Juan Cole

Eyewitness Account of the Attack on the Al-Rashid Hotel Posted by permission: “10/26/03 Today things hit closer to home than previous acts of violence here in Baghdad. It was near 6:00 AM in the morning and I was half awake, I usually get up at that time. Then, boom, a thunderous thud rattled the building. […]

Reading into the Mind of a Terrorist See Mark Clayton’s summary of some of the techniques used by the 9/11 hijackers to stay in their monstrous mindset. It is based in part on some of my own work. I put up parts of a paper I gave on it (the link is to the left). […]

4 US troops killed, 1 wounded, 7 Ukrainian Troops wounded Guerrillas in Blid, 60 miles north of Baghdad, attacked US troops Tuesday with rockets and automatic weapons, killing two. Monday night, north of Baghdad, a US tank hit a land mine, and it was destroyed, killing two soldiers inside. In Kut, guerrillas ambushed a Ukrainian […]

Feldman: Iraq will be an Islamic Republic at Odds with the West Noah Feldman, an independent consultant to the Coalition Provisional Authority and to President Bush has [written a report]* to the White House casting severe doubts on the likelihood that Iraq will emerge as a Western-style democarcy with separation of religion and state and […]

IGC sees Foreign Fighters supported by Baathists Sources in the Interim Governing Council told al-Zaman that there is evidence that between 200 and 400 foreign fighters, from Sudan, Yemen, Palestine and even Chechnya, are responsible for suicide bombings in Iraq, and that they receive logistical support and help from a network of Baath loyalists. What […]

Thai Prime Minister threatens pull-out of Troops The Thai prime minister said Wednesday that the 447 Thai troops at Karbala would be pulled out of the country if they appeared to be in danger. Most of them are medics and engineers, and they are under Polish command. UPI reported, “Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra told the […]

Sistani Representative Wounded in attack in Karbala Shaykh Abdul Mahdi al-Karbala’i was wounded in the head and five guards were also wounded when assailants tossed hand grenades and fired machine guns at him as he left the shrine of Imam Husayn in the holy Shiite city of Karbala late on Wednesday. Al-Karbala’i is the representative […]

One US Soldier Killed, 7 wounded; Deputy Mayor of Baghdad Assassinated Tuesday: Guerrillas fired from a rooftop into the main US military base in Tikrit, wounding at least one US soldier from the Fourth Infantry Division. Guerrillas detonated a car bomb near a police station and a school in Fallujah on Tuesday, killing four Iraqis. […]

Iraq War Death Toll: 8,700 Iraqi Troops, 3,400 Iraqi Civilians A new study by The Project on Defence Alternatives, based on field hospital data and US government reports, finds that approximately 13,000 Iraqis were killed in the US attack of March-April. A little less than a third of the dead, 3,400 or so, were noncombatants […]