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Children play in debris created by an airstrike in Qayyara on Sunday, November 6. Hide Caption 41 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Female members of the Freedom Party of Kurdistan sing as they hold a position near Bashiqa on November 6. Hide Caption 42 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A baby is passed through a fence back to his mother at a refugee camp in the Khazir region on Saturday, November 5. Hide Caption 43 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city People line up to receive food at a refugee camp in the Khazir region on November 5. Thousands are taking refuge in camps set up for internally displaced people. Hide Caption 44 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi soldiers pass near a bridge destroyed in an airstrike in Qayyara on November 5. Hide Caption 45 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi soldiers patrol an alley on the outskirts of Mosul on Friday, November 4. Hide Caption 46 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A suspected member of ISIS is detained at a checkpoint near Bartella, Iraq, on November 4. Hide Caption 47 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi families pack into a truck to be moved to camps on Thursday, November 3. Hide Caption 48 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi special forces soldier searches for the location of an ISIS sniper in Gogjali on November 1. Hide Caption 49 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A man fleeing the village of Bazwaya carries a white flag as he arrives at a checkpoint on November 1. Hide Caption 50 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi soldier receives treatment after being injured during clashes with ISIS fighters near Bazwaya on October 31. Hide Caption 51 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi soldier navigates through a shattered windshield as coalition forces advance on Bazwaya on October 31. Hide Caption 52 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Archbishop Yohanna Petros Mouche, center, performs Mass in the liberated town of Qaraqosh on Sunday, October 30. Hide Caption 53 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Children play in a camp for internally displaced people near Kirkuk, Iraq, on October 30. More than 600 families from Tel Afar, a town west of Mosul, have been living in the camp since ISIS took control of the area in 2014. Hide Caption 54 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Displaced families are seen on the road near Qayyara on Saturday, October 29. Hide Caption 55 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city U.S. military personnel take cover in a bunker after a mortar alarm was sounded at a coalition air base in Qayyara on Friday, October 28. Hide Caption 56 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Women and children grieve over the grave of a family member at a Qayyara cemetery damaged by ISIS on October 27. Hide Caption 57 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Residents of Qayyara wait for distribution of food and water rations on October 26. Local water sources have been contaminated by the burning oil and sulfur. Hide Caption 58 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraq's counterterrorism forces advance toward ISIS positions in Tob Zawa on October 25. Hide Caption 59 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Soldiers give first aid to an injured boy in Tob Zawa on October 25. Hide Caption 60 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Kurdish Peshmerga forces take positions as they start to move toward the Imam Reza and Tizxirab villages of the Bashiqa district on Sunday, October 23. Hide Caption 61 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi forces distribute fruit in the village of al-Khuwayn, south of Mosul, after recapturing it from ISIS on October 23. Hide Caption 62 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Kurdish security forces detain a suspected member of ISIS in the eastern suburbs of Kirkuk on Saturday, October 22. Hide Caption 63 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city An Iraqi forces member helps a man push a car as they arrive at a refugee camp in Qayyara on October 22. Hide Caption 64 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Spent bullet cartridges litter the street around the Jihad Hotel, where ISIS militants battled Iraqi security forces in Kirkuk on Friday, October 21. Hide Caption 65 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Gen. Abdel Ghani al-Asadi, who leads Iraq's counterterrorism forces, sits in Bartella on October 21 after the town was reclaimed. Hide Caption 66 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Peshmerga fighters look over a village during an assault near Bashiqa on Thursday, October 20. Hide Caption 67 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Iraqi forces head toward the front lines near Qayyara on Tuesday, October 18. Hide Caption 68 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city A Peshmerga fighter peers up from an underground tunnel in the liberated town of Badana on October 18. ISIS fighters have built tunnels below residential streets to escape from airstrikes. Hide Caption 69 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Kurdish security forces take up a position near ISIS-controlled villages on Monday, October 17. Hide Caption 70 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Smoke rises from a suicide car bomb attack carried out by ISIS in the village of Bedene on October 17. Hide Caption 71 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Members of the Iraqi coalition gather around a fire at Zardak mountain ahead of the offensive. Hide Caption 72 of 73 Photos: Mosul: Iraqi-led forces push into key city Peshmerga forces deploy in the dark near the village of Wardak early on October 17. Hide Caption 73 of 73

Clashes in Kirkuk, Laylan

Kurdish security forces were going house to house Saturday in Kirkuk following a major ISIS attack a day earlier. Kirkuk is 175 kilometers (109 miles) southeast of Mosul.

