Juan Cole

Sadr Mediates Sunni-Shiite Dispute Al-Sharq al-Awsat/ DPA: Young Shiite nationalist leader Muqtada al-Sadr said Monday that the attempts of his aides to mediate between the Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars and the Shiite Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq’s Badr paramilitary had achieved advances. Deutsche Press Agentur reported that Sadr told them in Najaf, […]

$100 Million “Mishandled” in Iraq An international audit has found that the Allawi government “mishandled” $100 million in petroleum funds that should have been used for development, and that the US Coalition Provisional Authority gave out uncompetitive contracts and misspent development monies. I don’t know what they mean by “mishandled.” I think they may be […]

8,000 Antiquities Still Missing from Iraq The Independent summarizes a paper given by John Curtis of the British Museum at an art crime conference in London, concerning Iraq’s ancient heritage looted while Americans stood by and watched: “[H]alf of the 40 iconic items from the Iraq National Museum in Baghdad still had not been retrieved. […]

14 Killed Sadr Tries to Mediate between Sunnis, Shiites At least 14 persons were killed in Iraq on Sunday in separate incidents. There was a car bomb in Tikrit, which wounded US and Iraqi soldiers. The director general of the Ministry of Trade, Ali Musa Salman, was shot down in Baghdad. There were firefights at […]

Is it George’s Fault? Laura Bush Heckled at Wailing Wall over Pollard Affair And at Temple Mount by Palestinians I was alarmed at the tenor of the reporting about First Lady Laura Bush’s close brush with both Israeli and Palestinian protesters, at the Wailing Wall and the Dome of the Rock respectively. Suzanne Malveaux, who […]

Muqtada Tries to Mediate Between Sunnis and Badr Three Sunni Arab organizations arranged a meeting of 1,000 Sunni notables on Saturday, in an attempt to form an umbrella group with greater political clout. The LA Time reports that, ‘ Meanwhile, a tribal leader from Madaen told the gathering that if security conditions didn’t improve in […]

US Public Confidence on Iraq Plummeting A new Harris Interactive poll shows that US public confidence in the Iraq venture is falling rapidly. Question: How confident are you that U.S. policies in Iraq will be successful? May 2005 Confident: 25%Not confident: 54%Not sure: 20% Mar. 2005 Confident: 30%Not confident: 49%Not sure: 21% Thinking about everything […]

Saturday Satire Not to be outdone.

Sadrists Clash with Police in Nasiriyah Baghdad Sunni Mosque Protest Ramadi Demonstrations against Koran Desecration Thousands of protesters rallied in Iraq (some reports say 6,000) on Friday denouncing the continued US military presence in the country. Many of the demonstrators in the south were followers of nationalist Shiite young Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, and they […]