Saudi Security Forces foiled major terror attempts by storming two hideouts of terrorist cells in Jeddah, like reported by aawsat.com.

The first operation, in al-Harazat District, resulted in two terrorists blowing themselves up after refusing to surrender to the security forces.

While in the second security operation in al-Nasim district, a Saudi national Hussam Bin al-Juhani and a Pakistani woman Fatimah Baloch were arrested

The security spokesman of the Ministry of Interior, Maj-Gen. Mansour al-Turki, said Saudi security forces surrounded a house in Jeddah’s eastern al-Harazat district and exchanged fire with the men, who blew themselves up after refusing to surrender to police calls.

The hideout at Harazat was used as a lab for making explosive belts and bombs.

He added that the man arrested at the second hideout, in Nasim District, was linked to those in the al-Harazat property.

The terrorist claimed the Pakistani women was his wife. In the apartment, the security men found a machine gun, a bag primed with explosives and other items.

Security authorities are still collecting evidence from the two locations and conducting investigations with the arrested persons. All details and identities of the terrorists will be announced later, Turki added.

The preemptive operation is yet another defeat for ISIS Jeddah cell, after Saudi authorities managed over the past two years to arrest several terrorists who were planning to target several facilities in the kingdom.

Two weeks ago, another preemptive strike led to the death of two terrorists in Yasmin neighborhood in Riyadh, one of which was an expert in making explosive belts.

In September 2015, security forces discovered a place for manufacturing explosive belts in Dhurma district. Few weeks after that, the forces also arrest a Syrian national who took a Filipina captive to help make explosive belts. This became known as the Fayhaa district cell, where ISIS resorts to using women as part of its camouflage.

The Ministry of Interior thwarted a number of terrorist operations by carrying out preemptive strikes which led to the arrest of 566 of ISIS supporters and sympathizers forming eight terrorist cells. They included six women and five experts in manufacturing explosives and explosive vests. Six labs for manufacturing explosive were also busted.

In three days of operations that began Jan. 18, coalition forces struck 90 watercraft and three barges on the Tigris River in Mosul, Iraq, U.S. Central Command officials reported to abna24.com .

Many of these watercraft were being used to ferry ISIS terrorists and equipment across the river from East Mosul to West Mosul in an attempt to escape the Iraqi security forces as they continued to clear the remaining portions of East Mosul, officials said.

Iraqi security forces secured the Eastern bank of all five bridges across the Tigris River in Mosul during the past week of clearing operations, they added, making it difficult for ISIS terrorists to flee.

“We believe this was a desperate attempt to retrograde ISIS terrorists now that the Iraqi security forces own the eastern bank of every bridge in Mosul,” said Air Force Col. John L. Dorrian, spokesman for Combined Joint Task Force Operation Inherent Resolve. “This is one more example of how the coalition is supporting the military defeat of ISIS by launching airstrikes while Iraqi military complete the clearance of eastern Mosul.”

Since the operation to liberate Mosul began Oct. 17, the coalition has destroyed at least 112 watercraft on the Tigris River in Mosul, officials said, with several more damaged or destroyed outside of the city.

An official source revealed that the Islamic State’s Diwan al-Hisba (Treasury) started forming committees to force women to donate a gold jewelry to finance the group in western Mosul, Alsumaria News reported in Sunday, according to iraqinews.com

The source said, “The Islamic State’s Diwan al-Hisba formed committees forcing all women in western Mosul to donate a gold jewelry to finance the group, and imposed sanctions on several women who refused to donate.”

“Members of Diwan al-Hisba in al-Dawasa neighborhood in western Mosul tied up four women and flogged them for refusing to finance the Islamic State group,” the source added on condition of anonymity.

Noteworthy, Islamic State cut the wages of its members after losing a large area of lands that represented an important funding source for the group.

While eyewitnesses reported a mass exodus of ISIS commanders and fighters from the Syrian town of Raqqa to Deir Ezzor, the Kremlin broke its silence concerning disputes with Iran in several issues related to the Syrian file, particularly the current disagreement between Moscow and Tehran regarding the participation of U.S. representatives in the Astana talks, according to aawsat.com.

Eyewitnesses in the Raqqa city told the German news agency that since the start of 2017, hundreds of ISIS commanders and fighters were seen leaving the city in the direction of Deir Ezzor, adding that the majority of the ISIS members were Arab and foreign fighters.

An eyewitness in al-Thakana neighborhood in the Raqqa town told the German news agency that “early this month, ISIS commanders mainly nationals from Saudi Arabia, Tunisia, Egypt and Turkey had already left around 30 houses located in the neighborhood of al-Thakana, carrying with them a small quantity of luggage, which seems to only include their clothes.”

The report said that ISIS commanders had also emptied tens of houses in the neighborhoods of al-Firdaous, al-Thakana and Harat al-Haramiya.

ISIS had controlled the Raqqa city at the start of 2014. There are around 500 thousand people living in the city, mainly from the areas of Palmyra, al-Sakhnah and the countryside of Aleppo and Idlib.

Meanwhile, Russia deployed six long-range supersonic Tupolev Tu-22M3 bombers from Russian territory to strike ISIS targets in the Syrian governorate of Deir Ezzor, the Russian Defense Ministry reported on Saturday, according to Russia Today.

The bombers hit militant base camps, weapon stockpiles, and armored vehicles, the report said.

