Terrorism

I ask myself why. Some Pakistanis are complaining about the violation of their country’s sovereignty during the Navy SEALs’ raid at Abbottabad. But why aren’t they complaining about Usama Bin Laden’s violation of Pakistani sovereignty? He and his family entered their country illegally, and then re-formed a paramilitary organization that killed Pakistanis and raided from […]

Christopher Anzalone writes in a guest column for Informed Comment The killing of Usama bin Laden, the founder of Al-Qa‘ida Central, this week in Pakistan has opened the door to intense speculation about the future of the militant organization and the transnational jihadi-takfiri trend that it represents. A great deal of attention has been paid […]

President Obama’s decision not to release photographs of Usama Bin Laden’s disfigured corpse is wise and decent. Obama is right that the photo would be used by radicals to whip up emotions. But it should also be remembered that a Mahdi Army member surreptitiously filmed the execution of Saddam Hussein on his cell phone, and […]

The Obama team is said to have been dismayed by the rapidity with which the national subject has switched from the death of Usama Bin Laden to the use of torture in interrogations. The first thing to say is that Democratic leaders and the Obama administration only have themselves to blame for this torture issue […]

New details of the operation against Usama Bin Laden have emerged. Here are the myths that people keep bombarding me with and which are now known to be untrue. 1. Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf held that Bin Laden had long been dead. Not true. Musharraf said in 2002 that he thought Bin Laden might have […]