Kirkuk's police chief said 48 ISIS militants were killed during hours of clashes.

Security officials told CNN that at least 40 others were killed and 76 wounded in the attack, the majority of them Kurdish Peshmerga.

The ISIS attacks continued in the area Saturday, with an attempt to infiltrate the town of Laylan, 20 kilometers (12 miles) southeast of Kirkuk. Nine militants were killed, according to the mayor of Laylan, Mohammed Wais, and some security force members were injured.

Kurdish President Masoud Barzani described ISIS' attack on Kirkuk as "a failed attempt by terrorists to make up for the defeats they have suffered at the hands of the Peshmerga on the front line."

Previous attacks by ISIS militants on Kirkuk have been attempts either to capture the city from the Peshmerga or divert Kurdish troops from the fight in Mosul.

Kurdish officials accuse local Arabs of helping ISIS

In the wake of the Kirkuk attack, Kurdish officials accused local Arabs and some displaced in camps around the city of helping ISIS.

Kirkuk's police chief, Brig. Gen. Khatab Omar, said the militants had probably infiltrated the 600,000 internally displaced in and around the city.

Gen. Hallo Najat, another police official, told local media to expect further fighting because 30% of the Arabs there supported ISIS rather than the government or Kurdish authorities.

Najmaldin Karim, Kirkuk's governor, said: "We have prior knowledge that an operation like this could happen; we were preparing for it, but the timing was not known exactly."

He said a curfew would remain in force for another day and urged the internally displaced community in Kirkuk to help track down militants.

US defense chief briefed on Mosul operation

Carter, the US defense secretary, paid an unannounced visit Saturday to Baghdad, where he was briefed on the Mosul offensive and met with Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi.

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Carter then addressed about 50 US service members at Baghdad International Airport, recalling the US naval officer killed this week in northern Iraq and the risks taken by all those serving.

The defense chief told the crowd he was encouraged by what he has seen so far in the fight to retake Mosul.

"So far it is proceeding according to our plan," Carter said. "We've got tough fighting ahead and the US will continue to play its part."

US forces in Iraq are providing air support for the Mosul operation as part of an international coalition. US special operations forces are also advising Iraqi and Kurdish units on the ground.

After meeting with Carter, Abadi repeated his view that Iraq does not need Turkey's assistance in the battle for Mosul, while acknowledging the importance of maintaining good relations with its northern neighbor. "If we (need) help, we will ask for it from Turkey or from other regional countries," he said.

UN 'gravely worried' over human shield use

The United Nations expressed concern Friday that ISIS has taken 550 families from villages around Mosul to use as human shields.

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Two hundred families from Samalia village and 350 families from Najafia were forced out Monday and taken to Mosul in "an apparent policy by ISIS to prevent civilians escaping," Ravina Shamdasani, deputy spokeswoman for the UN Human Rights Office, told CNN.

Zeid Ra'ad Al Hussein, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, said, "We are gravely worried by reports that (ISIS) is using civilians in and around Mosul as human shields as the Iraqi forces advance, keeping civilians close to their offices or places where fighters are located, which may result in civilian casualties."

Iraqis flee violence

The first influx of Iraqis -- 144 people -- arrived at a new camp, Zelikan, set up to shelter what is expected to become a flood of families displaced by the Mosul offensive, the UN refugee agency said Saturday.

UN data indicate some 3,900 people -- or 650 families -- have so far been forced from Mosul and Hamdaniya districts, agency spokesman Adrian Edwards told a news briefing Friday in Geneva, Switzerland.

The UN refugee agency is working to establish 11 camps , five of which are already in place, to house those forced from their homes by the battle. The camps will have capacity for about 120,000 people, the agency said.

As many as 600,000 could be helped if the refugee agency obtained sufficient funding, it said. Mosul is believed currently to have a population of about 1.5 million people, it added.

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The charity Oxfam warned Saturday that more must be done to provide safe routes for those fleeing the conflict.

People who escaped from Hawd, 50 kilometers (about 30 miles) south of Mosul, told Oxfam that many civilians had been injured.

A woman told Oxfam her children had respiratory issues after breathing in thick smoke from oil wells that ISIS militants set afire to provide cover from coalition air attacks.

The smoke also concerned US and coalition troops at an airfield near Qayyara, about 60 kilometers (37 miles) south of Mosul. Forces were assessing Saturday whether the smoke was putting them at risk, and troops have been told to limit their outdoor activity, the US military said.</s>KIRKUK, Iraq – Islamic State militants launched a wave of pre-dawn attacks in and around the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk on Friday, killing at least 14 people and setting off fierce clashes with Kurdish security forces that were still raging after sundown.

