if you have better information that they re gearing up to retake the second largest city in their country mosul. i think they are actually, wolf. you have to look at it from two directions. if you draw a straight line between raqqah and mosul, that s one line of operations and it goes through the kurdish regions. the reason you don t see the iraqi army in sinjar is because that s part of the kurdish regional government. let s draw another line from baghdad to mosul from south to north. there are a lot of iraqi security forces fighting in ramadi, in baiji, mr. al abadi was just in baiji a few weeks ago and they are having extreme difficulty in those towns. they also have to capture the towns in that south to north area. they re choking isis from several different directions to attempt to get back to mosul. but this is, as we ve said many times, is going to be a long slog. what kimberly said earlier about the fight for sinjar, i think
kind of kurd is doing the fighting. the peshmerga from the kurdish regional government up in northern iraq, very clear they re leading this operation. we saw the occasional sign of all the kurdish groups somewhere in the area but not in evidence at all frankly. this was a peshmerga operation. it was always thought to be one. the americans who are clearly in the skies but according to them today when you talk to them on the ground, perhaps other western militaries too, advising this operation. they seem to be comfortable with the peshmerga because of their organization you get from them and certainly their ability to deliver on fielding large numbers of troops. enormous columns we saw piling down these main roads. not an unstoppable force but one that s pretty hard to argue with. clearly, the americans are comfortable with working alongside them and perhaps this, i think, is aimed at building some sense of momentum to perhaps ensure a quick victory in sinjar because raqqah and mosul, th
neighborhood isn t associated with the group hezbollah. it s mixed sunni/shia neighborhood on the outskirts of a major palestinian camp in beirut. this area we ll been saying is the burj al barajneh area, is that right? yes, just on the fringe of the refugee camp. it s a mix of sunni and shia. it s a mixed area. we re going to stay in close touch with you and get more information. obviously, a horrendous situation happening. at least 37 dead, 181 wounded. but those numbers could go up. we ll have much more on this story coming up throughout the day. also coming up, an issue that s front and center in the race for the white house here in the united states. could the growing rift over how to handle 11 million undocumented ingrants in the united states hurt the republican party s chances against the democrats? our political panel standing by to weigh in. mariecan make any occasion feel more special.
it s called burj al barajneh. no claiming of responsibility by anyone yet. it is a stronghold of lebanon s hezbollah group who s fighting in syria alongside the government there of bashar al assad and the iranians. this area has been hit in the past. sunni militant groups have threatened to carry out more such attacks. as of right now, as of right now, we have no direct claim of responsibility for what happened. once again, 37 people dead. 181 wounded in beirut. i think we re trying to reconnect. with the journalist who s there. are you there, can you hear me? yes, i can hear you. tell us where you are and what you ve seen. i am now in the southern suburb of beirut near the scene of the twin bombings that happened just over two hours ago. i m actually near a school which is just 15 meters away from the
the iraqi military is really tied up around the ramadi area, the baiji area. they are splitting the territory within iraq as per their greatest concentration of forces. they re trying to build greater cooperation and coordination. the iraqi ambassador here says they re going to set up a point man, a military chief who would be talking to the coalition and representing the iraqi army, the kurds, and the sunni fighting forces. but we haven t seen that yet. so it s a forcing function. this fight for territory that s going to make them cooperate but so far they haven t demonstrated real coordinated cooperation in an effective way on the battlefield. that s so frustrating, as you know, to u.s. officials because when the u.s. left iraq, they supposedly left an iraqi military, security forces of about 300,000 troops. so many of them have simply abandoned their positions. right now, there s no signs i see maybe you can update us