On Monday, Islamic State militants took control of Rutba, a town of 20,000 people in Iraq's western Anbar province that controls the road from Baghdad to Jordan and Syria.
They overran the mayor's office, executed at least five people, and fanned across several neighborhoods, Al Jazeera reports. Rutba is a "very strategic town," Al Jazeera's Imran Khan says, and this is "seen as a significant victory. The fact that they lost this town is very significant."
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