Juan Cole

Rumsfeld, the Military Irrelevance of Fallujah, and Retina Scans Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld was called on the carpet at a meeting with troops in Kuwait, as Reuters reports. “Why do we soldiers have to dig through local landfills for pieces of scrap metal and compromised ballistic glass to armour our vehicles … (scrap) that […]

King Abdullah II and President Yawir Worry about Iran and Shiism Robin Wright and Peter Baker of the Washington Post got King Abdullah II to say the most amazing things about alleged Iranian influence in Iraq. [By this I only meant to say that they were excellent interviewers who elicited very frank comment, not that […]

Controversies over Middle East Studies at Princeton The Daily Princetonian has a fascinating overview of controversies about Middle East Studies at Princeton University.

Churches Bombed in Mosul Reuters reports that guerrillas in Mosul cleared two churches and then blew them up. There were no injuries, but extensive damage was done to an Armenian and an old Chaldean church. Mosul, a city of 1.2 million, has a substantial Christian population (Christians form about 3 percent of the Iraqi population). […]

Elections face Logistical Obstacles Mohamad Bazzi of Newsday reports that quite aside from major security problems, the January 30 elections could be derailed by poor preparations. In contrast to the 600 UN election workers in Afghanistan for the recent presidential elections, there are only 35 in Iraq, and security concerns are delaying the sending of […]

Character Assassination Yes, I’m aware that Daniel Pipes of the so-called Middle East Forum sent some puppy out to slime me over at David Horowitz’s Frontpagerag. So this is the way it goes with the Likudniks. First they harass you and try to have you spied on. Then they threaten, bully and try to intimidate […]

Shiite List to be Announced Hussein Shahristani, the Shiite scientist charged by Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani with cobbling together a big comprehensive Shiite list, said Monday that the full listing of candidate names (in ranked order) would be made available on Tuesday. The list is being called the United Iraqi Congress. The list groups the […]

Clash on a Street called Haifa Guerrillas on Haifa Street in downtown Baghdad fought a running battle Monday with Iraqi police or national guards, and killed one civilian working for the US. The battle took place near the Green Zone, where the US embassy is sited. There were also attacks on an oil pipeline that […]

Carnage becoming Routine in Iraq: Another Bloody Sunday ArabNews summarizes the carnage in Iraq on Sunday. Tikrit: Guerrillas ambushed a bus as it let off Iraqis working for the US military at a weapons dump in Tikrit on Sunday morning around 8:30 am, spraying it with machine-gun fire and then fleeing. They killed 17 Iraqi […]