Most of Mosul Airport Is Taken by Iraqi Forces in Push Against ISIS<br />23, 2017<br />MOSUL, Iraq — Iraqi forces seized most of Mosul’s airport on Thursday, an important milestone in the broader offensive to<br />retake the western half of the country’s second-largest city from the Islamic State, Iraqi and allied officials said.<br />One bombing attack was directed at a five-story building in Al Jumhuri medical complex in western Mosul<br />that an American official said had been turned into an Islamic State command center.<br />The push to take the airport, which has been led by the Iraqi federal police, is a promising start to what is expected to be a difficult<br />and bloody fight to completely evict the Islamic State from the city.<br />The Islamic State first conquered the city in 2014,<br />but it has consistently lost ground in recent months to Iraqi forces backed by coalition air support.<br />Abdulhadi Ahmed of Iraq’s counterterrorism unit said that Islamic State snipers had taken up positions in the air traffic control towers.<br />Moving south to north, Iraq’s federal police took Abu Saif, a town<br />that sits on high ground overseeing the Mosul airport, before moving on to the airfield itself.<br />The runways in the Mosul airport have been heavily damaged by the Islamic State to prevent Iraq and its allies from ferrying in troops and supplies.
