The campaign against ISIS has intensified over the past year, firstly with the capture of Mosul and now with the extended initiative against the so called capital of the Islamic State Raqqa. The current offensive by Arab and Kurdish fighters began in June and is still ongoing, and with just a few hundred militants holding onto land in the middle of the city, it seems like only a matter of time until they are flushed out and the city is finally reclaimed.

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It seems like it as come at a terrible cost though with most of Raqqa now lying in ruins, and hundreds of casualties coming from both the civilians and the army. BBC journalists Quentin Sommerville and cameraman Darren Conway went into the heart of the action to film what America is calling ‘the war of annihilation’ in the short documentary below:

Wow. It’s kind of crazy how nobody will admit how many innocent people have been killed by bombs meant to liberate them, but I suppose that’s just one of the realities of war these days sadly.

Given how intense it is just to take half a mile of road though, it seems like it could still be a long time before the city is liberated. Mad props to everyone involved in the war effort and hopefully there aren’t any more casualties before we can finally say that the caliphate has been destroyed once and for all, although that appears unlikely at this point.

For more updates from Raqqa, check out this footage of what it was like to live there under ISIS rule a year ago. Not so good.