The Turkish army is shelling and burning Kurdish villages in the country's east, while just across the Syrian border ISIS continues to harass Kurdish towns with suicide attacks.
Following years of drought, Iran has quietly sought help from the US in managing a severe water crisis during the same period that US-Iran nuclear talks were underway.
A partial ceasefire in Syria was brokered by the great regional enemies Turkey and Iran—and may signal the division of the country into "spheres of influence."
As Turkey continues to bomb Kurdish anti-ISIS fighters in Iraq, violence is quickly spreading within Turkey itself—with bombings and armed clashes from Istanbul to the Kurdish east.
The US and Turkey have reached an agreement to keep Kurdish forces out of the northern Syria "buffer zone" as Ankara expands its air-strikes in both Syria and Iraq.
Washington has given Turkey a green light to crush the revolutionary Kurds—in Turkey, Syria and Iraq alike—as the price of Ankara's cooperation against ISIS.
With US support, Turkey is moving to seize its "buffer zone" in Syria—ostensibly against ISIS but actually against the Kurdish forces that have been the most effective against ISIS.
As Turkey opens Incirlik Air Base to US warplanes, it has launched sweeps against supporters of both ISIS and their enemies in the PKK and allied leftist forces.
A suicide bomb attack in the southern Turkish town of Suruc killed at least 30 at a meeting of young activists to organize solidarity with the reconstruction of Kobani.
Protesters attacked the Thai consulate in Istanbul as Bangkok deported 109 Uighurs back to China despite international warnings that they could face persecution and torture.
Two Spanish volunteers who went to Iraq to fight ISIS in an "International Brigade" were arrested upon their return and face charges of membership in a "terrorist organization."
Obama's Pentagon speech on his strategy against ISIS boasted of "effective partners on the ground"—but pointedly made no actual reference to the Rojava Kurds.
