ERBIL, Kurdistan Region—Kurdish forces and US-led coalition airstrikes targeted several Islamic State positions near Mosul late on Saturday, drawing increasingly closer to the jihadists' most populous city, according to Kurdistan Region officials. Saeed Mamuzini, an official from the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) told Rudaw that the number of Islamic State (ISIS) casualties are not known but that major fire broke out in Gogjalil, a village near Mosul, as a result of the bombing. Mamuzini said the Peshmerga forces also pounded ISIS positions near the Christian town of Bashik with heavy artillery, killing four militants and wounding several others. The Kurdish Peshmerga pushed back ISIS militants in many areas they ceded to the group in August. During this period they have benefitted from western military aid, including anti-tank missiles from the German government. Meanwhile Sunni tribal chiefs reported that US air strikes in the town of Qaim on the Iraq-Syria border on Friday had killed 10 people and wounded 25 others, among them women and children. Sheikh Qasim al-Karbuli, chief of the Karbul tribe told Rudaw: “The fighter jets first fired a rocket at the house and when people rushed to help they fired a second rocket.” Qaim is a Sunni town 480 km northwest of Baghdad on the Euphrates River. It was overtaken by ISIS in June. Local sources told Rudaw that the Iraqi army had dropped leaflets in the Sunni city of Kubaisa in Anbar province ahead of a major assault, asking people to leave or hide in safe places.
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