Archives for 2006

Rumsfeld’s Shocking Memo; Over 100 Dead in Sectarian Violence The NYT has gotten hold of a memo by Donald Rumsfeld detailing options on Iraq. Several things struck me about it: 1. Rumsfeld doesn’t understand the magnitude of the crisis or the tightrope the US is walking in the Gulf. His attitude is almost lackadaisical. Doing […]

Bus Stop Massacre Kills 20; Sistani Aide Warns against Violence, Blames Arab T.V. On Saturday morning, an empty fuel trucker slammed into people waiting at a bus stop in al-Wahada, 22 miles south of Baghad, killing twenty persons and wounding 15. In his Friday prayers sermon, Shaikh Abdul Mahdi al-Karbala’i, a key aide to Grand […]

Dozens of Bodies in Sinjar and Baghdad 40% Increase in Violent Deaths in November AFP says that political violence left nearly 2000 dead in Iraq in November, a 40* percent increase over October. The number of wounded, however, fell substantially. AFP says that these numbers come from the Iraqi government. In fact, survey research has […]

The Bush-Maliki Summit and the New Middle East Cold War Over 100 Bodies found in Past 48 Hours Al-Hayat writing in Arabic sums up the results of the Bush-Maliki Summit: 1. The US and its Arab allies rejected the notion of making any concessions to Iran in return for Tehran’s help in calming the situation […]

Bush Will Speed Turn-over of Security Responsibilities Maliki Skipped Weds. Banquet, Snubs Bush over Memo Bush will speed the transfer of security responsibilities to Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, it was announced at their summit in Amman. Al-Maliki has been pressing Washington for some time to give him the authority to order much bigger battle […]

Health Ministry Attacked Khamenei Calls for US Withdrawal Iraq’s Shiite-run Health Ministry was attacked again Weds. morning, presumably by Sunni Arab guerrillas. Thomas Ricks and Robin Wright at WaPo examine the increasing tendency of the American political class to blame the Iraqis for the political turmoil there. I see. The US invaded their country, abolished […]

King Abdullah II: It’s Palestine, Stupid US Troops may Leave al-Anbar A surprise for Americans: The most urgent and destabilizing crisis in the Middle East is not Iraq. It is, according to King Abdullah II of Jordan (who will meet Bush today), the Israel-Palestine conflict, which is a major engine driving the radicalization of Muslims […]

Hizb and Mahdi: Do they or Don’t they? The NYT was told by somebody in Washington that Hizbullah has trained between 1,000 and 2,000 Mahdi Army militiamen. I don’t know if I believe it, and I am not sure it is significant if true. There are thousands of Mahdi Army militiamen, and some have much […]

Will Bush Rehabilitate the Baathists? Al-Zaman [in Arabic] is under the impression that Bush’s talks with al-Maliki in Amman will aim in part at politically rehabilitating members of the Baath Party. The “Debaathification Commission” of Ahmad Chalabi (who anyway lives in London) will be abolished, it says. Discussions will be held with the neo-Baathist leadership […]