The assault appeared aimed at diverting attention from the Iraqi offensive to retake Mosul, and raised fears the extremists could lash out in unpredictable ways as they defend the largest city under their control and their last urban bastion in Iraq.

Multiple explosions rocked Kirkuk, and gunfire rang out around the provincial headquarters, where the fighting was concentrated. Smoke billowed over the city, and the streets were largely deserted out of fear of militant snipers.

North of the city, three suicide bombers stormed a power plant in the town of Dibis, killing 13 workers, including four Iranian technicians, before blowing themselves up as police arrived, said Maj. Ahmed Kader Ali, the Dibis police chief.

Iran’s Foreign Ministry spokesman, Bahram Ghasemi, condemned the assault, which he said also wounded three Iranian workers, according to the official IRNA news agency. It was not immediately clear if Iranians were targeted in other attacks.

Kirkuk is some 100 miles from the IS-held city of Mosul, where Iraqi forces launched a wide-scale offensive on Monday. IS has in the past resorted to suicide bombings in and around Baghdad in response to battlefield losses elsewhere in the country.

Iraqi and Kurdish forces backed by a U.S.-led coalition launched the multi-pronged assault this week to retake Mosul and surrounding areas – the largest operation undertaken by the Iraqi military since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

By Thursday, the Iraqi forces had advanced as far as Bartella, a historically Christian town some nine miles from Mosul’s outskirts.

“Bartella was liberated yesterday, and today we are inside its church,” Lt. Gen. Talib Shaghati declared on friday. “I bring the good news to our Christian brothers that the church is liberated.”

Some 3,900 people, or about 650 families, have fled Mosul and the nearby Hamdaniyah district since the operation began, according to Adrian Edwards of the U.N. refugee agency.

Ravina Shamdasani, of the U.N. human rights office, said it had “verified information” that IS forced 550 people to relocate to Mosul from the nearby villages of Samalia and Najafia on Monday, part of an “apparent policy of preventing civilians from escaping to areas controlled by Iraqi security forces.”

Shamdasani reiterated concerns IS could use civilians as human shields, and said the office was investigating reports that the group had killed at least 40 civilians for suspected disloyalty. She did not provide further details.

Schreck reported from Irbil, Iraq. Associated Press writers Susannah George in Irbil, Ahmed Sami and Joseph Krauss in Baghdad, Bassem Mroue in Beirut , Amir Vahdat in Tehran, Qassim Abdul-Zahra in Bartella, Iraq, and Jamey Keaten in Geneva contributed to this report.</s>(IraqiNews.com) Nineveh – Iraqi media outlets reported on Saturday, that the Islamic State group executed 284 persons, including children in the city of Mosul over the past two days.

Al Sumaria News stated, “The victims were killed by firing squad at the Faculty of Agriculture north of the city of Mosul, where they were brought to the site on three consecutive batches,” adding that, “After the execution the bodies were transferred by bulldozers to mass graves at the same area.”

“Nearly 150 of these victims were executed after sunset on Thursday,” Al Sumaria added. “61 victims did not exceed the age of 14 years, and the dead were residents of villages and towns located to the northwest of Mosul, including al-Zawiya town,” Al Sumaria explained.

The ISIS is trying to strengthen its grip on Mosul, while the joint security forces, backed by the Army Aviation and the international coalition air force, continue advancing in the battle to liberate Mosul from the grip of ISIS.</s>Almost week into the U.S.-led onslaught, many of those running the campaign say the battle to retake the city could be long and hard. But they have also identified what they think is a chink in the jihadists' armor.

If local fighters in Mosul can be persuaded to drop their allegiance to Islamic State, there is a chance that the battle can be brought to a more speedy conclusion, and that could have major implications for the future of Iraq.

Against a background of splits and rebellions in the Islamic State ranks in Mosul, some opposing commanders believe that a successful attempt to win over those local fighters could mean the battle lasts only weeks rather than months.

Mosul, Iraq's second biggest city, is where IS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi declared his Sunni caliphate in 2014, after his alliance between millenarian Islamists and veteran officers from the disbanded army of Saddam Hussein roared back into Iraq from bases they set up in the mayhem of Syria's war. Five Iraqi army divisions melted away before jihadis numbered in hundreds.

