The WSJ reports,"islamist militants swept out of northern Iraq Wednesday to seize their second city in two days, threatening Baghdad and pushing the country's besieged government to signal it would allow U.S. airstrikes to beat back the advance".
"An alarmed Iraqi government also asked the U.S. to accelerate delivery of pledged military support, particularly Apache helicopters, F-16 fighters and surveillance equipment, to help push back fighters from the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham, an al Qaeda offshoot known as ISIS. The U.S. said it has been expediting shipments of military hardware to the Iraqis all year".
Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said his country faces a "mortal threat" from the ISIS insurgents.
"Officials declined to say whether the U.S. would consider conducting airstrikes with drones or manned aircraft. The Obama administration is considering a number of options, according to a senior U.S. official who added that no decisions have been made.
"White House National Security Council spokeswoman Bernadette Meehan said the White House won't discuss diplomatic discussions with Baghdad but said the government of Iraq "has made clear that they welcome our support in their effort to confront" ISIS".
ISIS overran Tikrit, the birthplace of former dictator Saddam Hussein, on Wednesday after capturing Iraq's second-largest city, Mosul, a day earlier. The takeover of the city of 250,000 about 85 miles north of Baghdad was confirmed by Ali Al Hamdani, a senior official in Salah Al Din province, where the city is located. The insurgents freed hundreds of prisoners from the city's jails.
By Wednesday evening, there were reports of fighting between Iraqi security forces and Islamists on the outskirts of Samarra, a city further south and less than 80 miles north of the capital.
The conquests over the past two days were by far the most significant by the Sunni group, which has also taken control of parts of neighboring Syria during the civil war there.
ISIS overran Tikrit, the birthplace of former dictator Saddam Hussein, on Wednesday after capturing Iraq's second-largest city, Mosul, a day earlier. The takeover of the city of 250,000 about 85 miles north of Baghdad was confirmed by Ali Al Hamdani, a senior official in Salah Al Din province, where the city is located. The insurgents freed hundreds of prisoners from the city's jails.
By Wednesday evening, there were reports of fighting between Iraqi security forces and Islamists on the outskirts of Samarra, a city further south and less than 80 miles north of the capital.
The conquests over the past two days were by far the most significant by the Sunni group, which has also taken control of parts of neighboring Syria during the civil war there.
ISIS aims to set up a state in a continuous stretch of territory from Sunni-dominated Anbar province in Iraq eastward to Raqqa province in northeast Syria.
Members of Shiite militias in Iraq, many of which are funded and trained by the neighboring Iranian government, said they were standing at the ready to defend Baghdad. One Shiite militiaman who asked not to be named said he knew of groups raiding homes throughout Baghdad, where ISIS militants were thought to be active.
The Iraqi security forces were trying to rebuild their ranks after hundreds of soldiers and police deserted their posts as the rebels advanced on Mosul. Those who returned to their barracks on Wednesday have been offered amnesty from prosecution, said security officials in the provinces of Kirkuk and Salah Al Din.
During the day's advance, the Islamists took the oil refinery city of Bayji, though security officials there said the vital refinery in the city remained under the protection of some 250 government troops.
There is growing international alarm over the rapid advances of the militant group. Adding to that alarm, militants stormed the Turkish consulate in the northern city of Mosul and took 49 staff hostage including the consul-general, the Turkish foreign ministry said.
The International Organization of Migration estimated that at least 500,000 people have fled Mosul and the surrounding province of Nineveh out of fear of escalating violence. Most went to nearby Kurdistan, a semiautonomous region of northern Iraq.
ISIS is capitalizing on a wave of Sunni discontent with the Shiite-dominated governments that have ruled Iraq since Saddam's ouster in 2003. Tikrit and Mosul are the provincial capitals of two of the three Iraqi provinces dominated by the country's Sunni Muslim minority.
On their first full day of control in Mosul, insurgents took up posts guarding banks and shops on Wednesday and were policing lines at fuel stations, witnesses said. They also circulated through city neighborhoods to help distribute fuel for generators, a main source of electricity.
The rebels were employing the same strategy they have used in Fallujah, a Sunni-majority city 36 miles west of Baghdad, which they have ruled since early January. Instead of enforcing strict Islamic law by policing the wearing of veils by women and chastising cigarette smokers, they sought to restore an air of normalcy.
