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SIS fighters launched attacks on police Friday in the city of Kirkuk, as Iraqi security forces continued a massive military offensive to try to pry Mosul, one of Iraq's largest cities, from the militant group. "The fighters struck [Kirkuk] before dawn, with suicide bombers hitting four police stations and gunmen killing police," NPR's Alice Fordham reports from Irbil, Iraq, though the number of casualties wasn't immediately clear. "A curfew is imposed in Kirkuk, but eyewitnesses say fighting continues." The militants also hit an electricity station outside the city, Alice says. At least 13 workers died in the apparent suicide bombing,...

Kurdish Peshmerga forces launched a fresh attack on Islamic State (IS) forces early on Sunday as part of a campaign to capture Mosul, the militants' de facto capital in Iraq, Kurdish officials said. The advance began after heavy shelling and air strikes by a United States-led coalition against IS forces, a Reuters correspondent reported from Wardak, 30 km (19 miles) southeast of Mosul. The militants fought back, firing mortars at the advancing troops and detonating at least two car bombs. A Peshmerga commander said a dozen villages had been taken from the ultra-hardline Sunni militants as Kurdish forces headed toward...

The United States is considering establishing additional military bases in Iraq to combat the Islamic State, the top American general said on Thursday, a move that would require at least hundreds more American military trainers to help Iraqi forces retake cities lost to the militant Sunni extremist group. President Obama’s decision this week to send 450 trainers to establish a new military base to help Iraqi forces retake the city of Ramadi, the capital of Anbar Province, could signal the beginning of similar efforts in other parts of the country, said Gen. Martin E. Dempsey, the chairman of the Joint...

The feeling is growing in the international commentariat that the Islamic State may win: That the group will continue to gain territory in Syria and Iraq and will consolidate a permanent government, a state ensconced in the Islamic caliphate its leadership has proclaimed. I ended a recent article on a note of bravado, writing that in spite of its successes on the battlefield and elsewhere, it remains all but certain that Islamic State will ultimately be ground up and destroyed. Today I am less certain, and I have started to imagine what would happen if ISIS actually prevails. I am...

In late April, a commander for Islamic State said his forces were ready to launch an offensive to take Ramadi, and the group called for fighters to redeploy to Iraq from Syria.

The Islamic State group’s takeover of the provincial capital Ramadi is stark evidence that Iraqi forces lack the “will to fight,” Defense Secretary Ash Carter acknowledged, a harsh assessment that raised new questions about the Obama administration’s strategy to defeat the extremist group that has seized a strategically important swath of the Middle East. Although Iraqi soldiers “vastly outnumbered” their opposition in the capital of Anbar province, they quickly withdrew last Sunday without putting up much resistance from the city in Iraq’s Sunni heartland, Carter said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” […] The White House declined to comment on...

A column of Shi'ite militia fighters arrived at a military base near Ramadi on Monday as Baghdad moved to retake the western Iraqi city that fell to Islamic State militants in the biggest defeat for the government since last summer. An eyewitness described a long line of armored vehicles and trucks mounted with machine guns and rockets, flying the yellow flags of Kataib Hezbollah, one of the militia factions, heading towards the base.

Via Islamic World News, this was Ramadi on Friday. The red represents Iraqi forces, the dark gray ISIS, and the magenta areas, including bridges, were contested. On Thursday, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Martin Dempsey was asked about Ramadi’s imminent fall. “The city itself is — it’s not symbolic in any way. It’s not been declared, you know, part of the caliphate, on the one hand, or central to the future of Iraq. But we want to get it back. I mean, the issue here is not — is not brick and mortar. It’s about defeating ISIL....

Over 20,000 trapped in no man's land at the mercy of advancing ISIS horde after the fall of Ramadi Thousands are stranded between ISIS-held Ramadi and the city of Baghdad Refused entry to Iraqi capital because of concerns they could be militants ISIS has reportedly taken control of a village between Ramadi and Fallujah Indicates the terror group are moving eastwards towards the Iraqi capital Meanwhile Shia militias are said to be moving to head off ISIS Homeless families 'face danger from all sides', Human Rights Watch said

Islamic State militants overran one of the last remaining districts held by government forces in the Iraqi city of Ramadi on Sunday and besieged a key army base on the edge of the western provincial capital, security sources said. The militants seized most of Ramadi on Friday, planting their black flag on the local government headquarters in the center of the city, but a contingent of Iraqi special forces was holding out in the Malaab neighborhood. Those forces retreated on Sunday to an area east of the city after suffering heavy casualties, security sources said, bringing Ramadi to the brink...

