Juan Cole

UIA Member Calls for Jaafari to Step Down A member of the United Iraqi Alliance called publicly Saturday for Ibrahim Jaafari to step down as candidate for prime minister from the coalition. The UIA groups at least 7 Shiite religious parties, and it is being alleged that 4 of them have lost faith in Jaafari. […]

Ayatollah Yaqubi Demands Khalilzad’s Expulsion Maliki: “US Will Destroy Iraq” Mortar shells, bombings and assassinations killed 9 in Iraq on Friday, in Baghdad and Kirkuk. A US soldier was killed in Anbar Province. Some prominent Shiite clerics used their Friday sermons to call for the expulsion from Iraq [Ar.] of US ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad. They […]

The Neocon Imaginary Middle East: Again Speaking of political frauds, the Web site Newshog has nailed Kenneth R. Timmerman for falsely alleging that Iran has bought nuclear warheads from North Korea. In fact, Jane’s Defense Weekly reported that Iran bought some ancient missile from Pyongyang, and there was never any question of a warhead. Timmerman […]

Al-Anizi: The US is Training an Insubordinate Iraqi Army Sistani Blows off Bush Guerrillas shot dead 8 oil workers at the Baiji refinery north of Baghdad. The guerrillas have for some time had a strategy of cutting the capital off from fuel and electricity as far as they can, and their sabotage in Baiji is […]

Attacks on Businesses Multiply Political Gridlock Continues A US soldier was killed in Habbaniyah and another was shot dead south of Baghdad. Guerrillas tried to kill the head of the Sunni Endowments Board and also an important banker, along with several other bombings and shootings. Steven Hurst of AP argues that the tactics used in […]

If you can’t do it, Just make it up Has any conflict since the Spanish American War been so much a fantasy of the yellow press and government hawks as the Iraq War? The Independent has gotten hold of some of the black psy-ops “newspaper articles” peddled by the Lincoln Group to Iraqi newspapers (it […]

Cole Receives Aronson Award from Hunter College Blogging as journalism just got a huge lift. Editors and Publishers carries the announcement that the James Aronson Award for Social Justice Journalism awarded by Hunter College will include for the first time this year a category for bloggers. I’m humbled to say that they are awarding it […]

Kamal Sayid Qadir Jailed for Criticism of Barzani The proto-fascist mini-state of the Kurdistan Democratic Party in Arbil [Irbil], northern Iraq, has sentenced an Austrian-Kurdish journalist to 18 months in prison for criticizing Massoud Barzani. Barzani Barzani last allied with Saddam Hussein against fellow Kurds as late as 1996, only a decade ago. And you […]

Dozens Kidnapped, Killed, Wounded A car bomb wounded 11 in an attack on police in the norther part of the city of Hilla. Guerrillas killed two US soldiers in separate incidents and wounded 3, at an installation near to Baghdad. Three guerrilla cells kidnapped 24 Iraqis in Baghdad on Tuesday, from 2 electronics shops and […]