ISIS fighting near Fallujah creates 'dire situation'

ISIS fightershalted an Iraqi army assault on the city of Fallujah with acounter-attack at its southern gates on Tuesday, while theUnited Nations warned of peril for civilians trapped in the cityand used by militants as human shields.

The Iraqi army's assault on Fallujah has begun what isexpected to be one of the biggest battles ever fought againstISIS, with the government backed by world powersincluding the United States and Iran, and determined to win backthe first major Iraqi city that fell to the group in 2014.

• Iraqi forces reach southern edge of Fallujah
• UNsays Iraqi civilians dying at a 'staggering' rate
• Canada's trainingin Iraq and Syria passes Commons vote

A week after Baghdad announced the start of the assault, itstroops advanced in large numbers into the city limits for thefirst time on Monday, pouring into rural territory on itssouthern outskirts but stopping short of the main built-up area.

Baghdad describes the assault to retake the city as apotential turning point in its U.S.-backed campaign to defeatthe ultra-hardline Sunni Muslim militants who rule aself-proclaimed caliphate across much of Iraq and Syria.

Fallujah, where U.S. troops fought the biggest battles oftheir own 2003-11 occupation against the precursors to Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, is the militants' closest bastion to Baghdad,believed to be the base from which they have waged a campaign ofsuicide bombings on the capital less than an hour's drive away.

Retaking it would give the government control of the mainpopulation centres in the fertile Euphrates River valley west ofthe capital for the first time in more than two years.

But the assault is also a test of the army's ability tocapture territory while protecting civilians. Although most ofFallujah's population is believed to have fled during six monthsof siege, 50,000 people are still thought to be trapped insidewith limited access to food, water or healthcare.

'Human catastrophe'

"A human catastrophe is unfolding inFallujah. Families arecaught in the crossfire with no safe way out," said JanEgeland, secretary-general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, one of theorganizations helping families displaced from the city.

"Warring parties must guarantee civilians safe exit now,before it's too late and more lives are lost," he said.

A spokeswoman for the NRC in Baghdad told CBC News the situation is dire.

"They've not had any access to food, water, there's no medicine, there's no electricity," Becky Bakr Abdulla said.

"There's no fuel. They've had to survive on dried dates. Some have found rotten yogurt and rice. And the only drinking water is hot water from the river."

Families are simply trying to find a way to avoid the crossfire, she said.

The United Nations said there were reports that themilitants were using several hundred families as human shieldsin the city centre, a tactic they have employed in otherlocations in Iraq. It said 3,700 people had managed to escapethe city in the past week.

"Most people able to get out come from the outskirts ofFallujah. For some time militants have been controllingmovements, we know civilians have been prevented from fleeing,"saidArianeRummery, spokeswoman for UN refugee agencyUNHCR.

"There are also reports from people who left in recent daysthat they are being required to move withISILwithinFallujah,"she said, using an alternate acronym for the group which is also known asDaesh.

Abdulla said she only knows of one family that has escaped from the city of Fallujah, but about 560 families have escaped from surrounding villages.

"The families that have managed to escape the fighting, they're all traumatized," she told CBC News. "They're extremely afraid. They're afraid for the lives of the families and friends they left behind. So no doubt, it's an extremely dire situation. And we remain very, very concerned for the lives of those 50,000 people who remain trapped."

Soldiers from Iraq's elite Rapid Response Team stopped theiradvance overnight about 500 metresfrom theal-Shuhadadistrict, the southeastern part of city's main built-up area, anarmy commander and a police officer said.

Militants dug in

"Our forces came under heavy fire, they are well dug in intrenches and tunnels," said the commander speaking in CampTariq, the rear army base south of Falluja, 50 kilometres west of Baghdad.

Reuters journalists in the area could hear explosions fromartillery shelling and airstrikes from a U.S.-led coalitionsupporting the Iraqi forces.

A staff member of Fallujah's main hospital said it receivedreports of 32 civilians killed on Monday. Medical sources hadreported that the death toll in the city stood at about 50 30civilians and 20 militants during the first week of theoffensive which had yet to involve street fighting.

Foreign aid organizations are not present in Fallujah but areproviding help in camps to those who manage to exit.

Fallujah is the second-largest Iraqi city still undercontrol of the militants, after Mosul, their de facto capital inthe north that had a pre-war population of about twomillion.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi announced the assault onFallujah on May 22 after a spate of bombings that killed morethan 150 people in one week in Baghdad, the worst death toll sofar this year. A series of bombings claimed by Islamic Statealso hit Baghdad on Monday, killing more than 20 people.

Political pressure

The worsening security situation in the capital has added topolitical pressure on Abadi, a member of Iraq's Shia majoritywho is trying to hold a ruling coalition together in the face ofpublic protests against an entrenched political class.

He has called for politicians to set aside their differencesand rally behind the army during the Fallujah offensive.

Shiamilitia groups backed by Iran are also taking partin the offensive against ISIS, but are holding backfrom participating in the main assault on Fallujah to avoidinflaming sectarian tension.

Reuters journalists saw hundreds of Shia militiafighters rallying at one location near Saqlawiya, a villagenorth of Fallujah still under ISIS control.

The United States is leading a coalition conducting airstrikes in support of the Iraqi government offensive, and saysit is having success in rolling back Islamic State.

• Bombings hitShiaareas of Baghdad, killing at least 72
• ISIS committed genocide in northern Iraq, U.S. report says

In neighbouring Syria, U.S. forces have also aided mainlyKurdish fighters who have seized territory from the militants,as has the Russian-backed government of President Basharal-Assad.

Fallujah has been a bastion of the Sunni insurgency thatfought both the U.S. occupation of Iraq and the Shia-ledBaghdad government that took over after the fall of dictatorSaddam Hussein, a Sunni, in 2003.

It would be the third major city in Iraq recaptured by thegovernment after Saddam's home town Tikrit and Ramadi, thecapital of Iraq's vast western Anbar province, which alsoincludes Fallujah.