Now the battle to retake Mosul pits an unwieldy coalition of a 30,000-strong Iraqi regular force backed by the US and Europeans, alongside Kurdish and Shi’ite militias, against jihadis who have exploited the Sunni community’s sense of dispossession in Iraq and betrayal in Syria.

Not just its outcome but the political sensitivity with which this battle is handled could determine the future of Islamic State and Sunni extremism, as well as the shape of this part of the Middle East, which is being shattered into sectarian fragments.

Islamic State fighters, estimated at between 4,000 and 8,000, have rigged the city with explosives, mined and booby-trapped roads, built oil-filled moats they can set alight, dug tunnels, and trenches and have shown every willingness to use Mosul’s up to 1.5 million civilians as human shields.

Islamic State would seem to have a plentiful supply of suicide bombers, launching them in scores of explosives-laden trucks against Kurdish peshmerga fighters converging on Mosul from the east and northeast, and Iraqi forces, spearheaded by counter-terrorism units, advancing from the south and southwest.

"Mosul will be a multi-month endeavor. This is going to take a long time," a senior U.S. official said in Iraq.

Karim Sinjari, Interior Minister in the self-governing Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) of northern Iraq, said IS would put up a fierce fight because of Mosul's symbolic value as capital of its self-proclaimed Islamic caliphate.

"If Mosul is finished the caliphate they announced is finished. If they lose in Mosul, they will have no place, just Raqqa (in Syria)," Sinjari said.

Adept at exploiting divisions among its enemies, last Friday's dawn assault by IS on Kirkuk, for example, was not just an attempt to divert Iraqi and Kurdish forces and relieve pressure on the main front.

It was also intended to galvanize Sunni Arab opinion against the Kurds, whose Iraqi peshmerga and Syrian Kurdish militia have fielded the most effective ground forces against IS.

That is why many of those invested in the battle for Mosul stress the need to break the cohesion of IS and the allegiance it has won or coerced among alienated Sunni, in Mosul and beyond.

The opportunity is there, they say.

They believe that while foreign jihadis will fight to the finish to protect their last stronghold in Iraq, the Iraqi fighters, many from Mosul itself, may lay down their arms.

“Most of the (IS) fighters now are local tribal fighters. They have some foreign fighters, they have some people from other parts of Iraq and Syria, but the majority are local fighters,” says a senior Kurdish military intelligence chief.

“If we can take this away from them, the liberation of Mosul is a job of a week or two weeks.”

Fissures are widening inside the IS camp, with Iraqi, Kurdish and Western sources reporting resistance in Mosul and a spate of attacks on its leaders.

Sinjari, also the KRG acting defense minister, says there is growing resentment against the group's brutality.

“There is information that many people are revolting and carrying out attacks against IS. A number of Daesh members were killed on the streets at night," Sinjari said. This was confirmed by the U.S. official but could not be independently verified.

It fits with accounts of a recent abortive uprising against IS, led by a former aide to Baghdadi, that ended with the execution of 58 Daesh dissidents.

Crucially, more than half IS’s fighting strength comes from Sunni tribes initially relieved they were being freed from sectarian persecution by a Shi’ite dominated government in Baghdad and a corrupt and brutal army.

Some strategists believe those tribes could turn against the brutality of IS rule – just as the Sunni tribal fighters of the Sahwa or Awakening turned against al-Qaeda in Iraq a decade ago – if Baghdad guarantees their lives and livelihoods.

In Mosul, there are Iraqi tribal people in IS who pledged allegiance when the group arrived, a Kurdish intelligence chief said.

“If the Iraqis send a message and reassure these Sunni Iraqis that they will be given a second chance I think it is wise to do so, because if they put their weapons down you are definitely taking out 60 percent of their (IS) fighting force”.

The official emphasized the need for the US-led coalition’s close involvement in Mosul, especially after the experience of the recapture of Falluja, Ramadi and Tikrit, IS-held cities where refugees and local Sunnis suffered at the hands of Shi’ite militias.

In the battle for Mosul, it has supposedly been agreed that neither Shi’ite fighters nor Kurdish peshmerga will enter the city when it falls to avoid stoking a sectarian backlash.

While the anti-IS coalition has gained momentum, military strategists and intelligence officials say the closer the Iraqi forces get to Mosul, the harder it will be.

"If they decide to defend the city then it will be more difficult and the process will slow down," the intelligence chief said.

Once inside Mosul, Iraqi special forces would have to go from street to street to clear explosives and booby traps set up by Islamic State.

"The roads are very narrow. You can’t use vehicles or tanks, so it will be a fight, person by person," Sinjari said.

