Arab World

CNN’s Arwa Damon reports from Baghdad on the sense of hopelessness among even upper-class Iraqi teens today. AFP gives support to Ms. Damon’s findings: a 2011 poll of Iraqi men under 30 found that 89% of them wanted to emigrate from the country. A more upbeat treatment by the Associated Press turns out to depend […]

Egypt

Pope Francis, the Muslim Brotherhood, and Women’s Equality: Why Must Religion be Patriarchal?

Juan Cole

The selection of the new pope was carried out by a conclave of elderly men, and the only candidates were men. The new pope is a staunch social conservative who opposes women’s ordination as priests and women’s right to control their own bodies and limit family size, key issues for women’s health and well-being. It […]

Iraq War

Falsity of Nuclear Accusation against Iraq Was Known before Bush’s Invasion

Juan Cole

As we approach the ten year anniversary of the launching of George W. Bush’s war on Iraq, it is worth my pointing out that I concluded even before the war began that the main rationale then given for it, Iraq’s alleged nuclear weapons program, was a fiction. I was following the inspectors which Bush had […]

Syria

Syrian Regime running out of Troops as Britain Threatens to arm Rebels

Juan Cole

British Prime Minister David Cameron said Tuesday that he would veto the renewal of a European Union ban on weapons exports to Syria, and hinted that Britain might go it alone in supplying rebels with arms. The Syrian opposition wants the ban lifted, arguing that the rebels would benefit more than the regime (which is […]

Egypt

Cairo Burning: The Great Soccer Riots of 2013 and the Revolution

Juan Cole

Some two thousand angry youth in Port Said attempted to block ferries and sent speedboats into the canal zone, aiming at disrupting shipping in the Suez Canal on Saturday (they failed), while in Cairo soccer ruffians angry about a court verdict set fire to the HQ of the Egyptian Soccer Federation and to a nearby […]

Syria

Humanitarian Catastrophe in Syria: Why don’t We Hear More, Do More?

Juan Cole

Oxfam says that the Syrian refugee crisis is ‘spiraling out of control’; Amy Christian reports: The Real News Network interviews Omar Dahi on this humanitarian catastrophe in Syria, with 70,000 dead, a million displaced abroad, and two million displaced internally. Dahi is scathing on the lack of reporting on the direness of the refugee situation […]

Lebanon

Lebanese Soccer Team, Coach Assault Referees after Penalty Called (Video)

Juan Cole

A Lebanese soccer/ football referee is quitting after having been assaulted for a call he made on the field at a match last weekend in a game between al-Nahda and Al-Salam Zgharta. He says he felt his life was in danger, and is resigning in an attempt to force Lebanese sports authorities to put in […]

Iraq

Mission Accomplished: Iraq as America’s biggest Blunder (Van Buren)

Juan Cole

Peter van Buren writes at Tomdispatch.com I was there. And “there” was nowhere. And nowhere was the place to be if you wanted to see the signs of end times for the American Empire up close. It was the place to be if you wanted to see the madness — and oh yes, it was […]

Syria

Syrian Rebels capture UN Troops, face Raqqah bombings, are pledged UK Armored Trucks

Juan Cole

The Syrian civil war heated up on several fronts on Wednesday. UK Foreign Secretary William Hague on Wednesday painted a horrific picture of the situation in Syria and went on to pledge armored vehicles and body armor for the Syrian rebels, as a ‘humanitarian’ measure. Russian media accuse the US, Western Europe and Jordan of […]