From the New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily.

Today, the biggest ISIS stronghold in Iraq seems on the verge of falling to U.S.-backed forces.

We go into the streets to see if a major victory over radical Islam is really at hand.

And back in the United States, he tweets they overreact.

Why the smartest minds in finance cannot predict the Trump effect on stock prices.

It's Thursday, February 23rd.

In the war against ISIS, its last great base in Iraq,

its on the ground claimed to a religious empire lies in one half of one city.

For those who want to see ISIS destroyed, its final chapter in Iraq is perhaps being written now

and its being written in Mosul. So Mosul right now is a divided city.

Rukh Mini Kalamaki, who has covered ISIS for years, has been in and out of Mosul for the past few months.

The eastern half was declared liberated at the end of January.

And most of those neighborhoods to be perfectly frank look pretty normal to me.

You drive around, you see vegetable sellers, open markets, customers.

I'm now trying on the Berkha. What is this like this? Oh my god.

Restaurants are open. I was able to have lunch in a beautiful Mosul restaurant.

But the liberated part of the city ends at the Tigris River,

which essentially cuts the city into. The western part of Mosul is still completely under

ISIS occupation. And that's the part where Iraqi forces are now inching towards.

And it's a no-go zone. We've been told to not move around there unless you're in an armored vehicle.

And even from the armored vehicle, you can hear the bodies going overhead, the occasional mortar

rounds, and the ratatat of machine gun fire.

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