religion

Channel 4 News | (Video Documentary) | – – “Bussed in from nearby settlements, Israel’s ultranationalist right were defiant at a rally for Jerusalem day this year. Hardline views have become more influential than ever in Israel – with both Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the wider public. Inigo Gilmore went to meet the settlers.” […]

Arab World

Women’s Voices Matter, especially in the Middle East

contributors

By Lauren Feeney | (Informed Comment) – – Before there were nine million Syrian refugees, civil wars in Yemen and Libya, mass death sentences being handed down in Egypt, there was a moment of profound hope. It is easy to lose track of the emotions that first defined the Arab Spring among headlines full of […]

Authoritarianism

Saudi Arabia Lashing Blogger Reveals What Religion Fears Most

contributors

Cenk Uygur & John Iadarola | (The Young Turks Video) | – – “The public flogging of jailed blogger Raif Badawi is now “sure” to resume after Saudi Arabia’s Supreme Court upheld his sentence at the weekend, his wife has told The Independent. Ensaf Haidar spoke out amid growing fears among human rights groups that […]

Iraq

Next year in Mosul: Iraqi Kurds cut off ISIL/ Daesh Supply Lines

contributors

VICE News | (Video report) | – “A year after the Islamic State’s lightning conquest of Iraq’s second-largest city of Mosul, the poorly-trained and equipped Kurdish peshmerga forces are the international coalition’s only reliable boots on the ground in northern Iraq. The Pentagon’s hopes of recapturing the city by spring 2015 have been dashed by […]

Featured

Can Leftist Kurdish Militia cut ISIL/ Daesh off from Turkish Supply Routes and Kill the Caliphate?

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The intrepid Liz Sly of the Washington Post gets the story of the attempt of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and their Arab allies, the Euphrates Volcano, to cut Daesh (ISIL, ISIS) off and kill it. Sly’s insightful report is buttressed by one from Ahmad […]

Druze

Al-Qaeda in Syria rubs out 23 members of Druze Religious Minority, Persecutes Others

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The al-Qaeda-linked Support Front has murdered 23 men from a single Druze clan in Qalb Lawzah, Idlib Province, Syria. Druze villagers fled in large numbers to surrounding Sunni hamlets seeking refuge from al-Qaeda. There are some 18 Druze villages in the north of Idlib Province. The […]

Iraq

Has US started Arming Iraq’s Shiite Militias against ISIL/ Daesh?

contributors

Mustafa Habib | Baghdad | (Niqash.org) The hostility between the US and Iraq’s Shiite militias seems to have slowed. One leading militia member even went to the US. Is this the beginning of a new, happier relationship and closer battle field cooperation? Last week Captain Amir al-Saadi, whose unit is based in the Habbaniyah camp […]

Featured

Has ISIL/ Daesh killed 50,000 in one Year? Iraq’s Horrors by the Numbers

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The Human Rights Commission of Iraq, a body attached to the Iraqi parliament, issued statistics on Wednesday for the one-year impact of Daesh (ISIL, ISIS) on that country. Some of the numbers have to be taken with a grain of salt, but others are likely about […]

Barack Obama

Modest Increase in Iraq Training Mission shows Obama still Uninterested & Maybe he’s Right

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – The Obama administration got itself some headlines on Wednesday morning by pledging to send a few hundred more military trainers to Iraq and to create a new base in al-Anbar Province. But there is less to this announcement than meets the eye. The US has some 3000 […]