Alissa J. Rubin, the New York Times Paris bureau chief who has spent much of the past decade anchoring the paper's Iraq and Afghanistan war coverage, was riding in a helicopter that crashed as it was delivering humanitarian aid to Yazidi refugees in northern Iraq today.

Mosul—Iraq's third-largest city, urbane center of the nation's northern regions, built on the remains of the once-great Assyrian empire, made free through the sacrifices of thousands of Iraqis, Kurds, and Americans—fell to a gang of Islamist insurgents Monday.

After sentencing them to eight years just last month, Iranian authorities have supposedly released Americans Joshua Fattal and Shane Bauer from prison today. At least that's what "a U.S. official" told CNN, to which CNN texted back, "pix or GTFO."

Without presenting any evidence whatsoever to back up their claim, Iranian authorities have sentenced American hikers Joshua Fattal and Shane Bauer to five years in prison for spying for the United States. And you thought American justice was bad!