Security forces locked down parts of Jerusalem's Old City on Saturday and an ultra-sensitive holy site remained closed after an attack that killed two police officers and heightened Israeli-Palestinian tensions.

Iraqi forces still faced pockets of resistance from Islamic State in Mosul's Old City on Friday, four days after the prime minister declared victory.

Iraqi forces clashed with Islamic State fighters holding out in Mosul's Old City on Wednesday, more than 36 hours after Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared victory over the militants.

Iraqi forces on Thursday battled the last remaining Islamic State group fighters in Mosul's Old City, where the UN said up to 20,000 civilians are trapped and in "extreme danger".

Iraqi forces launched an assault Sunday to retake Mosul's Old City, the last district still held by the Islamic State group three years after the jihadists seized the northern city and declared their "caliphate".

Iraqi armed forces launched an operation on Saturday to capture the last Islamic State-held enclave in Mosul, according to a military statement.

Iraqi forces launched a fresh push on the Islamic State group in Mosul on Thursday, opening a northern front in their battle for the west side of the city, officers said.

Iraqi forces retook two more neighbourhoods in west Mosul on Thursday, tightening the noose around jihadists holed up in the Old City, commanders said.

Israeli paramilitary police officers shot and killed a Palestinian woman who tried to attack them with a knife outside Jerusalem's walled Old City on Wednesday, police spokesmen said.

Iraqi forces are to deploy new tactics in a fresh push against Islamic State in Mosul, military officials said on Friday, after advances slowed recently in the campaign to drive the militants out of their last stronghold in the country.

More than 180,000 people have fled west Mosul as Iraqi forces battle to retake it from the Islamic State group, the Iraqi government said on Monday.

Iraqi army helicopters strafed and fired rockets at Islamic State positions in Mosul's Old City on Sunday as troops on the ground closed in on the strategic and symbolic prize of the al-Nuri Mosque.