Mosul (AsiaNews) - The people of Mosul are worried and are preparing for the worst, after the announcement of a vast anti-terrorist offensive in the zone. The city has been left to itself for four years, and has never been the object of a real and proper military plan. The operation, which will be conducted jointly by United States and Iraqi forces, is still in a preparatory phase, but the people are already "desperate". It cannot be predicted how the terrorists will react, who for years have found a secure refuge in capital of the province of Nineveh. "Jihadists and criminals of all sorts, fleeing from the security operations in Anbar province and Baghdad, have infiltrated the very social fabric of the city", the inhabitants recount. "Children, young people, entire families are involved in various ways with the terrorists, who since the American innovation have been the only stable presence in the city, in the absence of any political or military authority".
The decision to carry out more intensive operations in Mosul was made last week after a series of attacks, the most serious of which, on January 23, killed at least 35 people according to official sources, but about 60 according to the Red Crescent. The following day, a suicide bomber caused the death of the head of the provincial police, Salih Mohammed Hassan Atiya al Juburi, who had come to investigate the scene of the attack. Yesterday Ansar al-Islam, a group linked to al-Qaeda, claimed responsibility for the attack: "We give them a lesson they won't ever forget".