On Saturday, the Kremlin’s spokesperson, Dmitry Peskov, said during a television interview that Iran had opposed U.S. involvement at the Astana talks.

“But, Russia invited representatives from the U.S. administration to participate in Astana,” Peskov said.
The spokesperson ruled out that the talks would yield to any serious deals.

But, he said, “It’s clear that it will be impossible to constructively regulate the Syrian issue without the participation of the United States.”

The peace negotiations on Syria will take place on Monday in Astana, Kazakhstan.

Meanwhile, Minister of Foreign Affairs Adel bin Ahmed Al-Jubeir received at his office in Riyadh on Saturday General Coordinator of Supreme Commission for Negotiations of the Syrian Revolutionary and Opposition Forces, Riad Hijab.

The majority of Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) commanders in Mosul, the terrorist group’s last major stronghold in Iraq, have been killed by the U.S.-backed Iraqi government forces and their allies, an Iraqi general tells Reuters.

An alliance primarily made up of tens of thousands of Iraqi security forces, Kurdish Peshmerga troops, and Iran-allied Shiite militias has been fighting to push ISIS out of Mosul since mid-October.

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi and senior coalition commanders have said the Iraqi coalition has captured nearly all districts of eastern Mosul.

Meanwhile, western Mosul remains in the hands of ISIS, but Iraqi Lt. Gen. Abdul Ghani al-Assad told Reuters the coalition should be able to recapture that side.

“God willing, there will be a meeting in the next few days attended by all the commanders concerned with liberation operations,” Gen. Assad said when asked when the offensive to seize western Mosul will begin.

“It will not be harder than what we have seen. The majority of [IS] commanders have been killed in the eastern side,” he added without elaborating.

Nevertheless, the Middle East Monitor points out, “Iraqi and US military officers have previously said that the more densely populated west bank could pose additional military challenges. This is not only because of population density, but also because the militants have a greater concentration of forces there.”

On Wednesday, some Iraqi military officials estimated that Iraq controls about 95 percent of eastern Mosul.

“Today we celebrate … the liberation of the eastern bank in Mosul,” Lt. Gen. Talib Al-Jughati told reporters in Bartella, just outside Mosul, Wednesday, according to the Middle East Monitor.

ISIS has taken a heavy blow in the ongoing Mosul campaign, PM Abadi said Tuesday.

The jihadist group’s defeat in Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city, could spell the end of ISIS in the country.

“Several thousand civilians have been killed or wounded in the Mosul fighting since October,” Reuters points out.

“Earlier reports cited US military commanders as indicating that the fighting in Mosul had been so bloody, that the elite soldiers of the [Iraqi Counter-Terrorism Service] CTS had been depleted by around 50 per cent,” states the Middle East Monitor, adding, “It is therefore unlikely that the fight for western Mosul will be easier than the more than three months spent in eastern parts of the city.”

The Syrian army and allied fighters are on a counter-offensive against the Islamic State (IS) group in the southern rim of the eastern province of Deir al-Zour, a military source told Xinhua on Friday.

The Syrian forces are advancing toward the Graveyard area south of Deir al-Zour, amid intense battles with the IS terror group in that area, the source said, on condition of anonymity.

He said assorted kinds of weapons are being used coupled with heavy artillery shelling on the IS positions there.

The source added that IS suffered losses of many of its fighters in the battles in Deir al-Zour.

The counter-offensive comes the IS militants made significant gains against Syrian army in a new offensive in Deir al-Zour.

Earlier this week, the IS militants captured areas around the Deir al-Zour airbase, which enabled the group to cut the road between the base and the city, just a day after the militants captured the mountain overlooking the city.

This progress is dangerous as the airbase is the only lifeline left for the city, which has been besieged by IS since early 2015.

Cutting the road is not only cutting a lifeline but also dividing the government-controlled parts of the city into two parts, eastern and western, which tightens the noose on over 500,000 civilians in the city.

The IS next step is apparently attempting to capture the airbase, and in near future to storm the government-controlled parts of the city, if there was no surgical military operation to put an end to the marching IS terrorists.

Member of State of Law Coalition Nahla al-Hababi announced to iraqinews.com , that the Islamic State group is forcibly recruiting children, after its defeat in the battle against security forces from army, police, al-Hashd al-Shaabi and tribal fighters.

In a press statement, Hababi said, “The Islamic State group abducted 150 children from Tal Afar, and forcibly recruited them in the so-called ‘Cubs of Caliphate’.”

“The Islamic State is training children that were abducted from Tel Afar, Yazidi families and Mosul’s families to kill civilians and security members using booby-trapped vehicles and explosive belts,” Hababi added.

“The government and United Nations should prepare a rehabilitation program for these children,” she explained.

Hababi also emphasized the importance of the presence of rehabilitation centers and specialized psychiatrists to help these children.

A senior Jordanian military commander says the kingdom faces a growing threat to its border as Islamic State extremists in neighboring Iraq and Syria are being dislodged from their strongholds by military offensives, according to ap.org.

Brig. Gen. Sami Kafawin told reporters on Thursday he expects some IS fighters, increasingly on the defensive, to make their way to southern Syria and Jordan’s border. Kafawin commands the border guard forces.

He says there has been a “big difference” in threat levels over the last three years and that nearly half of Jordan’s military personnel and resources have been deployed along the Iraqi and Syrian border – a sharp increase from before the 2011 outbreak of the Syrian conflict.

He says Jordan is deploying “more and more forces” at the border to safeguard against IS.