After Iraq’s victory in Fallujah, what’s next in the battle against Islamic State?

After Iraqi forces took full control of the Islamic State group’s bastion of Fallujah, what’s next in the battles against the jihadists, not just in Iraq but in Syria and further afield?

The retaking of Fallujah, claimed as complete by Iraq’s government over the weekend, is the latest in a series of IS defeats shrinking the “caliphate” that the group proclaimed two years ago over the vast areas it conquered in Iraq and Syria in 2014.

Fallujah was one of only two major cities IS still held in Iraq and the security forces are now training their sights on Mosul, whose fall commanders and analysts believe would spell doom for the caliphate in Iraq.

The battle for the northern city will have different contours than previous ones, with an ever greater variety of forces than usual potentially involved in operations and staking their claim in a post-IS Mosul.

Operations aimed at retaking Mosul began months ago, with an offensive moving up the Tigris from the south and another led by Kurdish forces moving from the east, but the battle appears far from starting in earnest.

After losing Fallujah and surrounding areas, the Iraqi half of IS’s “caliphate” looks increasingly fragmented, with limited territorial contiguity between some its remaining bastions.