Newsweek International 10/28/2016 - 11/4/2016

Mosul, Iraq—More than two years after the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) forced the Iraqi army to flee the country’s second-largest city, an American-supported coalition is trying to take it back. On October 17, Kurdish forces made their way through a series of villages east of the city. “The Iraqi flag,” said Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, “will be raised in the middle of Mosul, and in each village and corner very soon.” The Kurdish one, however, will fly too—at least along the way into Mosul.…

Kolkata, India—A man paints earthenware lamps on October 17, two weeks before Diwali, a five-day festival of lights celebrated by millions of Hindus, Sikhs and Jains across the world. Millions of these twinkling lamps will be filled with oil and lit to decorate temples and homes on October 30. Celebrated for more than a millennium, the festival marks the triumph of good over evil. For many Hindus, it can be traced back to the return of Lord Rama, his wife Sita and his brother Lakshmana to the ancient kingdom of Ayodhya upon defeating the demon king Ravana, after 14 years in exile. It marks the start of a new year for many in the Hindu community.…

Abuja, Nigeria—A girl who was kidnapped along with about 300 others over two years ago celebrates on October 16 with her family after being released along with 20 other girls by Boko Haram. The mass abduction shocked the world and led to the campaign and hashtag “#Bring BackOur Girls.” Almost 200 girls remain in captivity; many are believed to have been taken as wives by the extremists and systematically raped, according to The Guardian.…

I AM Sidney Blumenthal. At least, that is what Russian President Vladimir Putin—and, somehow, Donald Trump—seems to believe. And that should raise serious concerns not only about Moscow’s attempts to manipulate this U.S. presidential election, but also about how Trump wound up pushing false information from an altered document to American voters. An email purported to be from Blumenthal—a confidant of Hillary Clinton and a man at the center of many conservative conspiracy theories—turned up in the October 7 document dump by WikiLeaks. American intelligence has repeatedly warned that Russian hackers are trying to interfere with the election, and many records stolen from multiple Democratic Party organizations have been fed to WikiLeaks, but now that I have been brought into the whole mess, Newsweekhas more evidence suggesting that the Russians…

 “WHEN AMERICA needs us, they call,” the woman tells me. “But will they forget what we have done when we need them?” SOME ARGUE THAT AN INDEPENDENT KURDISTAN WOULD THROW THE REGION INTO GREATER TURMOIL. Khota Kider is a commander of a female Kurdish brigade, and her question resonates here in Iraqi Kurdistan, on the front lines in the war against the Islamic State group (ISIS). A stateless people of roughly 25 million, Kurds live in oil-rich parts of Iraq, Turkey, Iran and Syria. They’re known for their skill on the battlefield, and they’ve long felt that other countries—especially the U.S.—use them as proxies, then abandon them when they’re no longer needed. Iraqi Kurds are expected to play a crucial role in the battle of Mosul, which began October 17…

THE MESSAGE from the head of ISIS’s war committee to his besieged comrades is clear: Stay and fight to the death—or we’ll kill you. “Inform all our besieged brothers that we will never accept withdrawal…. We will kill all who withdraw or encourage withdrawal and work for it. And we order you, Abu Yahya, to kill all who withdraw,” the unnamed leader writes in a letter apparently sent on August 8 from the headquarters of the Islamic State militant group in the Syrian city of Raqqa to its fighters in the then-besieged Syrian city of Manbij. The three-page handwritten letter is addressed to Abu Yahya al-Shami, who was the top ISIS commander in Manbij. Three experts who examined the letter at our request believe it to be genuine, but Newsweek…