Juan Cole

Muqtada’s Softer Side A more extended analysis of Muqtada al-Sadr’s recent softening toward the US presence and his turn to playing ordinary politics instead of appealing to a kind of radical politics of theater and, to be frank, thuggery, has appeared by Hamza Hendawi. He argues that Muqtada is now reaching out to other Shiite […]

Klein: Not Just “Troops Out Now” but “Contractors Out Now” Journalist Naomi Klein says, “It’s too late to stop the war, but it’s not too late to deny Iraq’s invaders the myriad economic prizes they went to war to collect in the first place . . Bring Halliburton home. Cancel the contracts. Ditch the deals. […]

Iraq faces Bitter Winter without enough Kerosene Iraq will need half a billion liters of kerosene this winter, according to a Reuters report, but only has managed to accumulate a quarter of a billion. The US has the responsibility to ensure the welfare of the Iraqi people, and the Coalition Provisional Authority is making arrangements […]

Alnasrawi: Privatization is Wrongheaded The eminent Iraqi-born economist Abbas Alnasrawi of the University of Vermont has written a wide-ranging argument against the immediate privatization of state-owned industries by the American administration of Iraq. He argues that such policies should have waited for an elected Iraqi government, which would have the legitimacy to implement them thoughtfully, […]

You will all be following in other news sources the story of the downed Blackhawk helicopter and further US casualties. I’m at a conference and so I’ll just report here some items that might not make the US newspapers or might not be highlighted.

Sunni Fundamentalists Protest arrests of Clergy 500 Sunni Islamists demonstrated in the streets of Baghdad on Friday, representing the Higher Islamic Institute and other Muslim groups, and demanding the release of Sunni clergymen imprisoned by the Americans. They prayed on the street before the Coalition HQ. Shaykh Abd al-Sattar al-Janabi announced after he had sought […]

Number of Iraqi Pilgrims to Mecca will Double The Islamic Foundations Board of Iraq announced that it would double the number of Iraqis permitted to undertake the pilgrimage to Mecca this year. It is authorizing 50,000 pilgrims to go this year, as opposed to 25,000 last year under the Baath. The Board also removed the […]

Multinational Troops Hit in Iraq; Polish Officer, 6 Ukrainians Wounded The Polish military announced Friday that the multinational force under its command, which includes Bulgarians, Kazakhstanis, Spanish, Ukrainians, Dominicans, etc., patrolling the south-center part of the country, was the target of 36 attacks on Thursday, resulting in the killing of a high Polish officer and […]

Islamic Party of Iraq Meets with Syrian President The Secretary General of the Sunni, Iraqi “Islamic Party,” Muhsin Abd al-Hamid, met yesterday with Bashar al-Asad, the president of Syria, in Damascus. Al-Asad’s office issued a communiqué afterwards affirming Syria’s empathy with the Iraqi people and its commitment to working for the continued unity of Iraq, […]