The Iraqi government -- supported by Shiite militias from Iran -- launched a large-scale military operation to take out Islamic State militants from Iraq’s western Anbar province Monday.
The operation is under way to recapture Fallujah and Ramadi, a senior defense official at the Pentagon confirmed to Fox News Monday. The efforts are supported by Shiite militias, known as Popular Mobilization Units, from Iran and its proxy Hezbollah.
Photos of Iran’s Quds force Commander Qasem Soleimani visiting Shia militia units inside Iraq have appeared on social media since ISIS took over large portions of Iraq a year ago.
The defense official was unaware of any U.S. air support boosting the operation. It has been longstanding Pentagon policy to support only units aligned with the government of Iraq, but the line can be blurred as the chain of command for units operating in Iraq is not always known.
The spokesman for the Joint Operations Command, Brig. Gen. Yahya Rasool, said in a televised statement that the operation started at dawn Monday and that government forces are backed by Shiite and Sunni pro-government fighters.
The operation met fierce resistance from insurgents, who deployed five suicide car bombs and fired rockets to repel their advance on the city of Fallujah, about 30 miles west of Baghdad, military sources in Anbar told Reuters.
There were also reports of fighting around the provincial capital Ramadi, captured by Islamic State two months ago.
There were also reports of fighting around Ramadi-- captured by Islamic State two months ago. Iraqi forces pushed towards the provincial capital from the west and the south, police sources in the province said. Islamic State supporters said those advances were repelled by the militants.