Tuesday, September 23, 2014

We're at War with ISIS

From my NBC News First Read email:
  • The New York Times: "The United States and five Arab allies launched a wide-ranging air campaign against the Islamic State and at least one other extremist group in Syria for the first time early Tuesday, targeting the groups' bases, training camps and checkpoints in at least four provinces, according to the United States military and Syrian activists."
  • From NBCNews.com: "In a statement early Tuesday, the U.S. military said that in addition to taking out ISIS targets it mounted eight separate strikes overnight "to disrupt the imminent attack plotting against the United States and Western interests conducted by a network of seasoned al Qaeda veterans," also known as "the Khorasan group." The strikes against Khorasan - which had established a haven in Syria to plot attacks, build roadside bombs and recruit Westerners to fight - targeted the group's training camps, explosives production facility, communication building and command and control facilities, the Pentagon said."
  • The AP reports that Washington informed Syria's U.N. envoy before the strikes. 
  • Meanwhile, in Iraq: "After six weeks of American airstrikes, the Iraqi government's forces have scarcely budged the Sunni extremists of the Islamic State from their hold on more than a quarter of the country, in part because many critical Sunni tribes remain on the sidelines," writes the New York Times.
  • "A Syrian fighter jet which apparently strayed into Israeli-controlled airspace over the occupied Golan Heights has been shot down by Israel," the BBC reports.
  • Reuters: "A French national was kidnapped in eastern Algeria on Sunday, France's foreign ministry said, and his kidnappers issued a video threatening to kill him if Paris did not halt its intervention in Iraq."
  • "Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi pledged his support for the U.S. war against Islamic State militants, but called on President Barack Obama to widen his campaign against extremism well beyond Iraq and Syria," reports the Wall Street Journal.

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