Iraqi Kurdish fighters backed by US warplanes retook the country's largest dam from jihadists on Sunday, as Sunni Arab tribesmen and security forces fought the militants west of Baghdad. The recapture of Mosul dam marks the biggest major prize clawed back from Islamic State (IS) jihadists since they launched their offensive in northern Iraq in early June when they swept Iraqi security forces aside.
IS militants, who have declared a "caliphate" straddling vast areas of Iraq and Syria, also came under air attack in their Syrian stronghold of Raqa today, a monitoring group said. Syria's air force carried out 16 raids on the city of Raqa and several more on the town of Tabqa in Raqa province, killing at least 31 jihadists and eight civilians, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
Two months of violence have brought Iraq to the brink of breakup, and world powers relieved by the exit of divisive premier Nuri al-Maliki are sending aid to the hundreds of thousands who have fled their homes as well as arms to the Kurdish peshmerga forces. Buoyed by the air strikes US President Barack Obama ordered last week, Kurdish forces are fighting to win back ground they had lost since the start of August, when the jihadists went back on the offensive north, east and west of the city of Mosul, capturing the dam on August 7.
Earlier today, US warplanes and drones pummelled the militants fighting against the Kurdish advance. The US Central Command reported that the military had carried out 14 air strikes during the day near the dam, which, located on the Tigris river, provides electricity and irrigation water for farming to much of the region. CENTCOM said the strikes destroyed 10 IS armed vehicles, seven IS Humvees, two armoured personnel carriers and one IS checkpoint.
An AFP journalist saw towers of smoke rising from the area of the dam, apparently from the sites of strikes. In Syria's Raqa, the air strikes were the "most intensive" against the IS since the jihadists joined the anti-regime revolt in that country in spring 2013, the Observatory said. "The regime wants to show the Americans that it is also capable of striking the IS," said the Britain-based group's director, Rami Abdel Rahman. In western Iraq's Anbar province, security forces backed by Sunni Arab tribal militia, who announced a new effort against the jihadists on Friday, made gains west of the provincial capital Ramadi, police said.
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