Report: Obama Mulling Food and Supply Airdrops to Aid Stranded Yazidi and Airstrikes on ISIS Fighters

In response to U.N. Rescues Some of Iraq’s Yazidis Who Have Been Stranded In the Mountains After Fleeing ISIS:

More help may be on the way for the tens of thousands of ethnic minorities struggling to survive on Mount Sinjar in Northern Iraq. Many of the children on the mountain are suffering from dehydration and at least 40 have died according to UN officials.

White House Dossier reports that the president is considering airstrikes or food and supply airdrops to aid the mostly Yazidi minorities who are stranded on a mountaintop. 

The president, in meetings with his national security team at the White House on Thursday morning, has been weighing a series of options ranging from dropping humanitarian supplies on Mount Sinjar to military strikes on the fighters from ISIS now at the base of the mountain, a senior administration official said.

“I’m not in a position to discuss those kinds of tactical options,” said White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest. Earnest tried to suggest the president was indeed responding to the crisis by seeking to reform the Iraqi government, which is approximately like a doctor telling someone who is having a heart attack that he won’t treat them until they change their diet.

A very apt analogy. Obviously, this situation requires immediate action.

The White House also on Thursday declared that the U.S. would decide to stop genocides on a “case by case basis” – quite a departure from a statement the president made said only a few months ago marking the 20th anniversary of the Rwandan genocide.

“At this moment of reflection, we also remember that the Rwandan genocide was neither an accident nor unavoidable,” Obama said in an April 6 statement.  “The genocide we remember today — and the world’s failure to respond more quickly — reminds us that we always have a choice. In the face of hatred, we must remember the humanity we share.  In the face of cruelty, we must choose compassion.  In the face of intolerance and suffering, we must never be indifferent.  Embracing this spirit, as nations and as individuals, is how we can honor all those who were lost two decades ago and build a future worthy of their lives.”

Earnest today: “Each of these situations is evaluated on a case-by-case basis.”