Iraqi defense ministry releases video of ISIS-held western Mosul

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - The Iraqi defence ministry released a video Sunday that it claims was taken in the ISIS-occupied part of western Mosul, to show that its intelligence agents have infiltrated neighborhoods still held by the militants.

 

“The heroes of the directorate of military intelligence were able to infiltrate the Daesh (ISIS) militants inside their defense lines and inside the heart of Mosul and the city center,” said the Iraqi General Directorate of Intelligence in a statement posted on the Iraqi defence ministry.

 

The video shows some roads inside Mosul, with a voice saying the film is being shot by Iraqi intelligence agents.  

 

At one stage the male voice says they have arrived at the fifth bridge on the Tigris River, or Jisir al-Khamis.  It then shows footage of a mosque, believed to be the Great Mosque of Mosul, or the Nuree Mosque as it is also called, where ISIS leader Abu Bakir al-Baghdadi announced the foundation of his so-called Islamic caliphate in Iraq and Syria in July 2014.

 

The voice on the video says that Iraqi intelligence agents carry out surveillance, track down ISIS militants and kill them.

 

It also threatens that those who have adhered to ISIS or have cooperated with it the group “will not survive,” unless they start to cooperate with the Iraqi security forces. 

 

Iraqi forces have liberated parts of Mosul’s east bank, where fighting continues as the military tries to push into more neighborhoods.