Northern Iraq offensive (August 2014)

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Northern Iraq offensive (August 2014)
Part of the War in Iraq
Date 1–19 August 2014 (2 weeks and 4 days) Location Nineveh and Kirkuk Governorates Result Partial ISIL victory ISIL besieges Yazidi refugees on Mount Sinjar after the withdrawal of Kurdish forces ISIL repels Iraqi military attack on Tikrit Territorial changes ISIL captures Sinjar, the Mosul Dam, and eight other towns Peshmerga and Iraqi special forces recapture the Mosul Dam, Mount Zartak and two towns
Belligerents
Republic of Iraq Security forces Shi'ite private militias[1][2] Promised Day Brigade United States[3]  U.S. Navy[4] U.S. Air Force[5] Kurdistan Region Peshmerga[6] Assyrian Patriotic Party[7] Assyrian Democratic Movement[8][9] PKK[10] YJA-STAR[10] YRK[11][12] HPJ[11][12] YBŞ[13]  Rojava YPG[10] Syriac Military Council[14] YPJ[10] PDKI[15][16] Komalah[15]	Islamic State[17]
Commanders and leaders
Haider al-Abadi Ali Ghaidan Ahmed Saadi †[18] Masoud Barzani Jaafar Sheikh Mustafa Mustafa Said Qadir Murat Karayılan Cemil Bayık Salih Muslim Sipan Hamo Polat Can Gewargis Hanna Yonadam Kanna Qasim Şeşo	Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi
Strength
150,000 federal soldiers[19][20] 60,000 militiamen[21] 3,000 Iranian Quds Force[22][23] 1,000 U.S. troops[24] 190,000 Kurdish peshmerga[25]	20,000–31,500[26]
Casualties and losses
1,652 killed 1,460 wounded[27]	3,112 killed[28] 673 wounded[29]
5,000 Yazidis killed[30] 5,000–7,000 Yazidis abducted[31]

Between 1 and 15 August 2014, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) expanded territory in northern Iraq under their control. In the region north and west from Mosul, the Islamic State conquered Zumar, Sinjar, Wana, Mosul Dam, Qaraqosh, Tel Keppe, Batnaya and Kocho, and in the region south and east of Mosul the towns Bakhdida, Karamlish, Bartella and Makhmour

The offensive resulted in 200,000 Yazidi civilians and 100,000 Assyrians driven from their homes, 5,000 Yazidi men massacred, 5,000–7,000 Yazidi women enslaved, and a foreign military intervention against the Islamic State.

After the withdrawal of Iraqi federal forces from advancing Islamic state troops from many cities, and later the withdrawal of Kurdish Peshmerga fighters from many positions including the Qaraqosh and Sinjar, ^[32] 50,000 of Sinjar's Yazidis took refuge in the adjacent Sinjar Mountains, where they lacked food, water, and other necessities. While providing help and aid to refugees, an Iraqi helicopter crashed, killing the pilot and injuring several passengers, including an Iraqi member of parliament and a photographer on assignment for TIME. ^[33] 35,000 to 45,000 of them were evacuated within several weeks after the United States bombed ISIL positions, and the Iraqi armed forces, Kurdish People's Defence Forces, People's Protection Units, and Peshmerga forces opened a humanitarian corridor to enable their escape. Some ISIL-controlled territory was retaken; a subsequent Kurdish counter-attack recaptured the Mosul Dam and several other nearby towns.