Conditions Deteriorate in Besieged Kurdish Town in Turkey

At least 30 people have been killed in in the Kurdish-majority Turkish city of Cizre since Turkish forces began new operations there to crack down on Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK) terrorism. Residents of the town report worsening humanitarian conditions. They report that troops have besieged the city, making access to food and water difficult. In some cases, the bodies of the dead are reportedly being kept at peoples’ homes on ice or in refrigerators because residents are unable to reach the mortuary or cemetery.

The Peoples’ Democratic Party, a pro-Kurdish political party that performed well in Turkey’s June elections, organized a protest march to the city, but they were blocked by police as they approached the city.

Congress Fails to Pass Resolution of Disapproval, Clearing Way for Iran Nuclear Deal

After two months of political debate, congressional efforts to pass a resolution of disapproval that would have blocked the implementation of the Iran nuclear agreement collapsed yesterday when opponents of the deal could not muster the necessary 60 votes for cloture in the Senate. Majority leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY) said he would force votes on the issue again, but “it is highly unlikely that any senator will change his or her vote,” the New York Times reports. The failed vote clears the way for the United States to begin implementation of the agreement.

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Headlines

• U.N. Special Envoy to Yemen Ismail Ould Cheikh Ahmed announced that the parties to the civil war will meet for peace talks next week, though the place and time have yet to be decided.

• The Obama Administration committed to accepting 10,000 Syrian refugees over the next year; to date, the United States has resettled only 1,500 Syrians refugees since the outbreak of the civil war in 2011.

• The Egyptian government is reportedly restoring its diplomatic ties with the Assad regime in Syria; those ties were cut by then-President Mohammed Morsi in 2013.

• U.S. officials believe the Islamic State has a unit within its organization dedicated to producing crude chemical weapons for use in attacks in Iraq and Syria.

• Residents of the northern Lebanese town of Akkar are protesting a government proposal to open a new landfill in their area in an effort to end Beirut’s ongoing trash crisis.

Arguments and Analysis

“Implementing the Iran Nuclear Agreement” (Christine Parthemore, Center for American Progress)

“The next 15 years of IAEA verification across Iran’s nuclear sites will establish a strong baseline for Iran’s capability levels with all of its equipment. From this baseline, the United States and its partners will be able to gauge more accurately how quickly — or slowly — Iran tries to ramp up its enrichment activities in the future than we can today without an agreement. If Iran rapidly reconfigures long assemblies of centrifuges or undertakes other actions that would indicate the political intention to quickly ramp up enrichment, then under the terms of the agreement, the international community will likely know and can react appropriately. Without the agreement, those clear indicators won’t be in place to signal Iran’s intentions.”

“No Changes in Moscow’s Stance on Syria” (Nikolay Kozhanov, Chatham House)

“However, recent events have proven that, once again, the West has misread Russia’s intentions. Moscow has instead decided to raise the stakes in Syria by stepping up military assistance to Assad. The latest consignments were said to include surveillance drones, BTR-80A (or, according to some sources, the more sophisticated BTR-82) advanced amphibious armoured personnel carriers, Ural military trucks and the GAZ Tigr infantry mobility vehicles (relatively recently provided to Russia’s own army). There have also been rumours that Moscow plans to supply several MiG-31 fighter jets and provide pilots to operate them.”

-J. Dana Stuster

ILYAS AKENGIN/AFP/Getty Images