First up, Iraqi forces say they're fighting back. They're trying to retake control of two provinces in western and central Iraq from the Islamic State terrorist group. ISIS expanded its territory last week, capturing the city of Ramadi. It's 70 miles away from the Iraqi capital Baghdad.

 

U.S. Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said that the Iraqi army in Ramadi vastly outnumbered the ISIS fighters but that it didn't want to fight. An Iraqi soldier put the blame on military leadership and said the army didn't have enough supplies or support.

 

But all this has renewed international pressure on the U.S. government, to do more to fight ISIS, following the terrorist group's two key victories last week. 

 

Arguably, this is the terror group's best week in a year. Combine their battlefield successes, uh, ISIS' biggest strategic gains since they swept across Iraq last summer. 

 

In Syria, the radical Islamists now control more than half the country, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. The latest attack added more oil and gas fields, more ancient artifacts, and a key highway intersection–all potential money owners. They also cemented their control of Syria's border crossings into Iraq, taking Tanf, the last outside the Kurdish region not already under their control. Their advances at times hard to follow.

 

It's hard for us to nail down with any sort of granularity exactly what's happening on the ground. So, this is something we're following.

 

The speed of ISIS's Syrian advance questions the ability or willingness of President Bashar al-Assad's forces to hold ground. Local reports described the Syrian army fleeing Palmyra. By design or default, he is losing the east of Syria to ISIS. 

 

In Ramadi, Iraq, where Iraqi special forces can call in U.S. air support, the army also retreated, as ISIS closed in on them. In scenes reminiscent of ISIS' sweeping gains in Iraq last summer, the terror group seized more weapons as government's stockpiles fell into their hands.

 

It's not uh, something positive which is happening, but we hope that we can conquer. The war is war. You lose some of the fighters, but you have to win the war ultimately.

 

For now, battlefield momentum is with ISIS, quickly moving on from Ramadi towards Baghdad.

 

By the end of the week, taking the town of Husayba, taken in totality, gains in the east of Syria, connecting through greater control of the border between Iraq and Syria, to gains to the west of Iraq, ISIS's power base is growing, and so are international concerns.

 

Extreme dry heat is blowing into India. It's pushing thermometers up to 117 degrees Fahrenheit. And this is in a country where about a third of the population doesn't have access to electricity. Many of those who do are dealing with occasional power outages, with fans and air-conditioning straining the system. 

 

More than 1,100 people have died in this week-long heat wave. They include India's poor, its homeless, and some construction workers who labored in direct sunlight. The monsoon rains are coming. They should bring some relief. But it could take a week or more before they cover the country.