Until now, it has been easy for the coalition to hit IS positions in deserted villages around Mosul but the air strikes will slow down once Iraqi forces get into the city.

Islamic State, Iraqi commanders say, have succeeded in the past in blocking army troops from moving against them by staging suicide attacks and rigging explosives.

But they say that would no longer be an obstacle in Mosul as the Iraqi army has recently received an effective guided missile system that destroys explosives-packed vehicles.

The Iraqi commanders say their tactic now would be to cut Islamic State fighters off from the hinterland of supporting villages then split the city into different neighborhoods.

Brigadier Haider Abdul Muhsin al-Darraji, from the army 10th division, said military units would launch simultaneous attacks from multiple fronts on Mosul, divide the city into sectors to isolate IS fighters. And with coalition air strikes the jihadis will have little chance of getting reinforcements from the western side, which has been left open to encourage their departure towards Syria.

The difficulty is how to hit IS targets inside Mosul without causing massive civilian casualties.

"Its just like a tough surgery to remove a brain tumor," Darraji said.

Colonel Mahdi Ameer from the 9th Iraqi army division fighting south of Mosul said Islamic State had "deliberately blocked residents from leaving the city to use them as human shields and prolong the battle".

Islamic State’s enemies do not underestimate the group’s strength, which depends on experienced former senior Baathist officers and Islamist radicals willing to blow themselves up to defend their Sunni heartland.

"They are much more organized than the peshmerga and others. They have good administration, a good support system and enough weapons and ammunitions,” said the Kurdish counter-terrorism official.

The Mosul offensive will be the most important battle fought in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. What happens next will shape or break an already fractured Iraq.

"There are growing concerns about fixing the political peace the day after liberating Mosul," said Hoshyar Zebari, a top Iraqi politician and former finance minister.

"How will this multi-ethnic, multi-sectarian city ... be governed and run without communal conflict, without revenge killing, without a large displacement of people? That needs some political planning on how the city will be governed. It should have a strong representative governance in the city."

But the battle against radical Islamists in the region will not end with the liberation of Mosul.

"Mosul is not be the end of Islamic State or the end of extremism in this region. They will go back to more asymmetric warfare. We will see suicide attacks inside Kurdistan, inside Iraqi cities and elsewhere."</s>Nearly 1,000 people have been treated for breathing problems linked to toxic gases from a sulphur plant which Islamic State militants are suspected to have set on fire near the city of Mosul, hospital sources said on Saturday.

No deaths were reported in connection with the incident, said the sources at the hospital in Qayyara, a town south of Mosul. The first cases began arriving on Friday morning, they said.

A sulphur plant caught fire earlier this week as the Iraqi army dislodged Islamic State fighters from the area of Mishraq, north of Qayyara. The US military said the militants had deliberately set it on fire.

Islamic State launched a major attack on the city of Kirkuk on Friday as Iraqi and Kurdish forces pursued operations to seize territory around Mosul in preparation for an offensive on the jihadists’ last major stronghold in Iraq.

Islamic State’s assault on Kirkuk, which lies in an oil-producing region, killed 18 members of the security forces and workers at a power station outside the city, including two Iranians, a hospital source said. Crude oil production facilities were not targeted and the power supply continued uninterrupted in the city.

Kirkuk is located east of Hawija, a pocket still under control of Islamic State, also known as Isis, that lies between Baghdad and Mosul. With air and ground support from the US-led coalition, Iraqi government forces captured eight villages south and southeast of Mosul. Kurdish forces attacking from the north and east also captured several villages, according to statements from their respective military commands overnight.

The offensive that started on Monday to capture Mosul is expected to become the biggest battle fought in Iraq since the US-led invasion in 2003. US Secretary of Defence Ash Carter said on Friday, Turkey and Iraq had reached an agreement in principle that could allow a Turkish role in the Mosul campaign.

Speaking in Ankara after talks with Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Mr Carter said the details still needed to be hammered out. Nato member Turkey sees Mosul as firmly within its sphere of influence, but Iraq views Turkish military moves on its territory with apprehension.

The United Nations says Mosul could require the biggest humanitarian relief operation in the world, with worst-case scenario forecasts of up to a million people being uprooted. About 1.5 million residents are still believed to be inside Mosul. Islamic State has taken 550 families from villages around Mosul and is holding them close to Islamic State locations in the city, probably as human shields, a spokeswoman for the UN human rights office said in Geneva.
The Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant executes at least 284 people in Mosul.