Despite there being no more combat operations in Mosul for
over two weeks now there is still violence in east Mosul. Two car bombs were discovered
and destroyed in two
separate neighborhoods. Those were probably the work of Islamic State sleeper
cells who are active in the city. The 9th and 16th
Divisions ran into an IS cell in Kuba,
killing four who were all wearing suicide belts. Rockets,
mortars and drone strikes by IS hit three areas killing 11 and wounding another
15. The shelling has gotten so bad that clean up operations to get rubble, etc.
off the streets have been halted. Authorities
had already imposed a curfew on northeastern sections of the city where the IS
strikes have been the heaviest. This points to the situation getting worse,
highlighted by the growing casualty figures.
What gets far less coverage is the fact that Coalition air
strikes and Iraqi shelling are taking a toll as well. A Coalition hit upon east
Mosul was blamed
for killing three and wounding 10. That was reported in a few Iraqi papers, but
it would seem odd that the Iraqi forces (ISF) would call in an air strike on
liberated east Mosul so this story may be false. ISF artillery
fire also hit a market in west Mosul leading to 20 deaths and 7 injured.
The Iraqis are hitting west Mosul every day so there are likely casualties all
the time, but because that side of the city is under IS control they are rarely
reported.
The Islamic State was still killing people in west Mosul to
maintain its hold over the population. 13 civilians were executed
for trying to get across the Tigris River to the government controlled side.
Over the last few days the group was also accused
of taking the lives of 46 young men who refused to join the group’s armed wing.
These are daily occurrences, and meant to instill fear in the population so
that the militants can keep them under control.
The Nujafi brothers are still a point of controversy in
Ninewa. Vice President Osama Nujafi claimed that after his
brother’s Ninewa Guards were told to leave Mosul there was looting, burning of
property and kidnappings. He was then accused of lying and making these stories
up. Osama and Atheel Nujafi hail from Mosul and have attempted to rebuild their
base via participating in the battle for the city. That has angered their
rivals who are increasingly attacking them, and caused Atheel to receive an
arrest warrant forcing him out of Mosul.
Prime Minister Haidar Abadi took aim at Human Rights Watch
(HRW). HRW released a report
at the start of February accusing a Sunni Hashd unit of detaining people at
displaced camps that were not on government want lists. The premier claimed
that the paper was full of fallacies. Baghdad has become increasingly hostile
to any bad press. It criticized
the United Nations for its high casualty figures for November 2016. It banned
embedded reporters in Ninewa in December, and now it’s going after Human Rights
Watch. These have all been political moves meant to discredit anything that
questions the government’s victory narrative that it has been pushing as
propaganda since 2014.
The International Organization for Migration’s (IOM) latest Factsheet
provided added information to earlier United Nation’s reporting that more
people were going back to their homes than leaving them in Ninewa. From
February 3 to 9 the number of registered displaced went down from 161,094 to
152,922. In total, IOM counted 46,278 people having returned in the province
since the start of the Mosul campaign in October 2016.
SOURCES
Adel,
Loaa, "WMC: Security forces detonate car bomb in eastern Mosul,"
2/9/17
AIN,
"Daesh executed 46 young men and boys in East Mosul," 2/9/17
Buratha News, “Osama Najafi back to his lies about
witnessing riots and burning during operations,” 2/9/17
Al
Forat, "Car bomb in al-Nassir neighborhood in Mosul dismantled,"
2/9/17
Human Rights Watch, “Iraq: Men Fleeing Mosul Held in
Secret,” 2/2/17
International Organization for Migration, “Displacement
Tracking Matrix Emergency Tracking Factsheet #15 – Mosul Operations From 17
October to 9 February,” 2/9/17
Iraq Oil Report, “Inside Mosul: Feb. 9, 2017,” 2/10/17
Al Maalomah, “Why did the cleaning work stop in east Mosul?”
2/9/17
Al Mada, “Coalition forces surprised by Abadi’s criticism of
Human Rights report,” 2/9/17
Al
Masalah, "The martyrdom of three children in coalition raid on school east
Mosul," 2/9/17
Mostafa, Mohamed, “Iraq puts out fires at Qayyara oil field
in northern Iraq – ministry,” Iraqi News, 2/9/17
-
"IS rockets kill school student in east Mosul, unknown rockets kill 8 in
west," Iraqi News, 2/9/17
Roblin, Sebastien, “Baghdad Doesn’t Want You to Know How
Many of Its Soldiers Are Dying,” War Is Boring, 1/4/17
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