Arab World

Iraqi parliamentarians are attempting to strip Adnan Dulaimi of his parliamentary immunity. They charge that he is complicit with terrorists. Dulaimi leads the 44-member [Sunni Arab] Iraqi Accord Front in parliament. US forces found weapons and bombs in a house next to his. These developments came as a blow to hopes for reconciliation between Sunnis […]

The conventional wisdom among the inside the beltway pundits is that Iraq is no longer a leading issue for American voters. This conventional wisdom is demonstrably untrue. First, some December polls (scroll down) show that it was the most important issue for 25% of likely voters, with other issues trailing substantially. In part it derives […]

Update: Zogby et al. is showing a last minute boost among voters for Obama and Huckabee in Iowa. But obviously many Iowans are undecided and the race is extremely volatile. Activists campaigning down to the wire in Iowa are invoking stances on the Iraq War. Joshua Holland argues that among the three leading Democratic candidates […]

A seasoned observer writes: ‘ The complexity, interrelationships, results and consequences (intended and unintended) of US Iraq policy – one of the seven foreign interventions by the Bush Administration – were on confused display this week. While the sequence was to have been Iran sanctions followed by the Iraq matter, because of manipulations by the […]

The banner under all CNN stories on Iraq on Wednesday in the US was “Progress in Iraq 2008,” with the ‘reduction in violence’ the subtext. This is not news, it is propaganda. CNN can’t know what 2008 in Iraq will be like, and this ‘progress’ banner gives a positive impression of what is still a […]

10. Myth: The US public no longer sees Iraq as a central issue in the 2008 presidential campaign. In a recent ABC News/ Washington Post poll, Iraq and the economy were virtually tied among voters nationally, with nearly a quarter of voters in each case saying it was their number one issue. The economy had […]

Guerrillas in the oil refinery town of Bayji killed at least 26 persons and wounded 80 others with a suicide truck bombing. In Diyala province to the southeast, a suicide bomber killed 10 persons and wounded 5 others in the provincial capital of Baqubah. A day earlier in Diyala Province, gunment kidnapped 14 Shiites from […]

Turkey bombed northern Iraq again on Sunday, in an apparent attack on suspected bases of the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) guerrilla group. Early reports were that no one was killed. US officials in Baghdad are convinced that some of the reduction in the number of attacks on US troops is owing to conscious Iranian decisions […]

Turkey bombed the Amadiya area of northern Iraq on Saturday. Ankara said that it was targeting bases of the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) guerrilla organization. The PKK stands accused of killing over two dozen Turkish troops in recent months. Turkey says that the culprits then cross into Iraq, where they are given safe haven by […]