ISIS abducts nearly 200 Iraqi children to use as human shields in battle for Mosul

Jardine Malado Wednesday, March 29, 2017

Displaced people who fled Islamic State militants from Mosul walk past at Deepaka camp in the northwest of Erbil, during an operation to attack Islamic State militants in Mosul, Iraq, October 20, 2016. | Reuters/Alaa Al-Marjani

The Islamic State terror group has kidnapped nearly 200 children to use as human shields as Iraqi forces continue to advance toward the territories held by the militants in Mosul.

According to the Iraqi Observatory for Human Rights, 197 children have been taken hostage by ISIS militants near the Al-Nuri mosque in west Mosul. Sources have said that the terror group intends to use the children as human shields to thwart the efforts of Iraqi troops to retake the city.

The military operation to liberate western Mosul was recently suspended by the Iraqi forces due to the increasing number of civilian casualties, according to Iraqi News.

Lt. Gen. Stephen Townsend, the top U.S. general in Baghdad, said on Tuesday that ISIS militants in Mosul may have herded civilians into a building as human shields just before the March 17 airstrike that killed over 100 people.

Townsend said that ISIS may have also set booby traps and other bombs inside the building to set off secondary explosions. He insisted that one coalition bomb "should not have collapsed an entire building."

The Iraqi Observatory for Human Rights revealed in a statement on Saturday that around 4,000 civilians have died as a result of the battle to liberate the western part of the city.

Iraqi Brig. Gen. Thaer al-Mosawi stated last week that as many as 3,846 civilians have died since the start of the operation on west Mosul in Mid-February. Over 22,000 civilians have been injured in the conflict, and more than 10,000 homes have been destroyed, according to al-Mosawi.

On Sunday, Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi claimed that ISIS will be defeated in the country "within weeks," but he acknowledged that the militants would continue to exist until it is completely eradicated in Syria and the Middle East.

"At the moment we are at a very important juncture where Daesh is on the retreat. We in Iraq have been killing Daesh, removing them from our land. We are killing their aim so that recruits are minimal at the moment," the prime minister said.

"In Iraq the defeat is sure, it's definite. We'll finish the job in a very short time â€“ it's within reach...within the next few weeks. We are defeating them militarily...we need the efforts of others to flush them out in Syria and other places," he continued.