The United States is “expediting” shipments of weapons to fight the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) in light of recent gains by the terror group. Vice President Joe Biden told Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-abaci on Friday the U.S. will rush the weapons to Iraq to help them try to hold the city of Ramadi, CNN reported Friday night. ISIS raised its flag over Ramadi on Friday after capturing the city’s provincial government building and police headquarters, CNN said. The shipment reportedly includes AT-4 shoulder-held rockets and ammunition.

Islamic State fighters took over the main government compound in the western Iraqi city of Ramadi on Friday, giving them nearly full control over Anbar's provincial capital, the group and officials said.

SADR AL-YUSUFIYAH — Thousands of families fleeing Iraq’s western city of Ramadi choked checkpoints leading to Baghdad on Friday, after an Islamic State advance spread panic and left security forces clinging to control. A column of traffic several vehicles wide snaked for miles at a checkpoint in Sadr al-Yusufiyah, on the edge of Baghdad province, as minibuses, cars and trucks picked up families who crossed by foot carrying their possessions in bags and wheelbarrows. Suhaib al-Rawi, the governor of Anbar province, of which Ramadi is the capital, described it as a human disaster on a scale the city has never...

One of the best lessons I learned in my years of service in the military is a quote often share with y’all: “the enemy has a vote.” You can try and sell the American people — and others — a politicized line such as “al-Qaida has been decimated and destroyed” or “we have reached the framework of a deal with Iran” or “ISIS is not Islamic,” but the bad guys are not affected by empty rhetoric. And here we go again with the Obama administration and the conflagration against Islamic terrorism. We’ve been told that ISIS has stalled. Their recruiting...

Falih Essawi shouted on the phone as he described his situation. From his point of view, ISIS militants might be just hours away from taking the key Iraqi city of Ramadi. Fierce fighting has engulfed Ramadi, which lies only about 70 miles (113 kilometers) west of Baghdad and is the capital of Anbar province, Iraq's Sunni heartland. Essawi, the deputy head of the Anbar Provincial Council, told CNN from inside the city Wednesday that it's unclear how much longer government troops can hold their front lines against the ISIS offensive. Security was "collapsing rapidly in the city," and he begged...

SANLIURFA, Turkey — When Abu Hamza, a former Syrian rebel, agreed to join the Islamic State, he did so assuming he would become a part of the group’s promised Islamist utopia, which has lured foreign jihadists from around the globe. Instead, he found himself being supervised by an Iraqi emir and receiving orders from shadowy Iraqis who moved in and out of the battlefield in Syria. When Abu Hamza disagreed with fellow commanders at an Islamic State meeting last year, he said, he was placed under arrest on the orders of a masked Iraqi man who had sat silently through...

BAGHDAD — Turkey’s government edged closer Tuesday to direct intervention in the conflicts in Syria and Iraq, bolstering security along its border with Syria and asking parliament to authorize sending troops to the two war-ravaged countries. Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc told reporters the proposal sent to parliament would include a wide range of options, including opening Turkish bases to foreign troops and deploying soldiers to establish safe zones for refugees inside Syria. The government wants the motion to be broad enough to avoid needing another parliamentary mandate for military action, he said. The motion is to be voted on...

America's GI "boots on the ground" in Iraq are so frustrated with the White House message about their mission against the Islamic State -- which Vice President Biden vowed Wednesday to chase "to the gates of Hell" -- that they're wondering how they'll accomplish the goal "when we can't even leave the front gate of our base." Biden on Wednesday delivered what was probably the toughest statement to date from the administration, declaring, after another U.S. journalist was beheaded by the Islamic State, "we will follow them to the gates of Hell until they are brought to justice." But his...

Wary of putting combat troops in Iraq, the U.S. government is gauging contractors’ interest in advising the Iraqi Defense Ministry and Counter Terrorism Service in a range of capacities, including force development, logistics and planning and operations. The U.S. Army Contracting Command posted a notice last month seeking contractors willing to work on an initial 12-month contract, who should be “cognizant of the goals of reducing tensions between Arabs and Kurds, and Sunni and Shias.” They would focus on administration, force development, procurement and acquisition, contracting, training management, public affairs, logistics, personnel management, professional development, communications, planning and operations, infrastructure...

For years, Anthony Zinni, a retired Marine General who once ran U.S. Central Command, blistered the administration of George W. Bush for its handling of Iraq. Now Zinni is teeing up on President Barack Obama's approach in Iraq, saying he is "worried" by Obama's cautious approach to the current crisis and the Sunni insurgent group Islamic State. "My God, we are the most powerful nation in the world," says Zinni, who was widely reported to have been passed over for the ambassadorship to Iraq in 2009 by Obama. "This is a moment we have to act. How many Americans getting...