Mossul

Mosul الموصل
Tigris, a bridge and Grand Mosque in Mosul
Nickname(s): Nīnwē
Mosul
Coordinates: 36°20′N 43°08′E / 36.34°N 43.13°E / 36.34; 43.13Coordinates: 36°20′N 43°08′E / 36.34°N 43.13°E / 36.34; 43.13
Country	Iraq
Governorate	Nineveh Governorate
Government
• Mayor	Hussein Ali Khajem
Elevation	223 m (732 ft)
Population (2015)
• City	664,221
• Urban	Unknown (estimates range between 750,000 and 1,500,000
	UNData 1987
Demonym(s)	Moslawi
Time zone	AST (UTC+3)
Area code(s)	60

Mosul (Arabic: الموصل‎‎ al-Mawṣil, Kurdish: مووسڵ‎, Syriac: ܡܘܨܠ‎, translit. Māwṣil) is a major city in northern Iraq. Since October 2016 it has been the site of a military operation led by the Iraqi Government, under Haider al-Abadi, in an effort to dislodge and defeat militant forces. The city had been under the control of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant since June 2014, and no westerner had entered the city until the latest initiative. The Battle of Mosul, a military offensive to retake the city begun in October 2016, is the largest deployment of Iraqi forces since the 2003 invasion by U.S. and coalition forces. As of March 2017, eastern Mosul is under the control of the Iraqi security forces, while a small portion of the western part of the city remains under siege.

Located some 400 km (250 mi) north of Baghdad, Mosul stands on the west bank of the Tigris, opposite the ancient Assyrian city of Nineveh on the east bank. The metropolitan area has grown to encompass substantial areas on both the "Left Bank" (east side) and the "Right Bank" (west side), as the two banks are described by the locals compared to the flow direction of Tigris.

At the start of the 21st century, Mosul and its surrounds had an ethnically and religiously diverse population; the majority of Mosul's population were Arabs, with Assyrians,Armenians, Turkmens, Kurds, Yazidis, Shabakis, Mandaeans, Kawliya, Circassians in addition to other, smaller ethnic minorities. In religious terms, mainstream Sunni Islam was the largest religion, but with a significant number of followers of the Salafi movement and Christianity (the latter followed by the Assyrians and Armenians), as well as Shia Islam, Sufism, Yazidism, Shabakism, Yarsanism and Mandaeism.