Obama Launches Humanitarian Air Drops in Iraq

Source: CBS News

@BreakingNews: President Obama approves humanitarian air drops in northern Iraq, US officials tell @NBCNews, @CBSNews, @CNN http://t.co/U5OjkTiIC6/s/Rx0V

Obama launches humanitarian air drops in Iraq

REBECCA KAPLAN, JAKE MILLER /CBS NEWS
Aug 7, 2014 6:37 PM EDT

President Obama has approved air drops of food and water on a mountain in Iraq where a group of religious minorities remains trapped by Islamic militants, CBS News National Security Correspondent David Martin reports.

The president also considering using airstrikes to help break the siege by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) which is increasing its march toward the Kurdish region of Iraq and seized the country's largest dam Thursday.

ISIS has targeted religious minorities including Christians and the Yazidis, a religious group with ties to Zoroastrianism. An estimated 15,000 of them are caught on a mountaintop with no food or water, but afraid to descend into ISIS-held territory where they might be killed.

The decision to deploy U.S. air power represents a significant escalation of America's involvement in the bloody civil conflict. As ISIS gathered strength over the last few months, the U.S. stepped up its nonlethal assistance to the Iraqi government. And at the end of June, Mr. Obama sent approximately 300 troops to Iraq to train and advise Iraq's army, though they were not to be deployed in combat. An additional 450 U.S. personnel followed shortly thereafter.

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