United States (US) President Barack Obama has expressed confidence that Iraqi forces and their US-led allies would be able to drive ISIS out from its self-declared capital of Mosul as tens of thousands of fighters advanced in an unprecedented offensive to liberate the city.
“I am confident that we can succeed, although it is going to be a tough fight and a difficult fight. It is Iraqis who are doing the fighting. They are performing effectively and bravely and taking on significant casualties,” he told reporters on Tuesday at a joint news conference with visiting Italian Prime Minister Matteo Renzi in the Rose Garden of the White House.
“There will be ups and downs in this process, but my expectation is that ultimately it will be successful,” he added.
This, he said, will be a key milestone in what he committed to doing when ISIS first emerged, which was to roll them back and ultimately drive them out of population centres and destroy and defeat them so that they are not in a position to carry out terrorist attacks against Americans, their friends and allies, or against innocent people inside of Iraq and Syria.
The first group of civilians started fleeing Mosul following the start of the Iraqi offensive to recapture the city.
The civilians began arriving on the outskirts of government-held Al-Qayyarah on Tuesday.
“People are fleeing from their homes. There will be significant displacement. This has all been part of the coalition planning process, in conjunction with the United Nations (UN), in conjunction with major aid organisations. And so we have put together plans and infrastructure for dealing with a potential humanitarian crisis that are as extensive as the military plans,” Obama said.
He said if they are not successful in helping ordinary people as they are fleeing from ISIS, then that makes them vulnerable to seeing ISIS return and feeding on the resentments in the aftermath of Mosul being liberated.
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