Middle East

In an interview with the Associated Press, PM Nuri al-Maliki warned that the future is dark if Iraq and the US do not agree on a security pact. And without a pact, he said, all the security progress made in the last year would be at risk. He points out that the alternative is to […]

A wave of deadly bombings and other attacks swept Baghdad on Sunday, killing nearly three dozen persons and wounding over 100. The attacks on Shiite neighborhoods were likely intended to remind the Iraqi public on the eve of Eid al-Fitr (the celebration of the end of the fasting month of Ramadan) that the Sunni guerrilla […]

One of the things that struck me about Friday night’s debate on the time line for troop withdrawal was that McCain appeared to believe that how long US troops remain in Iraq and at what strength is a unilateral matter dictated by Washington. The government of prime minister Nuri al-Maliki is already trying to negotiate […]

Aljazeera English on the Shell deal with Iraq to develop natural gas. Critics of the deal say there was no competitive bidding. Supporters say it will help the British, Dutch and Iraqi economies.

Reuters reports that “A U.S. soldier died after a small-arms fire attack on his patrol in Baghdad.” Near Baquba, Reuters says, “Police found three mass graves containing tens of bodies in two areas south of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) northeast of Baghdad, the government said in a statement. . . “ Iraqi auditor Salam […]

Suicidal Ambitions: Human Bombs and the War in Iraq By Matan Chorev Review of Mohammed M. Hafez Suicide Bombers in Iraq: The Strategy and Ideology of Martyrdom (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace, 2007) 285 pages, $17.50 hardcover. Since 2003, according to the United States Library of Congress, over 800 books on the Iraq […]

The guerrilla war continues in Iraq. On Sunday, guerrillas blew up the general manager of the Ministry of Finance, Ihsan Ridha, and a Brigadier General, Adel Abbas, who was a manager of the ministry of the interior (which has FBI-like functions in Iraq). Ridha was injured; Abbas was killed. Police and army patrols were bombed […]

The USG Open Source Center translates a recent interview with Baghdad mayor Sabir al-Isawi in a Czech newspaper. The mayor 1) denies that the US troop ‘surge’ is the major reason for the reduced violence in Iraq; 2) complains bitterly that US armored corps drivers continually run their tanks over lampposts, gardens and other things […]

Fred Kagan has once more been proved wrong. He called the ethnic cleansing of Sunni Arabs in Baghdad a ‘myth.’ For all their arrogance and academic credentials, the Neoconservatives keep having trouble with that reality-based thing. Satellite imaging that shows Sunni Arab neighborhoods in Baghdad dark gives evidence that the ethnic cleansing of the Sunnis […]