NATO Holds 5th-Ever Emergency Meeting

For just the fifth time in its 66-year history, NATO ambassadors will meet in an emergency session today to gauge the threat ISIS poses to Turkey and the debated actions Turkish authorities are taking in response. The extraordinary meeting at NATO headquarters was requested by Turkey under Article 4 of the treaty that founded the US-led alliance, which empowers its 28 member states to seek such consultations when they consider their "territorial integrity, political independence, or security" to be in jeopardy.

The meeting comes as Turkey's security situation "has deteriorated dramatically," an analyst at the German Marshall Fund think tank says. The rise of ISIS "in northern Iraq, in northern Syria, has effectively destabilized the southern border of Turkey. But also domestically, the threat of terrorism has become very real," he says. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, who will chair the closed-door session, says Turkey requested it following recent "heinous terrorist attacks." (The US and Turkey have come up with a plan to eradicate ISIS from a 68-mile border zone.)