As Iraqi forces take parts of Mosul from the brutal regime of Daesh. We are seeing the clean-up operation is being started by volunteers of different faiths who are coming together to rebuild their community.
A focus of the work is the Chaldean church, located in Mosul's Drakziliya neighbourhood, on the left bank of the Tigris River. The area is now under the control of the Iraqi army.
Around 30 young civilian volunteers are organising a clean-up effort - most of whom are Muslim. Keen to clear the debris of two years of Daesh rule, both literally and psychologically, they are an interfaith force for good, helping to unite a community torn apart by the terrorist group.
When Daesh millitants stormed Mosul in 2014, it took control of the church, choosing to use it as a logistics base. Reports now suggest that the church only suffered minor damage during the occupation, contrary to the false information given in recent years, which spoke of the total destruction of the Christian place of worship by means of explosives.
However, Daesh plastered the church with writings, banners and murals promoting its twisted ideology. There is debris and damage caused by shelling and explosions nearby. Photos and videos published of the clean-up operation show a floor littered with plaster and dirt and a ceiling caving in.
The mainly Muslim volunteers are shown sweeping debris into wheelbarrows, restoring the church to as near its former glory as possible.
It is an inspiring example of communities coming together, regardless of faith or religion, for a common good, are signs of hope for brighter future, with peaceful religious co-existence in a city that has been ravaged by Daesh's twisted ideology for so long. And the fact that young people of different faiths are uniting to clean up their neighbourhood is a striking sign of hope in a place where darkness reigned for the last two years.
The operation sends a powerful message to the residents of Mosul that liberation is real and a peaceful, tolerant and accepting future is possible. And the photos resonate with a world watching the collapse of Daesh's so-called 'state' that the terrorists have not succeeded in turning communities against each other, but have actually united communities to rid Iraq of their evil and to erase their ambitions of a caliphate.