Juan Cole

50 Killed, 114 Wounded in Coordinated Series of 17 Bombings 3 Americans Killed, 7 wounded The guerrilla movement pulled off a spectacular set of bombings in Iraq on Friday, as though responding decisively to President Bush’s news conference Thursday night in which he said, ” “I believe we’re making really good progress in Iraq . […]

Parliament Approves Cabinet Interior Ministry goes to Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq Al-Jazirah is reporting, early Friday morning, several car bombs in the al-Azamiyah and Salikh neighborhoods of Iraq, which killed at least 10 and wounded dozens. The new Iraqi government was approved by parliament on Thursday, by 180 of 185 MPs in […]

US Soldier, 4 Policemen Killed in Afghanistan by Neo-Taliban Resurgent Taliban forces attacked Afghan police and a US patrol on Wednesday, leaving one American soldier and 4 policemen dead. CNN says the US has 18,000 troops in harm’s way in Afghanistan as well as substantial NATO forces. Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri are at large. Parliamentary […]

Racism in Israel The increasing racial tension inside Israel is a worrisome development. But what really struck me is the Israeli government projection that in 2025 inside current Israeli borders, 30 percent of the population will be Arab, and only 70 percent Jewish. That’s only twenty years from now, i.e. as near to us on […]

Iraqi Cabinet More details of the new Iraqi cabinet are now out. The big and rather ominous surprise is that Ahmad Chalabi is the temporary Petroleum Minister. It has not in the past been easy to pry him out of positions once in them. And, in the past, whenever he has been around big money, […]

New Cabinet Al-Hayat says that Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani had pressed for 10 of the cabinet posts in the new government of Ibrahim Jaafari to go to Sunni Arabs. In the end, only 6 did, with 8 for the Kurds and some 16 or 17 (reports differ) for Shiites. Some 7 are women. Al-Hayat was […]

Iraq News Round-Up Guerrillas assassinated an Iraqi female member of parliament Wednesday, women’s rights activist Lamia Abid Khadduri Sakri. Al-Zaman says she was a member of the Iraqiya List of Iyad Allawi, which is dominated by secularists and ex-Baathists. Earlier, failed assassination attempts were made against Iyad Allawi and Mishaan Juburi, both of whom are […]

Abu Muslim Rebels Against al-Mansur When we left the story, it was perhaps late 754, and a conflict was brewing between the second caliph of the Abbasid dynasty, al-Mansur, and his minister, the old revolutionary Abu Muslim. Al-Mansur had his seat in Anbar in Iraq about a decade before the founding of Baghdad. He also […]

Guest Comment: “Bush is Lying” by Kevin McMillan Kevin McMillan of Columbia University writes: “I’d suggest a friendly amendment to today’s post on many Americans’ view that President Bush actively lied to them about WMD in Iraq. You appear to be trying to offer an “interpretation” of that view that “makes sense” of it. This […]