DId the Kurds retake Mosul Dam?
Iraqi TV is reporting that Kurdish and Iraqi government forces have retaken Mosul Dam.
Kurdish peshmerga fighters and Iraqi counter-terrorism forces have pushed Islamic State militants out of Mosul dam, state television reported on Monday.
The television station quoted Lieutenant-General Qasim Atta, a military spokesman, as saying the forces were backed by a joint air patrol. He did not give details. An independent verification was not immediately possible.
A Twitter account belonging to a media organization that supports the Islamic State said the dam was still under the group's full control.
On Sunday, a Mosul dam engineer who has been in close contact with Islamic State militants holding the dam said they had been placing roadside bombs along roads leading in and out of the complex in anticipation of an assault.
I am taking this claim with several grains of salt. The army spokesman, Lieutenant-General Qasim Atta, is the Baghdad Bob of this war, having been caught hugely exaggerating gains by the Iraqi army against Islamic State forces several times. In contrast, the Washington Post reports that Islamic State forces are "on the run" but still maintain control of the dam.
Baghdad Bob Atta may have jumped the gun. Or he may be lying. Suffice it to say, we're better off getting our war news from other sources than General Atta.