A Fleeing Family Finds Iraqi Troops, and a Reprieve From ISISbr The Iraqi soldiers in our group, which also included a small unit of American advisers, gave one of the familybr members a cigarette, as the militants took over the area and forbade smoking nearly three years ago.br Photographs and Text by RUKMINI CALLIMACHIMARCH 1, 2017br From a ridge overlooking a village in western Mosul, the Iraqi troops spotted the family fleeing the Islamic State.br Ms. Abbas pleaded with the troops, saying their relatives were in three white cars, two silver ones and a blue one.br As members of the family were catching their breath, a ripple of panic suddenly spread throughbr the group: The troops spotted five cars speeding toward us and began firing warning shots.br The pregnant woman, who was still hooked up to the drip, and the grandmother, Ms. Abbas, began screamingbr that the people coming up the hill were their relatives.br The Iraqi Army has suffered numerous casualties from car bombs detonated by Islamic State militants, and the soldiers were visibly on edge.br The family included three women — one of them pregnant — two men, several children and a dog.br When the terrorist group began lobbing mortars in their direction, the Iraqi troops asked the families to move.