Four Iraqi soldiers killed fighting with Islamic State in Tikrit
 

Four Iraqi soldiers were killed in street fighting with Islamic State militants in Tikrit overnight as they advanced slowly into the city, a Sunni jihadist bastion, in the wake of coalition air strikes, a security official said. The troops entered Tikrit's southern Shishin and **rthern al-Qadisiya neighbourhoods on Friday, after the U.S.-led international alliance carried out air strikes against Islamic State, the ******r from the Salahuddin province operation command told Reuters on Saturday. The campaign was slowed on Friday evening by clashes with Islamic State that killed of four and wounded 11 other soldiers, the security official said, speaking on condition of a**nymity. Most of the Iranian-backed Shi'ite paramilitaries, which Iraqis call the Popular Mobilization Committees, or Hashid Shaabi in Arabic, are openly hostile to the United States and have opposed coalition air strikes.

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