Iraqi Forces Pound Besieged Tikrit Jihadists
Source: Agence France-Presse
Baghdad (AFP) - Iraqi forces Friday battled Islamic State jihadists making what looked increasingly like a last stand in Tikrit, but the group responded by vowing to expand its "caliphate".
Thousands of fighters surrounded a few hundred IS holdouts, pounding their positions with helicopter and artillery strikes but treading carefully to avoid the thousands of bombs littering the city centre.
Two days after units spearheading Baghdad's biggest anti-IS operation yet pushed deep into Tikrit, a police colonel claimed around 50 percent of the city was now back in government hands.
"We are surrounding the gunmen in the city centre. We're advancing slowly due to the great number of IEDs (improvised explosive devices)," he told AFP. "We estimate there are 10,000 IEDs in the city," he said.
Massively outnumbered, the jihadists are defending themselves with a network of booby traps, roadside bombs and snipers, with suicide attackers occasionally ramming car bombs into enemy targets.
<snip>
Read more: http://news.yahoo.com/iraq-forces-wont-rushed-final-tikrit-assault-104224042.html
Much more at the link, including on the key role of the Iranians. Ooh, ISIS really doesn't like
them.
= new reply since forum marked as read
