Iraqi security forces took part Thursday in an intensive security deployment against Islamic State militants in Adhaim, a village in Diyala Province north of Baghdad. Reuters

Is The Tide Turning Against Islamic State? -- Kenneth Kaplan, CSM

Iraqi security officials said today their forces had recaptured Baiji oil refinery, while US Defense Secretary Hagel said yesterday that IS advances had been stalled. IS leader Baghdadi, meanwhile, released an audio call for more attacks.

Is the tide turning in Iraq against the self-described Islamic State, or are events there just the normal ebb and flow of war?

US defense officials said yesterday that the Islamist group’s advances in Iraq had been stalled or reversed, and held out the possibility that US ground forces may be called on to assist an Iraqi Army that was no longer fleeing the battlefield. Today, Iraqi security officials said that IS militants had been driven from Baiji, Iraq’s largest refinery, which they had captured in a stunning summer offensive.

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Commentaries, Analysis, And Editorials -- November 14, 2014

ISIS Keeps Getting Better at Dodging U.S. Spies -- Shane Harris & Noah Shachtman, Daily Beast

Has ISIS peaked? Terror group suffers setbacks in Iraq -- Tim Lister, CNN

Don’t underestimate ISIS’ Baghdadi -- Joyce Karam, Al Arabiya

Can the U.S. Defeat ISIS Without Removing Assad? -- Adam Chandler, The Atlantic

Can UK stop ISIL fighters returning home? -- Inside Story/Al Jazeera

Lebanon's politics paralyzed by regional conflict -- Oliver Holmes, Reuters

The school that says Osama Bin Laden was a hero -- Mobeen Azhar, BBC

New commander in Afghanistan reviews drawdown plans -- Andrew Tilghman, Military Times

Who Will Pay for China's Bust? -- Mark Whitehouse, Bloomberg

APEC 2014: Russia Tries To Leave Europe Behind -- Colin Chilcoat. Oil Price

Putin Is Lying on Ukraine—and the West Can't Stop Him -- Jamie Dettmer, Daily Beast

Can gold deflect Western economic attacks? The Kremlin thinks so. -- Fred Weir, CSM

Standing Up to Aggression, or Ensuring Nuclear Security -- New York Times

Latin American Violence: After Mexico, Brazil Could Be Next -- Clóvis Rossi, World Crunch

Interview with Henry Kissinger: 'Do We Achieve World Order Through Chaos or Insight?' -- Inerrview Conducted By Juliane von Mittelstaedt and Erich Follath, Spiegel Online