IRBIL, Iraq (AP) — Iraqi officials have begun the excavation of what is believed to be a mass grave left behind by the ...

Lastly, the United States learned a hard lesson when all U.S. troops left Iraq in 2011. About 5,000 are back in the country to support the push on Mosul.

Iraqi officials have begun the excavation of what is believed to be a mass grave left behind by ISIL (ISIS) during its years ...

Mosul is the most critical battle to date in the campaign to drive the Islamic State from Iraq. It is Iraq’s second-largest city and was captured by militants more than two years ago.

The project’s director said victims buried at the huge site, near Mosul, include executed soldiers, members of the Yazidi ...

Iraq's long-shuttered Mosul International Airport, rebuilt after it was devastated by ISIS, has drawn bids from foreign ...

Other officials estimate that an eight to 12 brigades, or an estimated 24,000 to 36,000 troops, will be needed for the Mosul operation. Currently, Iraq has just two brigades in Makhmour.

Mosul was by far the largest city seized by Islamic State in its offensive three years ago where the ultra-hardline group declared its "caliphate" over adjoining parts of Iraq and Syria.

It captured Mosul in June 2014, butchered thousands of people and prompted an exodus from Iraq’s second largest city. Harrowing accounts of suffering and survival surfaced in the ensuing months.

In 2014, Islamic State militants seized Mosul, the second-largest city in Iraq, in a prelude to a rampage that saw the group proclaim a caliphate over wide swaths of Iraq and Syria.

So far in the Mosul offensive, Iraq’s counterterrorism forces, which are by far the military’s most battle seasoned unit, have done most of the fighting, advancing from east of the city.

The Iraqi forces moving on Mosul will include at least 10 Iraqi Army brigades and two Kurdish Peshmerga brigades, all trained by the U.S. led coalition in Iraq.