Middle East

The Iraqi government is backing off its demand that the Blackwater security firm be expelled from Iraq in the wake of apparently unprovoked shootings that left 11 Iraqis dead, according to the LAT. Apparently the argument has been made to Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki that the 1,000 Blackwater guards who escort US embassy personnel would […]

Reprinted for Monday readers: An article on how the schedule for turning Iraqi provinces over to the Iraqi army and police for security purposes has slipped to August 2008 notes of a new Pentagon report: ‘ The Pentagon report cited a litany of problems with the police. For example, it said as few as 40 […]

Iraqi authorities said Saturday that they have a videotape of the shootings in Nisur Square last Sunday by Blackwater security guards, which shows that they fired without provocation. The company has maintained that its personnel were responding to incoming fire. There is now talk in Baghdad of trying the guards, though a decree by US […]

AP reports that two more aides to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani were assassinated on Friday, bringing the total since late August to 5. Some worshippers who follow Sistani in Basra cancelled Friday prayers, and their mosques stayed empty, in protest. AP says that the governor of Basra, Misbah al-Wa’ili, called for better security for these […]

Al-Hayat reports in Arabic that Iraqi PM Nuri al-Maliki slammed his rival, Iyad Allawi of the National Concord Movement, for engaging in secret talks with the Izzat al-Duri branch of the Baath guerrilla movement, aimed at bringing it in to the political process. Al-Maliki said that such activities equated to terrorism. On Wednesday, two members […]

Iraqi guerrillas killed four US troops on Tuesday. Republican senators succeeded in blocking the Webb plan to give US troops off as much time between deployments as they spent in Iraq. The Bush administration managed successfully to lobby Senate Republicans to defeat the measure, which would have resulted in a reduction of the number of […]

Guest Op-Ed by David Wagner: “It seems to me that political polarization in Congress prevents action on common sense measures that are needed, regardless of how fast this war winds down. The consensus for getting back to 130K troops, even by next summer is a significant load on our existing withdrawal capacity. Nothing in this […]