Iraq launches major offensive to recapture Tikrit from ISIL

Government forces backed by allied Shia and Sunni fighters have begun a large-scale military operation to recapture Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit from the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). 

The offensive is part of the biggest military operation in the Sunni-majority province of Salahuddin since last June, when ISIL fighters, exploiting sectarian resentments of the Shia-led government, seized vast swaths of northern Iraq and advanced towards the capital, Baghdad.

"Today, God willing, we start an important military campaign to liberate the citizens of Salahuddin province," Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abbadi said on Monday, speaking to forces gathered at the government-held city of Samarra, where the operation was launched.

"I call upon you and all other commanders to deal with citizens well. Our goal is to liberate people from the oppression and terrorism of Daesh," he added in the televised address, using the Arabic acronym for ISIL.

Some 30,000 Iraqi troops started attacking ISIL positions in Tikrit from the northern, western and southern fronts early on Monday, backed by artillery and air strikes by Iraqi fighter jets. Iraqi authorities reported that security forces were already in the process of retaking some neighborhoods in Tikrit's northeast.

Police and medical sources told Al Jazeera that ten members of the army and popular mobilization forces were killed on Tikrit's northern front on Monday, while 45 more were wounded.

Tikrit, some 100 miles north of Baghdad, fell into the hands of ISIL last summer along with the country's second-largest city of Mosul and other areas in the Sunni minority heartland.

Thousands of government troops, around 2,000 fighters from Shia militia as well as anti-ISIL Sunni tribes have gathered around Samarra for the operation in the nearby strongholds of ISIL near the Tigris River.

Raed Salahuddin, governor of Salahuddin province, said last week that 5,000 fighters from the security forces and Hashid Shaabi militia, which was formed last year with Iranian support, would join the operation.

The disparate coalition is meant to bolster the Iraq's army, which ISIL quickly overpowered in its June surge across the country. There are fears, however, that Sunni residents in ISIL-held territory, such as Tikrit, will resent the incursion of Iran-backed Shia militias firing on their cities.

"These groups have a troubling history of sectarian violence and abuse that, if left unchecked, could provide the Islamic State with the sectarian war they desire above all else," said intelligence consultancy the Soufan Group in an analysis on Monday. "Salahuddin is a Sunni-majority province in a Shia-majority country. This means there will be a short fuse before sectarian violence explodes, when towns such as Tikrit...are liberated by the much-feared and loathed Shia militias."

The battle for Tikrit may also offer a preview of the Iraqi military's ultimate goal of recapturing Mosul, Iraq's second city and ISIL's most important holding in Iraq. A U.S. official said the assault on Mosul could start as early as April, although Iraqi officials have declined to confirm that timetable.

"The group might fight very hard for Tikrit, but it will fight to the death for Mosul, since the loss of Mosul would be the end of the caliphate for all intents and purposes," said the Soufan Group. "Yet before that fight can begin, the fight for Tikrit and Salahuddin has to be won."

Al Jazeera and wire services