Thousands of displaced Iraqis who had been besieged on a mountain by jihadists escaped to safety yesterday while Western powers ramped up efforts to save those still stranded with air drops. Meanwhile, Iraq's Kurdish peshmerga, buoyed by US air strikes, reclaimed two towns from Islamic State (IS) jihadist fighters yesterday. The third straight day of strikes by US jets and drones brought the first
sign that US President Barack Obama's decision to return to Iraq could turn the tide on two months of jihadist expansion. "The peshmerga have liberated Makhmur and Gwer," peshmerga spokesman Halgord Hekmat told AFP, adding that "US aerial support helped". The two photos released by the United States Central Command (Centcom), show a US military F/A-18 Hornet fighter jet strike on what the US army says is an Islamic State (IS) target at an undisclosed location in northern Iraq. At least 20,000 trapped civilians on the Mount Sanjar in northern Iraq have safely escaped to Syria and been escorted by Kurdish forces back into Iraq, officials said yesterday. Photo: AFP The past week saw jihadist fighters make dramatic gains, seizing Iraq's largest dam, repeatedly defeating the peshmerga and taking over large swathes of land. Advertisement The US air strikes which Obama announced on Thursday stopped the rot just as the militants moved close enough to the autonomous Kurdish region to cause a panic in Arbil, where some US personnel are stationed. IS attacks have displaced 200,000 people since August 3, including all the residents of Iraq's largest Christian town Qaraqosh. Among the others affected were a large contingent of Iraq's small Yazidi minority, whose main hub Sinjar was attacked last weekend. According to leaders and witnesses, several dozen men were executed and groups of women abducted, although reliable information from IS-held areas is scarce. The two photos released by the United States Central Command (Centcom), show a US military F/A-18 Hornet fighter jet strike on what the US army says is an Islamic State (IS) target at an undisclosed location in northern Iraq. At least 20,000 trapped civilians on the Mount Sanjar in northern Iraq have safely escaped to Syria and been escorted by Kurdish forces back into Iraq, officials said yesterday. Photo: AFP When the militants entered Sinjar, tens of thousands of people ran up the nearby mountain to hide. Thousands were still there a week later, trying to survive in searing heat with little food or water. The siege of Mount Sinjar, which local legend holds as the final resting place of Noah's Ark, as and a poignant appeal by Yazidi MP Vian Dakhil to save her community from extermination have captured the West's attention. Obama justified his decision to send warplanes back over Iraqi skies three years after the last troops pulled out partly because of the risk of an impending genocide. The US intervention appeared to yield early results on that front too as officials said around 20,000 people had escaped the siege and been escorted to safety by Kurdish troops since Saturday. Foreign aid groups operating in the region confirmed several thousand survivors of the Mount Sinjar siege had transited through Syria and crossed back into Iraq, many of them traumatised and dehydrated. US and Iraqi cargo planes have been air dropping food and water over Mount Sinjar, a barren 60-kilometre ridge. Britain and France joined the effort overnight Saturday with its first air drop of food and water. At pains to assure war-weary Americans he was not being dragged into a new Iraqi quagmire, Obama put the onus on Iraqi politicians to form an inclusive government and turn the tide on jihadist expansion which has brought Iraq closer than ever to breakup. His comments were yet another nudge for Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to step aside and allow for a consensus government by abandoning what looks like an increasingly desperate bid to seek a third term. French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius and UN chief Ban Ki-moon hammered home the same message. Obama did not give a timetable for the US military intervention but said Saturday that Iraq's problems would not be solved in weeks. "This is going to be a long-term project," he said.
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