ISIL Orders Rapid Withdrawal of Forces from Iraq’s Mosul to Syria’s Raqqa

The sources said that commander of Jeish al-Khilafeh (army of the Caliphate) have received an order from the ISIL leadership to pull their forces back from Mosul city in and move towards Raqqa.

They added that ISIL’s military command in Raqqa has meantime ordered the rest of commanders of the group in Iraq’s Nineveh province to gather their forces as soon as possible and move towards Raqqa after setting fire to their command posts and positions.

The Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi made a scheduled trip to the front-lines in the Northern city of Mosul on Tuesday in order to inspect the Iraqi forces battling the ISIL terror organization in the flashpoint city.

Photos of Iraqi prime minister meeting with soldiers from the Iraqi Army and Federal Police were published by local media outlets, Al Masdar reported.

Local media also said the Iraqi prime minister also visited the liberated areas of Mosul.

Abadi’s visit to Mosul marks the first time in nearly three years that any Iraqi Prime Minister has traveled to the Nineveh province located in Northwestern Iraq.

The visit by the Iraqi prime minister came as latest reports said elite Iraqi forces dislodged ISIL militants from the main government buildings in Mosul on Tuesday, their last major city stronghold in Iraq.

Seizing the government complex would help Iraqi forces attack the militants in the nearby old city center and mark a symbolic step towards restoring state authority over Mosul, even though the buildings are destroyed and not being used by the ISIL militants.

The battle for Mosul, which started on Oct. 17, will now enter a more complicated phase in the densely populated old city where, the Iraqi military believes, several thousand militants are among the remaining civilian population.