Syria

By Mustafa Habib | Baghdad | via Niqash.org Senior members of the Sunni Muslim extremist group, the Islamic State, have disappeared from Mosul and Tikrit. Sources suggest they defected for a number of reasons: they fear the end is nigh for their group, the threat posed by unhappy former allies who have already assassinated some […]

Displaced and Refugees

Could ISIL be Put on Trial? Challenge for International Law

contributors

DUBAI (IRIN) – The international outcry to the openly advertised atrocities committed in Iraq by the jihadist group calling itself Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS or ISIL) has led to calls for investigations and punishment, with US President Barak Obama saying “justice will be done” after the killing of journalist James Foley. This has […]

Featured

The end of National Sovereignty in the Middle East? Iraqi Kurdistan sends troops into Syria

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole: Al-Manar reports that the legislature of the Iraqi Kurdistan Regional Government (a super-province of Iraq) has voted to send Kurdistan forces to the Syrian Kurdish city of Kobane to help it fight off a concerted attack by ISIL. The vote opens the way for Iraqi Kurdistan to intervene in the Syrian civil […]

Featured

Defying Turkey, US airdrops arms to Kobane Kurds

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole In a step that over-ruled America’s Turkish NATO ally, US jets dropped food, first aid and weaponry into the besieged Syrian Kurdish town of Kobane on Monday morning. Turkey’s president Tayyip Erdogan, in remarks made on Sunday, rejected the idea of arming the Syrian Kurdish fighters, equating them with terrorists. Al-Khaleej [The […]

Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

The Kobane Crisis: Where are Turkey, the PKK and the Kurds Going?

contributors

By Mustafa Gurbuz For many Kurds, Ankara’s spectator role in Kobane is a systematic policy to weaken PKK to get more leverage in the peace talks. The radical ISIL group is besieging the Kurdish town of Kobane in Syria, and so far the Turkish government has done little about it. It is the leftist, separatist […]

Featured

Kobane Kurds fight off ISIL Assault, as Shells land in Turkey

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole Kurdish forces at Kobane (Ayn al-Arab) on Saturday fought off an assault by ISIL that sought to cut the city off from Turkey and completely surround it, according to an Aljazeera reporter on the scene (At the moment, there is a corridor between Kobane and the Turkish border). ISIL also subjected Kobane […]

Iraq

Top 7 Ways US Intervention in Iraq/Syria could turn Catastrophic

contributors

By Peter Van Buren via Tomdispatch.com What Could Possibly Go Wrong? Seven Worst-Case Scenarios in the Battle with the Islamic State By Peter Van Buren You know the joke? You describe something obviously heading for disaster — a friend crossing Death Valley with next to no gas in his car — and then add, “What […]

Displaced and Refugees

Humanitarian Crisis: Health Care and Jordan’s 600,000 Syrian Refugees

contributors

By Katy Montoya I was scrambling to take notes when the First Lieutenant of the Jordanian Security Forces joined my conversation with security personnel in one of the small offices of Ruba’a al-Sarhan. “No other country would do this for Syria’s civilians,” he declared. Located close to the Syrian border in the al-Mafraq governate, Ruba’a […]

Human Rights

Iraqi Kurds to Turkey: Let Volunteers Through To Defend Failing Kobani

contributors

By Charles Recknagel via RFE/RL A top official of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdish region is calling on Turkey to let volunteer fighters through to the besieged Syrian city of Kobani, where Syrian Kurds are waging a desperate battle against Islamic State (IS) militants. Speaking on a visit to RFE/RL in Prague on October 13, Falah Mustafa, […]