ISIS defeated in hellhole capital Raqqa where jihadis ruled caliphate of death for three years
The brutal ISIS occupation and the bitter street fighting and air strikes have left the major Syrian city a blasted shell
THESE jaw-dropping pictures show the ruins of the Syrian city of Raqqa - which has finally been liberated from ISIS rule after a bloody battle.
Streets that once ran red with blood from the murderous terror group's savage executions are now under the control of the Syrian Democratic Forces - an alliance of Kurdish and Arab militias.
The brutal ISIS occupation and the bitter street fighting and air strikes have left the major Syrian city a blasted shell, filled with ruins and pocked with craters.
The SDF has taken control of Al-Naim Square - where Islamic State once displayed the severed heads of its victims and carried out its vile public killings.
But even though Islamic state has been defeated in its self-declared capital of Raqqa, the future of Syria and Iraq is looking even more tangled, and potentially just as violent.
The downfall of a common enemy could open up cracks in temporary alliances created to fight the extremists, and rivalries for influence are now likely to take centre stage.
Already, a multitude of players in the crowded theaters of Iraq and Syria are racing for the spoils of war.
Militias are still clearing mines and other booby traps sweeping the city for any possible Islamic State sleeper cells.
This week fighters hauled down the black flag of Islamic State, the last still flying over the city, from the National Hospital near the stadium.
The fall of Raqqa, where Islamic State staged euphoric parades and brutal executions after its string of lightning victories in 2014, is a potent symbol of the jihadist movement's collapsing fortunes.
ISIS has lost most of its territory in Syria and Iraq this year, including its most prized possession, Mosul.
In Syria, it has been forced back into a strip of the Euphrates valley and the surrounding desert.
The SDF, backed by a US-led international alliance, has been fighting since June to take the city ISIS used to plan attacks abroad.
The flags waved in the city streets were of the SDF, the Kurdish YPG militia, and the YPG's female counterpart, the YPJ.
Colonel Ryan Dillon, a spokesman for the coalition, said: "We do still know there are still IEDs and booby traps in and amongst the areas that ISIS once held, so the SDF will continue to clear deliberately through areas."
The SDF has been supported by a US-led international coalition with air strikes and special forces on the ground since it started the battle for Raqqa city in early June.
The final SDF assault began on Sunday after a group of Syrian jihadists quit the city under a deal with tribal elders, leaving only a hardcore of up to 300 fighters to defend the last positions.
Raqqa was the first big city Islamic State captured in early 2014, before its rapid series of victories in Iraq and Syria brought millions of people under the rule of its self-declared caliphate, which passed laws and issued passports and money.
It used the city as a planning and operations centre for its warfare in the Middle East and its string of attacks overseas, and for a time imprisoned Western hostages there before killing them in slickly produced films distributed online.
The offensive has pushed Islamic State from most of northern Syria, while a rival offensive by the Syrian army, backed by Russia, Iran and Shi'ite militias, has driven the jihadists from the central desert.
The only populated areas still controlled by the jihadist group in Syria are the towns and villages downstream of Deir al-Zor along the Euphrates valley.
They are areas that for the past three years Islamic State ran from Raqqa.
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