At least five people have been killed and over a dozen others wounded in a bomb blast at a Shia mosque in the Iraqi capital of Baghdad, security officials say.
The bombing was carried out on Wednesday in the Obeidi area of the city when an assailant blew up his explosives in the entrance of the mosque as worshippers were exiting after midday prayers.
The ISIL Takfiri terror group, which captured parts of Iraq’s west and north in 2014, claimed the bombing in a statement, saying an attacker identified as "Abu Salem" carried it out with an explosives-rigged belt.
Iraqi forces have succeeded in taking back significant territory north of the country, as the militants have been pushed back from some of their major bastions, including the cities of Tikrit and Baiji in Salahuddin Province, while the operation continues to retake positions in the Western province of Anbar and also in the northern province of Nineveh.
ISIL has also suffered setbacks in the north of Anbar as Kurdish forces, known as Peshmerga, purged the terrorists from the border city of Sinjar last month. The loss of Sinjar and other areas in Anbar would deprive militants from most of their communications with terrorist-controlled areas in neighboring Syria.
source : irib
