Medical aid agency MSF (Médecins Sans Frontières, or Doctors Without Borders) said thousands of Iraqi civilians fleeing the besieged city of Fallujah have been without access to medicine for months and are fleeing to areas without adequate water and sanitation, raising the likelihood of epidemics such as cholera.

Iraqi forces say they have secured the southern edge of the Islamic State group stronghold of Fallujah, two weeks after the launch of an operation to recapture the city.

The UN children’s fund has issued a stark warning to Iraqi troops and Islamic State (IS) militants to spare thousands of youngsters trapped by the battle for Fallujah.

Good afternoon. Here’s all the news you need to know this lunchtime.

Iraqi government forces have started a new phase of the operation to recapture the city of Fallujah, which is held by Islamic State.

Iraqi forces have launched an operation to retake the Islamic State-held city of Fallujah.

Good morning. Here’s everything you need to know before you start your day.

The photo of a dead 3-year-old Syrian boy on a Turkish beach captures everything we don’t want to see when we tap our phones or open our newspapers: a vicious civil war, a surge of refugees, the death of an innocent. 

IS militants have reduced the amount of water flowing to government-held areas in Iraq’s western Anbar province, an official said.

Islamic State (IS) extremists have unleashed a wave of suicide attacks targeting the Iraqi army in western Anbar province, killing at least 17 troops.

A video released by the Islamic State group yesterday appears to show the killing of two different groups of captured Ethiopian Christians by the extremist group’s Libyan affiliates.

The armed forces seem to be reassuring themselves that the violence they inflict — and the violence the enemy inflicts in return — is definitely worth it, according to David Axe

The head of the extremist Islamic State group has said it will fight to the last man.

As long as Islamic militants fight the US-led alliance on Washington’s terms, they will lose but they are already reverting back to guerilla warfare which will prolong the conflict, writes David Axe.

A triple suicide bombing has killed 26 members of Kurdish security forces north east of Baghdad while a roadside bomb killed the police chief of the western Anbar province.

A British man who had been held hostage by militants in Libya has been released, the British Foreign Office said.

As the US begins to move against Islamic State forces, intelligence gathering on the ground, from the air, and through the airwaves is of paramount importance, write David Axe and Robert Beckhusen.

Some 4,000 Iraqi volunteers are being airlifted to an embattled city west of Baghdad to help bolster government forces locked in a running battle with Sunni militants there.

The unfolding debacle in Iraq has set off a furious — and drearily predictable — partisan dispute in Washington over who was more to blame: George W Bush or Barack Obama, writes Bill Powell

Sunni fighters led by an al-Qaeda breakaway group expanded their offensive in a volatile western province, capturing three strategic towns and the first border crossing with Syria to fall on the Iraqi side.

The Obama administration is willing to talk with Iran over deteriorating security conditions in Iraq and is not ruling out potential US-Iranian military co-operation in stemming the advance of Sunni extremists, Secretary of State John Kerry said.

Al-Qaida-inspired militants have pushed deeper into Iraq’s Sunni heartland, conquering Saddam Hussein’s hometown of Tikrit as soldiers and security forces yielded ground once controlled by US forces.

A series of car bombs exploded across Iraq’s capital tonight, killing at least 52 people in a day of violence that saw militants storm a university in the country’s restive Anbar province and take dozens hostage, authorities said.

Attacks across Iraq, including a series of bombings targeting shoppers in a Sunni neighbourhood in the capital Baghdad, have killed at least 16 people today.

A paralympic skier and former soldier challenged David Cameron about being denied compensation for his war injuries during a reception for the Sochi Games team.

US secretary of state John Kerry said yesterday that the United States will support Iraq’s fight against al Qaeda-linked militants who have overrun two cities, but won’t send in US troops.

A new wave of bombings has caused carnage in Iraq’s capital, Baghdad, killing at least 20 people.

A senior Iraqi military commander has said it will take a few days to fully dislodge al-Qaida-linked fighters from two key western cities.

A triple bombing struck the funeral of the son of an anti-al-Qaeda tribal leader north-east of Baghdad on Sunday, one of several attacks across the country that left 14 people dead, Iraqi officials said.

A series of attacks in Iraq has left at least 24 Shiites and five policeman dead.

A double suicide bombing attack at a Shiite mosque in Baghdad has killed at least 24 people and wounded dozens more.

Bombs struck Sunni areas in Baghdad and surrounding areas today, killing at least 76 people in the deadliest day in Iraq in more than eight months, officials said today.

Insurgents in Iraq detonated a series of car bombs across Iraq today as co-ordinated attacks killed at least 55 people on the deadliest day in nearly a month.

A highly coordinated string of attacks have hit Iraq killing at least 36 and wounding more than 200.

A wave of bombings has left at least 43 people dead in Iraq.

At least 15 people have been killed and dozens wounded when militants launched attacks in central and northern Iraq, the latest wave of strikes aimed at undermining the government’s authority.

Authorities say that seven Iraqi police have been killed in two bombings and a drive-by shooting in a former al-Qaida stronghold in western Iraq.

Two men who were acquaintances of mine died recently from drink.

A wave of bombings and shootings across eight Iraqi cities today, targeting police and Shiite pilgrims, killed 46 people.