Dispatches

May 20

Thousands of desperate Iraqis fled the besieged city of Ramadi as Islamic State militants captured the strategic capital of Anbar Province. (ISIS militants also captured the ancient city of Palmyra, Syria.) During a Pentagon news conference, U.S. Gen. Martin Dempsey downplayed Ramadi’s disastrous fall, saying the city wasn’t key to defeating the Islamic State. Some U.S. lawmakers disagreed and underscored the loss of 1,335 American soldiers during the battle for Fallujah and Ramadi from 2004 to 2007. Debbie Lee lost her son, Navy SEAL Marc Lee, in Ramadi in 2006, and wrote an open letter to Dempsey: “You, sir, owe an apology to the families whose loved ones’ blood was shed in Ramadi. Ramadi matters to us.”

Ireland approves gay marriage

May 22

Citizens in Ireland—a country once considered one of the most Catholic nations in the world—voted to redefine marriage legally as a union between “two persons without distinction as to their sex.” More than 62 percent voted to approve gay marriage in the first country to legalize the practice by a popular vote. Catholic priests opposed the referendum, but the church’s influence has waned in Ireland, partly in the wake of clergy sex abuse scandals. On the morning after the vote, Diarmuid Martin, the archbishop of Dublin, spoke to children awaiting confirmation in the church. “Boys and girls, I made my confirmation 60 years ago,” he told them. “Your world is different from mine.”

Biker brawl

May 17

In one of the worst eruptions of biker-gang violence in recent history, nine persons died and 18 were hospitalized after a massive brawl at a restaurant in Waco, Texas. Police arrested 170 persons after an altercation morphed into bikers from different gangs shooting, stabbing, and beating each other. The U.S. Department of Justice has reported one of the gangs, “the Bandidos,” is a growing threat with at least 2,000 members in 14 countries.

Benghazi revelations

May 18

Newly released documents show the Obama administration knew in 2012 that weapons were flowing out of Benghazi to Syrian rebels with well-publicized ties to al-Qaeda and other extremist groups. The Washington, D.C.–based watchdog group Judicial Watch obtained the cache of 100 documents from the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) after filing a lawsuit in federal court. Administration officials and congressional Democrats had claimed no evidence existed of arms flowing from Libya to Syria. The DIA documents also confirmed the CIA and the State Department—then led by Hillary Clinton—received immediate intelligence that the 2012 terrorist attack on the U.S. consulate in Benghazi was pre-planned and executed by al-Qaeda-linked brigades. Administration officials initially claimed the attack stemmed from spontaneous rioting over an offensive video. A House committee investigating the Benghazi attack plans to call Clinton away from her presidential campaign to testify in coming months.

Deluge in Texas

May 24

Severe flooding swept away at least 350 homes outside Austin, Texas, and damaged hundreds more in Oklahoma over Memorial Day weekend. At least seven persons died and some 2,000 persons fled their homes in both states, as record-breaking rains pummeled the region. Oklahoma City broke its all-time record for rain in any single month, and the Blanco River in Texas surged to 40 feet. Flash floods late on Memorial Day and the day after left much of Houston’s freeway system under water.

Set adrift

May 20

Human traffickers abandoned at sea thousands of refugees fleeing poverty in Bangladesh and persecution in Myanmar. Some of the migrants told rescuers they had been at sea for weeks, left behind by smugglers they paid to ferry them to Indonesia. Officials said hundreds more boats could still be adrift. Rohingya Muslims have faced persecution in Myanmar (formerly Burma) for years, and thousands flee harsh conditions each year. A local fisherman told CNN he had seen one of the packed boats now missing. “There are so many children on the boat,” he said. “There must have been 100 small children.”

Save the bees

May 19

The U.S. Department of Agriculture announced stinging figures for beekeepers fighting to keep colonies alive: More than 40 percent of U.S. honeybee colonies died in the year ending in April. It’s serious business for beekeepers struggling with the cost of replenishing hives and for farmers dependent on honeybees to pollinate dozens of commercially grown crops in the United States. The Obama administration announced a plan to study the causes of the surge in honeybee deaths across the country and the potential impact on the nation’s food supply.

Santa Barbara spill

May 19

The idyllic shoreline of Santa Barbara, Calif., ran black when a ruptured pipeline dumped 105,000 gallons of crude into a nearby culvert. An estimated 21,000 gallons of oil flowed into the Pacific Ocean. Plains All American Pipeline, the owner of the ruptured line, sent 18 vessels to skim thousands of gallons of oil from the ocean’s surface. Marine scientists took samples to determine the spill’s potential effect on wildlife in a region sometimes called “the Galapagos of the north” for its ecological diversity.