ISIS militants, booby-trapped houses in Ramadi to delay civilians’ return

As the red, white and black flag of the Iraqi government was raised over the government compound in Ramadi, Iraq, on Monday, leaders of the U.S.-led military coalition against the Islamic State faced a new question: How do they and the Iraqi military recapture that success in other cities, some of which could be even tougher to win? The government sidelined the PMF in the Ramadi battle to ensure air support from the United States which is reluctant to be seen fighting on the same side as the Iranian-backed militias.

The coalition said its advisers were not on the ground during the Ramadi battle but provided training and equipment to Iraqi forces. But their progress was slowed by snipers, booby traps and the militants’ destruction of bridges leading into the city center. Most significantly, in November, ISIS-affiliated terrorists carried out attacks in Paris that left 130 people dead and hundreds more injured.

A military spokesman, Brig.

Rasool claimed that Ramadi had been fully liberated.

Moreover, the Iraqi forces will need to consolidate power over the areas they have already taken over, experts said.

General Sami al-Aardi, an Iraqi counterterrorism military officer, told Anadolu Agency that al-Abadi visited Ramadi to review the security operations in the city. Reuters was told that 93 government troops were admitted to Baghdad hospitals on Sunday alone.

“We are coming to liberate Mosul and it will be the fatal and final blow to [ISIL]”, he said. “There are still neighborhoods under their control and there are still pockets of resistance”.

Iraqi armed forces reclaimed Ramadi from Daesh on Monday.

A commentary published by Fars rejected the notion that the USA had helped in Ramadi.

He said there had been more than 600 airstrikes around Ramadi during the past six months.

Britain has been carrying out airstrikes against IS targets in Iraq since September a year ago as part of a US-led worldwide coalition.

IS militants still control an estimated 30 percent of the city, according to Gen. Ismail al-Mahlawi, head of military operations in Anbar province.

“I expect that IS will continue to be weakened in Iraq”, Khatib said.

Suham Sabah, 55, whose family of eight survived the occupation of Ramadi, said in a phone interview that his nephew had been killed by Islamic State militants.

The foreign secretary said that IS has been driven out of cities across the country by Iraqi forces, with support from the global coalition.

On Tuesday, as Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi was making his way to Ramadi, suspected ISIL fighters opened fire at his helicopter using small arms, but were too far out of range to do any damage.

Ramadi, a city of about 220,000 people, fell to the Islamic State in May 2014, after months of the militants attacking Iraqi security forces, and eventually overwhelming them and prompting survivors to flee. On the contrary, the dawn of 2016 finds Isil very much on the defensive in both Iraq and Syria, where the intensification of coalition air strikes – in due part to the Commons vote to allow RAF bombing operations in Syria – has seriously disrupted the organisation’s lucrative oil smuggling operation. It has declared a caliphate in the areas under its control and imposed a harsh and violent interpretation of Islamic law. One of the main challenges of the conflict since then has been rebuilding Iraq’s army into a force capable of capturing and holding territory.