Mosul Old City Resident Cheers on Iraqi Forces Near Al-Nuri Mosque

Iraqi security forces engaged in several street-to-street clashes with Islamic State fighters in the vicinity of the historic al-Nuri Mosque in western Mosul’s Old City on April 16, according to Iraqi media reports.A number of Iraqi forces were wounded, however, new house-to-house search and clear tactics have enabled local forces to destroy at least one IS headquarters near the mosque on April 16.Otherwise known as the Great Mosque, al-Nuri served as the backdrop for Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s declaration of the caliphate in July 2014, and has remained a strategic compound in IS-controlled Mosul in the time since.