Iraqi forces find child soldiers, mass graves in the push toward Mosul

In Iraqi boy fleeing ISIS near Mosul holds a white flag
(Image credit: Bulent Kilic/Getty Images)

Iraqi soldiers making their way toward Mosul, the last major city controlled by the Islamic State in Iraq, are in the process of taking the final town on the city's southern outskirts on Saturday. Hammam al-Alil is defended by about 70 ISIS fighters, some of whom attempted to escape while others are fighting back with attempted suicide bombings.

The UN Refugee Agency said Friday it has received reports that ISIS is conscripting all boys aged 9 or older in Hammam al-Alil to bolster defenses. ISIS has executed dozens of Hammam al-Alil residents and is using others as human shields.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up
Explore More
Bonnie Kristian

Bonnie Kristian was a deputy editor and acting editor-in-chief of TheWeek.com. She is a columnist at Christianity Today and author of Untrustworthy: The Knowledge Crisis Breaking Our Brains, Polluting Our Politics, and Corrupting Christian Community (forthcoming 2022) and A Flexible Faith: Rethinking What It Means to Follow Jesus Today (2018). Her writing has also appeared at Time Magazine, CNN, USA Today, Newsweek, the Los Angeles Times, and The American Conservative, among other outlets.