U.S. President Barack Obama said Thursday he'd
authorized targeted airstrikes in Iraq to protect
American personnel.
"We do whatever is necessary to protect our
people. We support our allies when they're in
danger," Obama said.
Obama also said he'd authorized targeted airstrikes
"if necessary" to help forces in Iraq fighting to
protect civilians trapped in the mountains as brutal
Islamist fighters advance.
"When we have the unique capabilities to help avert
a massacre, then I believe the United States of
America cannot turn a blind eye," Obama said.
(CNN) -- The United States has airdropped meals
and water in Iraq, sending aid to minority groups
trapped as brutal Islamist fighters advance.
"The mission was conducted by a number of U.S.
military aircraft under the direction of U.S. Central
Command," a senior U.S. defense official said. "The
aircraft that dropped the humanitarian supplies have
now safely exited the immediate airspace over the
drop area."
And U.S. President Barack Obama -- scheduled to
give a statement on Iraq at 9:30 p.m. ET Thursday
-- is weighing a key question: Should airstrikes be
next?
Why is the United States sending aid
and considering airstrikes?
Rapid developments on the ground,
where a humanitarian crisis is
emerging with minority groups facing
possible slaughter by Sunni Muslim
extremists, have set the stage for an
increasingly dire situation.
"The latest news just might meet the
threshold for action," a U.S. official told
CNN.
Thousands of families from the Yazidi
minority are reportedly trapped in the
mountains without food, water or
medical care after fleeing the
rampaging fighters of the Islamic State,
also known as Islamic State of Iraq and
Syria or ISIS.
Throngs of refugees, many of them
Iraqi Christians, are on the run -- their
largest city now occupied by fighters
who gave them an ultimatum, "Convert
to Islam or die."
Defense officials say the airstrikes the
President and his national security
team are weighing would be primarily to
protect American consular staff and
military advisers working with the Iraqi military in
Irbil, the largest city in Iraq's Kurdish region.
The United States is also concerned that ISIS could
make a move against the several dozen U.S.
military advisers there, a Pentagon official said.
U.S. officials were tight-lipped about their plans
Thursday, but a Pentagon official stressed that any
reports that the United States had conducted
airstrikes in Iraq were "completely false."
Asked about the possibility of U.S. airstrikes, a top
Iraqi diplomat said it had been discussed.
"There is some communication between Baghdad
and Washington on that issue, but no strike has
been done yet," said Mohammad Ali Al-Hakim,
Iraq's Ambassador to the United Nations.
A potential escalation of U.S. military involvement
comes two years after Obama ended the Iraq war
and brought home American forces.
White House spokesman Josh Earnest told
reporters Thursday that any potential U.S. action in
Iraq would be limited, with no chance of ground
troops heading back.
He said the principle for taking a military step would
be threats to core American interests or U.S.
personnel in Iraq.
Refusing to offer details on what options were being
considered, Earnest described the current situation
in Iraq as "disturbing," with "innocent populations
persecuted just because of their ethnic identity."
Iraqi forces fight back as Islamists advance
The Iraqi air force bombed a number of targets
Thursday night, Qubad Talabani, deputy prime
minister of the Kurdish Regional Government, told
CNN. The strikes killed at least two ISIS emirs, he
said.
Talabani also reported that U.S. officials said
humanitarian airdrops would take place for the tens
of thousands of Yazidis he estimates are stranded
without food or water.
The United States has been sharing intelligence
through reconnaissance but are not involved in any
airstrikes, a senior Iraqi military official told CNN on
Thursday.
The ISIS fighters, armed with armored vehicles and
other military hardware taken from Iraqi forces in a
lightning sweep through the north earlier this year,
have overrun Iraq's largest Christian town and
nearby villages.
When radical Islamist fighters stormed the northern
Iraqi town of Sinjar over the weekend, the Yazidi
minority who call it home fled into the surrounding
mountains in fear of their lives.
Now, trapped without food, water or medical care in
the summer heat, thousands are in desperate need
of help. It's already too late to save dozens of
children who've died of thirst.
Other groups targeted by ISIS, which seeks to
establish a Sunni caliphate stretching from Syria to
Baghdad, include Shiite Muslim, Turkmen and
Shabak -- all religious minorities.
Fleeing people, some in cars and trucks and others
on foot, got out with whatever possessions. The
United Nations estimates 200,000 people heading
toward Kurdistan in the past 48 hours.
After an emergency meeting on the situation
Thursday, the United Nations Security Council
issued a statement condemning the Islamists'
attacks.
"The members of the Security Council reiterate that
widespread or systematic attacks directed against
any civilian populations because of their ethnic
background, political grounds, religion or belief may
constitute a crime against humanity, for which
those responsible must be held accountable," the
statement said
The council called on the international community to
support Iraq "and to do all it can to help alleviate the
suffering of the population affected by the current
conflict."
Kurdish region
Outside Irbil, the internal refugees were sleeping in
parking lots or shells of buildings under construction
with little access to water or any other services,
CNN's Ivan Watson reported.
Kurdish officials call for U.S. or NATO airstrikes to
help them fight the ISIS forces.
They also issued statements intended to boost
morale of the Kurdish people, saying the Kurdish
Pershmerga fighters would be able to hold off any
serious threat to Erbil and other cities.
A senior State Department official said the United
States also was weighing opening a humanitarian
corridor to provide support to Kurdish and Iraqi
forces.
Earnest, however, said while the United States
would support Iraqi and Kurdish efforts, "we can't
solve these problems for them. These problems
can only be solved with Iraqi political solutions."
The United States has 245 military personnel in
Iraq, 90 of whom are advisers. The carrier USS
George H.W. Bush and other Navy ships also are in
the region.
Sinjar unrest
Yazidis, among Iraq's smallest minorities, are of
Kurdish descent, and their religion is considered a
pre-Islamic sect that draws from Christianity,
Judaism and Zoroastrianism.
Most of the 500,000 or so members live in and
around Sinjar in northwestern Nineveh province,
bordering Iraq's Kurdish region.
The U.N. children's agency, UNICEF, said Tuesday
that official reports indicated 40 children from the
Yazidi minority had died "as a direct consequence of
violence, displacement and dehydration" since the
weekend.
"Families who fled the area are in immediate need
of urgent assistance, including up to 25,000 children
who are now stranded in mountains surrounding
Sinjar and are in dire need of humanitarian aid
including drinking water and sanitation services," it
said.
Who will stop ISIS?