Juan Cole

Breaking News: 16 Italians, 8 Iraqis dead in Nasiriyah Police Station Attack On Wednesday guerrillas launched a well-coordinated bombing attack against an Italian military police compound in Nasiriyah, a city in the largely Shiite south. First, a lead truck crashed through the entrance, then another car followed through and was detonated, according to a British […]

Armitage: We need to bring the Iraqi Sunnis into the Political Process Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage in Cairo said that the US wishes to bring the Iraqi Sunnis back from being marginalized and to engage them in a political process. He said the US wants to turn power over to an Iraqi government […]

US Rule in Iraq Collapsing? US civil administrator Paul Bremer’s sudden, rushed trip to Washington earlier this week signalled that the White House is considering a radical rethinking of Iraq policy. As Josh Marshall notes, Rumors are flying that he himself may resign or be fired. He and his colleagues in Washington are also clearly […]

Medact: Iraqi Health Situation Deteriorating Medact, a health professionals service organization, has issued a new report on the Iraq war and its aftermath. It alleges that between 21,700 and 55,000 people have died since the US/UK invasion, and that the casualties continue to mount. It estimates that at least 7,800 Iraqi civilians have been killed, […]

Iraqi Analyst: Resistance is Nationalist, Not Foreign According to al-Jazeera, Baghdad U. Political Scientist Salman al-Jumaili reports that the majority of attacks on Coalition forces in Iraq are carried out by Iraqi nationalist and Muslim radical groups. He adds, “It is important to mention nationalist resistance – among the dead we have found Turkmen and […]

References http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/ archives/week_2003_11_09.html#002196 http://www.washingtonpost.com/ wp-dyn/articles/A28318-2003Nov11.html http://www.foxnews.com/story/ 0,2933,102823,00.html http://www.medact.org/tbx/pages/ http://www.abc.net.au/am/content/2003/s987254.htm http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/ 61180572-880F-4712-AC8E-CCC0E16BFDBE.htm”

Further instability in Iraq Guerrillas hit a convoy at Iskandariya, killing one American soldier. Guerrillas exploded an improvised bomb along the side of the street in Basra, killing 3 civilians at least. In Mosul, guerrillas killed a petroleum official and his son with machine gune fire on Monday.

British Fear Uprising after One Year The British authorities in the Iraqi south are desperately afraid that the Americans are going to dawdle around so long in creating an Iraqi government that they will provoke a massive uprising. The British want a return of sovereignty to Iraqis by summer of 2004 at the latest. The […]

Wave of Assassinations in Basra Dozens of prominent Iraqis have recently been assassinated in Basra, according to az-Zaman. The paper says that a few of these may be reprisal killings of former Baath officials. But many of those being mown down are just physicians or technocrats with no obvious Baathist past. Other assassinations may be […]