Juan Cole

Why does the Mahdi Army fight? Mariam Fam of AP talks about the cultural dynamics around the Army of the Mahdi, the militia of Muqtada al-Sadr. She does a good job of providing a balanced view. She quotes one of the militiamen: ‘ Ayad Ali, a militiaman in Baghdad’s Sadr City slum, claimed his brother […]

Muqtada Press Conference: “No Ordinary Politics Under Occupation” The one-day truce in Najaf has collapsed. And, even the council of tribal chieftains in the Middle Euphrates, a previously pro-American group, has issued a statement condemning the “barbaric massacres perpetrated by the United States in Najaf,” according to al-Jazeerah’s crawl. Just saw a long press conference […]

US War Planes Bomb Samarra Al-Jazeerah also showed footage of the US bombing of the city of Samarra (north of Baghdad) on Friday night or early Saturday morning, and the huge craters it produced, along with residential buildings reduced to rubble and a few corpses. It is annoying that al-Jazeerah (the mirror image of Fox […]

Muqtada to Allawi: Resign! In a press conference on Friday, Muqtada al-Sadr called on the caretaker government of Iyad Allawi to resign: “I advise the dictatorial, agent government to resign … the whole Iraqi people demands the resignation of the government … they replaced Saddam (Hussein) with a government worse than him.” Muqtada seemed to […]

Kadhim on the Najaf Crisis Abbas Kadhim, an Iraqi Shiite scholar who knows Najaf intimately, has published an op-ed that questions the common wisdom about the movement of Muqtada al-Sadr. He points out that, despite the claims of some politicians in the Allawi government, Iran is not in fact implicated in the Sadr movement. ‘ […]

Muqtada Wounded by US Bombing Muqtada al-Sadr was wounded by US bombardment of Najaf on Friday morning, according to Reuters. Sadr spokesman Ahmad al-Shinabi told Reuters, “Sayyed Moqtada was wounded in American bombing. He suffered three injuries to his body.” The wounds are not considered life threatening, and are being treated at the Imam Ali […]

223 dead, 500 wounded in clashes across Iraq US marines launch major assault on Najaf The headline, which is perfectly serviceable, is ripped off from a Pakistani newspaper mainly based on Agence France Presse reporting. The story was put to bed before a lot of the Arab newspapers came out Friday morning, so it underestimates […]

Endgame in Najaf? From Arabic and English radio and television broadcasts, including al-Jazeerah: The Marines have completely surrounded Najaf and cut off all the roads leading into the shrine of Imam Ali (Shiite Islam’s St. Peter). US warplanes bombarded positions in the vast Valley of Peace cemetery (2 million graves) again today. At one point […]

Fierce Fighting in Amara Marines Prepare for final Push in Najaf Fresh explosions and machine gun fire rocked Najaf early Thursday morning. On Wednesday, fighting in 5 Iraqi cities (excluding Najaf) left 35 dead and 219 wounded. Amara British military forces attacked Mahdi Army positions in Amarah, killing 20 persons and wounding 78. Fighting raged, […]