Between 1 and 15 August 2014, the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) expanded territory in northern Iraq under their control. In the region north and west from Mosul, the Islamic State conquered Zumar, Sinjar, Wana, Mosul Dam, Qaraqosh, Tel Keppe, Batnaya and Kocho, and in the region south and east of Mosul the towns Bakhdida, Karamlish, Bartella and Makhmour The offensive resulted in 200,000 Yazidi civilians and 100,000 Iraqi Christians driven from their homes, 5,000 Yazidi men massacred, 5,000–7,000 Yazidi women enslaved, and a foreign military intervention against the Islamic State. After the withdrawal of Iraqi federal forces from advancing Islamic state troops from many cities, and later the withdrawal of Kurdish Peshmerga fighters from many positions including the Qaraqosh and Sinjar, 50,000 of Sinjar's Yazidis took refuge in the adjacent Sinjar Mountains, where they lacked food, water, and other necessities. While providing help and aid to refugees, an Iraqi helicopter crashed, killing the pilot and injuring several passengers, including an Iraqi member of parliament and a photographer on assignment for TIME. 35,000 to 45,000 of them were evacuated within several weeks after the United States bombed ISIL positions, and the Iraqi armed forces, Kurdish People's Defence Forces, People's Protection Units, and Peshmerga forces opened a humanitarian corridor to enable their escape. Some ISIL-controlled territory was retaken; a subsequent Kurdish counter-attack recaptured the Mosul Dam and several other nearby towns. Background In June 2014, Islamic State invaded and conquered significant territories in western and northern Iraq, including the cities of Mosul, Iraq's second largest town, with over a million residents, and Tikrit, 200 km south of Mosul. Iraqi federal military forces withdrew from the advancing ISIL troops and Kurdish Peshmerga fighters withdrew from Qaraqosh and Sinjar and later took over the control of a wide territory in northern Iraq outside the Kurdistan Region from the federal Iraqi government. A former commander of the Iraqi ground forces, Ali Ghaidan, accused former Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki of being the one who issued the order to withdraw. ISIL assault 1 August Friday 1 August 2014, ISIL attacked a Peshmerga post in Zumar, 40 km northwest of Mosul, in the peshmerga-controlled zone of northern Iraq, and a nearby oil-winning facility and the nearby Mosul Dam, Iraq's largest dam and an important supplier of electricity and water. The Peshmerga fought off ISIL, killing 100 ISIL fighters, according to Kurdish sources, but also