Two years on: How does Mosul resist its ISIS occupiers?

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Two years after militants of the Islamic State (ISIS) captured Iraq’s second largest city, most people in Mosul are still waiting to be freed from the rule of the extremist group. People who are in touch with relatives in the city testify to this reality.

One piece of news reaching outside tells of peaceful resistance by civilians in Mosul. Even though all resistance is punishable by death, people have found ways to show their anger.

They paint on walls the letter ‘M’ the short for Muqawama, or resistance in Arabic. They also write the letter on pieces of paper and photograph it in parts of the city before posting it on social media.

The letter also gets sprayed on houses where ISIS fighters or leaders live, who often flee once they discover it, fearing it might means they are going to be targeted by coalition air strikes.

Possibly the most striking act of resistance is when civilians spray on public walls words such as ‘your days are numbered’ or ‘leave us alone’.

Thousands are listening to or phoning radio stations broadcasting from outside the caliphate or tell relatives that they can’t wait to be liberated by the army.

They know they are being used as human shields as fighters are living in among civilians. Schools have been turned into arms depots and for fear of air attacks people living near these schools have secretly moved elsewhere.

ISIS is also preparing for battle. Like in other cities it captured it is digging tunnels for leaders to escape unseen and for fighters to take cover.

Civilians report hearing the digging going on at night, and they dismiss the ISIS explanation that it is work on the sewage system.

At the same time the economic situation has gotten worse since roads connecting the city to Syria were severed by the Kurdish Peshmerga.

Food prices have likewise gone up enormously. So has the price of cooking gas so much so that many people can only afford one meal a day.

ISIS itself keeps raising taxes and adding new ones, causing many shops to close down. The group imposed a 50,000-dinar ($42) tax per month on street vendors. That business stopped, too.

There are reports of an ISIS ban on satellite TV since the beginning of Ramadan and a decree that all must wear in Afghan style dressing.

It is said that on Fridays men with scissors stand outside the mosques to cut trousers that are considered too long to above the ankle and in an act of defiance young men have since started wearing knee-long shorts that show their ankles.

These stories still reach the outside world even though making the contact is getting harder as ISIS has further restricted the use of the Internet. It has demanded that all users be registered in order to catch those who may report information on the group and its leaders.

Those caught would be executed publically as punishment and to scare those who may consider spying on the group.

One story circulating among Mosul civilians is the execution of a young girl who was executed recently after relaying information to her officer brother in Erbil about locations to be bombed. She was caught after the bombing for she did not delete the information from her phone.

Internet cafés are still open but the fact that all service providers have to register the names of their users it is keeping people away.

Sources believe that some three quarters of the people who were in contact with the outside world by email, WhatsApp, Viber have stopped doing so.

The main channel of contact now is secret phone calls, from the few places in the city where coverage of the Kurdish cell phone network, Korek, can be picked up.

ISIS tries to crack down on this activity by banning the sale of scratch cards and two sellers are said to have been executed.

But Mosul civilians resist this one, too. Relatives in the Kurdistan Region send them scratch card numbers by SMS so they stay in touch with the world outside the Islamic caliphate.