Iraq

by Mustafa Habib | Baghdad | (Niqash.org) – Iraq’s unofficial Shiite militias are an essential part of the fight against the extremist Islamic State group. But they act independently of the army, and are sometimes brutally murderous. Army officers now note that the militias have better weapons and better working conditions and that’s why their […]

Displaced and Refugees

Angelina Jolie in Iraq: Int’l Community Failing Refugees from ISIL Brutality

contributors

Associated Press | — “Actress and director Angelina Jolie is calling on the international community to do more to aid refugees displaced by fighting in Iraq and Syria. The UN special envoy for refugees visited a camp in Iraq Sunday, saying that despite good intentions, “the international community has failed …” Angelina Jolie Visits Refugees […]

Featured

How Stable is Saudi Arabia?

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) This article appeared at The Nation earlier this month. I’m reprinting an excerpt on the occasion of King Abdallah’s death . . . the kingdom faces a severe budget shortfall because of the plummeting price of petroleum. All this instability takes place against a backdrop of substantial regional turmoil. […]

Iraq

Ragtag Kurdish Forces Face ISIL assaults at ‘The Kobani of Iraq’

contributors

By Shalaw Mohammed | Kirkuk | (Niqash.org) — NIQASH visits the northern Iraqi town of Kharabaroot, near Kirkuk, which has become the frontline for fighting between Iraqi Kurdish military and extremists from the Islamic State group. The Kurdish forces there come from Iran, Syria and Iraq and because of this, and because of the length […]

Barack Obama

Obama to GOP: More Iran sanctions lead to War (& 7 other Foreign Policy points in SOTU)

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) — President Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address slighted foreign policy in favor of touting domestic progress and proposing new domestic initiatives. But there were some foreign policy highlights worth underlining. 1. Obama pushed back hard against hawks like Senator John McCain, who want to ramp up a […]

Iraq

Iraqi Shiites, Fuming over Slow US Fight against ISIL, threaten to Revoke Agreement

contributors

By Mustafa Habib | Baghdad | (Niqash.org) – Four months have passed since the US began to work with an international alliance to confront the threat of the extremist group, the Islamic State, in Iraq. Yet for many locals, there don’t seem to be any obvious results. The Islamic State, or IS, group still has […]

Iraq

US Mission Creep in Iraq, Part Deux

contributors

By Peter Van Buren | (Tomdispatch.com) — The current American war in Iraq is a struggle in search of a goal. It began in August as a humanitarian intervention, morphed into a campaign to protect Americans in-country, became a plan to defend the Kurds, followed by a full-on crusade to defeat the new Islamic State […]

al-Qaeda

Yes, they’re Condemning the Paris Attacks: The Muslims’ War on Terror

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) — When American commentators like Carl Bernstein complain that Muslim authorities have not sufficiently denounced the terrorist attack on the Charlie Hebdo staff in Paris, they show a profound ignorance of the current situation in the Middle East. The fact is that both governments of Muslim-majority countries and the […]

Iraq

Saudi General, Border Guards Killed by Daesh/ISIL for not being Fanatical Enough

contributors

France24 | — “At 4,30 am 4 men coming from Iraqi territory attacked a border post on the northern frontier of Saudi Arabia. Two of the attackers were killed during the attack, one by gun shot and the second activated his explosive belt killing general Awda al-Balwi, commander of the northern frontier zone, with one […]