Juan Cole

Maliki and Bush Pledge Troops to Baghdad 32 Dead in Scattered Violence In a tense and awkward news conference on Tuesday, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and President Bush pledged that more US troops would be brought to Baghdad. There has already been an increase from something like 44,000 to 55,000 in recent weeks, but apparently […]

Hizbullah Pledges Deeper Attacks Strikes Haifa, Galilee Kills Arab Girl Hasan Nasrallah, the Hizbullah leader, threatened Tuesday to fire rockets beyond Haifa, implictly threatening Tel Aviv (and Jerusalem?) He expressed confidence that Israel could not win its ground war in the south, and said his fighters would ultimately recover any land taken by the Israelis. […]

Problems with Israeli Military Performance If you read Reuven Pedatzur’s article in Haaretz attentively, you will see that he is indicting the Israeli armed forces as incompetent and also will detect that he is extremely alarmed. Despite his confidence, expressed at the outset, that Israeli military mistakes (primarily grossly underestimating Hizbullah) will not affect the […]

Rice Ultimatum to Lebanon undermined by Maliki Israelis Kill 7 Civilians Monday in 40 Bombing Raids The LA Times reports that Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki broke ranks again with Washington on Monday, strongly criticizing Israel’s destruction of Lebanon’s ports, roads, bridges and other infrastructure and warning that it will lead to further extremism i […]

Chronicle Forum on Blogging and Careers The Chronicle of Higher Education did a forum, which is freely accessible this week, on the question of “Can Blogging Derail your Career?” Among the respondents are some prominent academic bloggers, including Michael Berube, Brad DeLong, Dan Drezner, and Glenn Reynolds. Several of the contributors said nice things about […]

Israelis Kill 8, wound 45 on Sunday Strike Clinic, Ambulance, Factories, Minibus, Journalist Hizbullah Rockets Hit Haifa, Kill 2 The Daily Star reports that “Israeli warplanes continued their bombardment of Lebanon on Sunday, killing at least eight and wounding 45, as Hizbullah gave the Lebanese government the green light to negotiate on its behalf for […]

100 Killed, In Massive Bombings in Sadr City, Kirkuk The LA times reports that civil war violence in Iraq killed around 100 persons on Sunday The most deadly incidents were the bombing of laborers in Sadr City and the bomb that guerrillas detonated near a courthouse in Kirkuk, killing 21 and wounding 70. Another deadly […]

The Descent into Hell is Optional Patrick McGreevy writes from Beirut: ‘ The Descent into Hell Is Optional The day after most of our American colleagues escaped the war zone of Lebanon, we wondered if the descent into hell many of them had imagined would materialize. In these days of precision terror, it seems that […]

Dershowitz and Grades of Human Beings Alan “Torture is OK” Dershowitz is annoyed that the Israelis have been accused of killing innocent civilians. He is now arguing that there are degrees of “civilianity.” He wonders how many innocent civilians killed by Israel in Lebanon would still be innocent if we could make finer distinctions. (He […]