Let Me Show You What ISIS Left Behind in Mosul
Iraq officially declared victory over the Islamic State in Mosul on Sunday, but a day later we heard artillery fired in other pockets of the city.
The Islamic State, which rejects Western iconography, had blurred out the faces of Dora the Explorer and Donald Duck.
In the nave, not far from where the altar would have sat, we found Islamic State-made mortar shells.
Churches, like mosques, were crucial hideouts for Islamic State members. They rightly assumed coalition forces would be reluctant to bomb religious sites.
Soldiers said it was C4, a plastic explosive. I’ve seen this before in Islamic State weapons factories, but never in a child’s backpack.
They said some Iraqi Islamic State members escaped by shaving their beards and joining fleeing civilians. Foreigners who couldn’t blend in had no escape.
It is a victory for Iraq to have cleared nearly all of the city, which had a population of at least a million.
But I saw a city devastated by fighting that United States officials have compared to the intensity of World War II.
3 Miles
Tigris
Mosul
Old
City
Light damage
Moderate damage
Heavy damage
3 Miles
Tigris
Mosul
Old
City
Light damage
Moderate damage
Heavy damage
3 Miles
Tigris
Mosul
Old
City
Light damage
Moderate damage
Heavy damage
3 Miles
Tigris
Mosul
Old
City
Light damage
Moderate damage
Heavy damage
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