The strikes began late on Tuesday as hundreds of vehicles carrying weapons and ammunition attempted to leave the Islamists’ last positions to the west of the city, the Joint Operations Command said.
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At least another 60 ISIL vehicles were destroyed later by air strikes conducted by Iraqi and US-led coalition aircraft on a convoy heading north-west of Fallujah, said Anbar operations command chief Ismail Mahalawi. Now the group is estimated to control 14 percent of Iraqi territory, according to the office of Iraq’s prime minister.
The footage also purports to show survivors of the strikes trying to take cover under shrubs or attempting to melt into the desert before being fired upon by Iraqi forces.
Losing Fallujah, 65 kilometers (40 miles) west of Baghdad, was a huge blow to the Sunni militant group, depriving it of bomb-making facilities, a safe haven for training recruits and sources of income through taxing the local population. Christopher Garver, who used the Arabic name for the Islamic State group. USA coalition aircraft joined in the attacks on the convoy, NBC reported.
The militants in the convoy may have been moving east to reinforce the Islamic State forces under attack near the Iraq-Syria border town of Abu Kamal, in the Euphrates River valley, defense officials said.
Iraqi forces declared the city of Fallujah fully liberated Sunday, after government troops pushed the remaining Islamic State fighters out of the city’s north and west under close cover of US -led coalition airstrikes. Then, as Col. Chris Garver explains, “When we could positively identify this as a convoy of Da’esh fighters, Iraqi Air Force and Coalition airstrikes attacked the convoy throughout the night and into Wednesday morning”. A week ago, virtually the whole population of Fallujah flooded out of the city after Islamic State fighters lifted road blocks and encouraged starving residents to flee. The escaping terrorists were trapped by Iraqi Army roadblocks in the area of Hassi.
US-led coalition airstrikes have “destroyed” 150 Islamic State-owned vehicles in Iraq’s Anbar province as they were leaving Fallujah, the White House said on Thursday.
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“More than 20 helicopters took part in the mission and were able to destroy more than 138 vehicles”, Iraqi army commander Lt. Gen. Hamed Al-Maliki, said Wednesday in a Ministry of Defense video. Iraqi security destroyed more, but that number is not known. An Iraqi pilot said in the same video that Iraqi forces had not hurt any women or children in the attack.
