Will Airstrikes in Iraq Escalate Growing Crisis?

The Pentagon announced that the U.S. military carried out airstrikes in northern Iraq on Friday targeting artillery used by the militant group Islamic State. The bombing came less than 12 hours after President Obama announced on national television that he had authorized strikes in an attempt to halt the group’s sweeping advance.

“Democracy Now!” reports Friday:

Obama becomes the fourth U.S. president in a row to order military action in Iraq. The Islamic State has captured large swaths of northern Iraq and has advanced to a half-hour drive from the Kurdish regional capital, Erbil. Up to 40,000 people, many of them members of the Yazidi religious minority, remain trapped on the Sinjar Mountains near the border with Syria, surrounded by rebels and slowly dying of thirst. The United States has also begun dropping relief supplies.

The program talks with Phyllis Bennis, a fellow at the Institute for Policy Studies. She has written several books, including “Ending the Iraq War: A Primer.” One of her recent articles is “Don’t Go Back to Iraq!: Five Steps the U.S. Can Take in Iraq Without Going Back to War.”

‘Democracy Now!’:

— Adapted from “Democracy Now!” by Alexander Reed Kelly