Iraq

( Middle East Monitor ) – Until a few years ago, farming in southern Iraq was “as lucrative as oil”, Qasim Abdul Wahad remembers, and his one-hectare farm plot in the Governorate of Basra produced enough to feed his family of eight. Now dust kicks up under his feet as he walks through his land, […]

Featured

Zelensky says Russia is the new ISIL: Top 3 Ways he may be Right

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – In an address on Tuesday to the United Nations Security Council, Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky compared Russia to the ISIL (ISIS, Daesh) terrorist group that took over eastern Syria and northwestern Iraq 2014-2018. His immediate comparison was of the brutality of Russian troops toward the civilian population in Bucha and […]

History

The Dangers of Assaulting Fortress Kyiv: The Peril Putin’s Troops Now Face was Shown by the Battles of Stalingrad, Grozny, and Mosul

Brian Glyn Williams

Brian Glyn Williams (University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth) and Aaron Rawley. Aaron Rawley is Volunteer Personnel Coordinator at the Gore Place Historical Museum, Waltham Mass. Dartmouth, MA (Special to Informed Comment) – At first glance Russia’s widely lambasted thrust from Belorussia down to the Ukrainian capital appears to have stalled due to logistic issues that have […]

Counter-Terrorism

US could have done more to prevent civilian casualties in Raqqa, report says

Middle East Monitor

( Middle East Monitor ) – The United States could have done more to eliminate the chances of killing civilians in the campaign to capture the city of Raqqa in northern Syria three years ago, a newly-released report by the RAND Corporation has stated. The report released on Thursday acknowledged the impact of the US-led […]

Bush

US Deplores Russia’s ‘Shock and Awe’ against Ukraine, but Found its own Against Iraq “Spectacular”

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – The scenes of the horrible destruction that Russia is inflicting on Ukraine’s civilian cities, from Kharkiv to Mariupol, and the killing of nearly 1,000 civilians, including nearly 100 children, have tugged at the world’s heart strings — and rightly so. Nineteen years ago, when the George W. Bush regime unleashed […]

Displaced and Refugees

US would be on firmer Ground declaring Putin a War Criminal if George W. Bush had been Tried

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – NPR reports that on Wednesday, President Biden called Russian dictator Vladimir Putin a “war criminal” for the first time. The report notes that this outburst is unusual for Biden, who prizes personal diplomacy and must know that such a charge would make it more difficult to negotiate with Putin down […]

Arab Americans

US Media (Rightly) focuses on Ukrainian Rights, but it Racializes Muslims deprived of those Same Rights

Assal Rad

(Special to Informed Comment) – Speaking about the significance of knowledge and its role in democracy, President John F. Kennedy once stated that only an “informed people will be a free people, that the ignorance of one voter in a democracy impairs the security of all.” One of the most important institutions that informs public […]

Featured

Americans Shocked to See Ukrainians treated Like Iraqis even though they are White (Not the Onion)

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Some European and American commentators on Russia’s war against Ukraine have covered themselves in shame by implying that because Ukrainians are “European” or “civilized” it is harder to see them hit by artillery and made refugees than it had been with regard to Iraqis or Syrians. While in 2015 Syrians […]

Bush

How Bush’s Iraq Fiasco ruined US Credibility and Enabled Putin’s Invasion of Ukraine

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – George W. Bush issued a statement about the Russian invasion of Ukraine. It went like this: DALLAS, TEXAS – “Russia’s attack on Ukraine constitutes the gravest security crisis on the European continent since World War II. I join the international community in condemning Vladimir Putin’s unprovoked and unjustified invasion of […]