Juan Cole

Iraq Roundup The US military announced 3 more US GIs killed by guerrillas on Thursday. The Arab League ambassador in Baghdad, Mukthar Lamani, said Thursday that in the previous week, 250 prominent Iraqi personalities have been assassiated. They included five tribal leaders from Diyala province who participated in the Reconciliation Conference last weekend in Baghdad. […]

76 Bodies found in Baghdad, Dozens More Killed Attacks on Teachers Roil Education Raed Jarrar argues that the Bush administration’s plans to ally with the Kurds and the Shiites and crush the Sunni Arabs in Iraq won’t work. He is right. He also points to the continued political alliances across sectarian lines, which show that […]

Hashimi: Bush Blackmailed Blair on Timetable Sistani Said to Back New Coalition A US Marine died of wounds received in al-Anbar Province on Monday, the US military announced. Iraqi Vice President Tariq al-Hashimi of the Iraqi Islamic Party said Tuesday that he thought George W. Bush had “blackmailed” or “brainwashed” British Prime Minister Tony Blair. […]

3 More US Troops Killed Violence in Iraq at ‘All Time High’ The deaths of three more US troops at the hands of Sunni Arab guerrillas were announced on Monday. Iraq violence is at an all-time high since the US “turned over sovereignty” to an Iraqi government June 28, 2004. USA Today writes, “The Pentagon […]

More on Elliot Abrams’ Censorship of Leverett The Last Hurrah has imagined the content of Flynt Leverett’s squashed opinion piece on Iran, based on his past pronouncements on the matter. Thanks to Daily Kos for taking up the issue of the quashed Leverett memo/petition and my call for people to write their representatives and senators […]

Bush White House Censors Op-Ed on Iran Elliot Abrams Must Go Steve Clemons of the New America Foundation carries the story of how Elliot Abrams and others at the National Security Council in Bush’s White House have intervened to stop the publication of an op-ed in the New York Times by Flynt Leverett. Leverett himself […]

Dozens of Red Crescent Workers Kidnapped The horror show in Iraq continued on Sunday, when men dressed as special police commandos invaded the offices of the Red Crescent Society [which is allied with the Red Cross] in Karrada in central Baghdad and kidnapped “dozens” (the local Adhamiyah police say they don’t know how many) of […]

3 GIs killed, 53 Bodies found Sunnis, Sadr Boycott ‘Reconciliation’ Conference Sunni Arab guerrillas killed 3 GIs north of Baghdad on Saturday with a roadside bomb. Police found 53 bodies in the streets of Baghdad on Saturday, some of them in the tense Sunni Arab district of Ghazaliya. A bombing in Kirkuk killed an Iraqi […]

Lando on Oil Insecurity in Basra Ben Lando of UPI gives us a 2-part report on oil security [part 1 here] in Iraq, or rather the lack thereof. This problem is often ignored in the press, but it is at the center of the inability of the new government to establish itself. You don’t need […]