Int’l coalition kills six Islamic State terrorists in Iraq’s Nineveh

Nineveh (IraqiNews.com) – The Iraqi army announced on Tuesday that six Islamic State militants were killed in an airstrike by the US-led international coalition in Nineveh province.

“A joint force of the army’s 66th and 22nd brigades clashed with a number of Islamic terrorists near the Atshana Mountains, northwest of Mosul, forcing them to retreat to a safe place inside one of tunnels,” the Security Media Cell said in a press statement.

“Later, the US-led international coalition bombarded the tunnel, leaving six IS militants dead and a terrorist hotbed destroyed,” added the statement.

Iraq declared the collapse of Islamic State’s territorial influence in November 2017 with the recapture of Rawa, a city on Anbar’s western borders with Syria, which was the group’s last bastion in Iraq.

IS declared a self-styled “caliphate” in a third of Iraq and neighboring Syria in 2014. A government campaign, backed by a U.S.-led international coalition and paramilitary forces, was launched in 2016 to retake IS-held regions, managing to retake all havens, most notably the city of Mosul, the group’s previously proclaimed capital.