Juan Cole

Margaret Cho and an Iraq Blog I have been a fan of comedian Margaret Cho for years, and so was happy and surprised to see traffic coming from her site to mine. I found her appreciation of an Iraqi family’s blog touching. As someone who has been interested in Iraq for more than 30 years, […]

Clinton’s Low-Key Dissing of Bush Bill Clinton is perhaps the most gifted political orator of our generation, so it is worth considering how he dealt with Bush and the Iraq War issue in his speech Monday evening to the Democratic National Convention. He and the other Democrats went out of their way to avoid appearing […]

8 Killed in Iraq Violence 3 US Soldiers Wounded in Mosul Bombing Mark Turner of the Financial Times in Baghdad reports that the violence continues in Iraq. He writes, “The spate of post-transition violence in Iraq showed no sign of let-up yesterday, as insurgents bombed an airfield in Mosul, a senior interior ministry official was […]

Shiite Parties Seek Power in National Assembly Defense Minister slams Iran Ashraf Khalil writes for the Los Angeles Times that the Shiite al-Da’wa Party is making an alliance with the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq in hopes of having significant influence in the 100-person Iraqi National Assembly to be elected at a convocation […]

Brahimi: Iraq War Caused More Problems than it Solved, Brought Terrorism to Iraq Deutsche Press Agentur reports that former UN special envoy to Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, expresed deep criticism of the Bush administration’s Iraq war in an Austrian newspaper interview. Excerpts: ‘ [Brahimi] said Iraq would no doubt recover from the chaos in which it […]

Brown: Israel-Palestine: Walled In Kenneth L. Brown gives us a guest editorial on the Israeli security wall being built in the Occupied West Bank. A form of it earlier appeared in an Italian newspaper, Europa. It is worth revisiting in the light of the light of the finding of the World Court in the Hague […]

Washington Post Weblog Contest The Washington Post is running a contest for the best weblogs on politics this fall, including international politics. They are now taking nominations and will then do voting online. Another sign that blogging has arrived. I hope the Blogistan community will take the time to make its preferences known, now that […]

Democratic Convention Will not Denounce Iraq War Stewart Powell of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports that there won’t be much difference between the policies on Iraq to be adopted by the delegates of the Democratic National Convention and those already pursued by the Bush administration. Powell writes: Delegates at the Democratic National Convention are expected tomorrow […]

Heavy Fighting at Buhriz Kills 15 Paul Garwood of AP reports that “the carnage” continued in Iraq over the weekend. US troops made a sweep of Buhriz, northeast of Baghdad near Baqubah, which is a radical Salafi (“Sunni fundamentalist”) stronghold, which has mounted numerous rebellions in recent months. Its nearby date palm groves were suspected […]