Terrorism

By Laura Gottesdiener | ( Tomdispatch.com ) | – – It was midday on Sunday, May 7th, when the U.S.-led coalition warplanes again began bombing the neighborhood of Wassim Abdo’s family. They lived in Tabqa, a small city on the banks of the Euphrates River in northern Syria. Then occupied by the Islamic State (ISIS, […]

Displaced and Refugees

After ISIL Defeat in Mosul, Camps or Rehabilitation for Families?

contributors

Nawzat Shamdeen | (Mosul) | (Niqash.org) | – – Locals in Mosul are divided on whether to rehabilitate, reconcile or punish the families of Islamic State members. Meanwhile rumour has it that secret detention camps are already being set up. “The families of the Islamic State are more dangerous than the members of the Islamic […]

Bashar al-Assad

Trump & Macron Consult on Syria Cease Fire in Shadow of Don Jr. Scandal

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – French President Emmanuel Macron and his American counterpart Donald J. Trump consulted on a number of bilateral issues on Wednesday, including cooperation in Syria and Iraq. Trump says he was in France to attend Bastille Day and commemorate the centenary of the entry of the US […]

Militarization

What good is our Nat’l Security State if we’re afraid to Leave Home?

contributors

By William J. Astore | ( Tomdispatch.com) | – – Has there ever been a nation as dedicated to preparing for doomsday as the United States? If that’s a thought that hasn’t crossed your mind, maybe it’s because you didn’t spend part of your life inside Cheyenne Mountain. That’s a tale I’ll get to soon, […]

Iraq

Rolex “Caliph” of ISIL Dead: Syrian Observatory

contributors

TeleSur | – – Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi’s death has been widely speculated for months. Reports from the United Kingdom-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, SOHR, claim that ISIL leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi has been killed. “(We have) confirmed information from leaders, including one of the first rank, in the Islamic State in the eastern countryside […]

Iraq

Can the Liberation of Mosul begin to free the Mideast from Fundamentalism?

contributors

By Balsam Mustafa | (The Conversation) | – – After an offensive lasting nearly nine months, the Iraqi prime minister, Haider al-Abadi, walked through the streets of Mosul on July 9 after Iraqi forces backed by US-led coalition airstrikes “liberated” the city from so-called Islamic State (IS). Abadi was there to congratulate security forces for […]

Iraq

Iraq united to defeat ISIL, but can it avoid Break-up Afterwards?

contributors

By Dylan O’Driscoll | ( OpenDemocracy.net ) | – – Multiple segments of the population, including at elite level, have come together in the fight against IS and now the time has come for this effort to extend beyond the battle. The Iraqi army recaptured Mosul’s historical al-Nuri mosque and its leaning minaret on June […]

Iraq

Freeing Fayza: A Journey to War-Torn Iraq to Rescue a Yazidi ISIL Slave Girl

Juan Cole

By: Brian Glyn Williams and Christopher Natola | (Informed Comment) | – – It began with an electrifying text message from a Yazidi member of a network dedicated to freeing Yazidis (an ancient people from Northern Iraq who adhere to a faith rooted in old Iranian religion and influenced by Sufi mysticism). The message was […]

Iraq

Was ISIL’s destruction of Mosul’s Nuri Mosque Grand Strategy?

contributors

By Benjamin Isakhan and Jose Antonio Gonzalez Zarandona | (The Conversation) | – – On June 29 2014 – nearly three years ago to the day – Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi took the pulpit at the Great Mosque of Al-Nuri in Mosul in northern Iraq. He announced the creation of a new Islamic State that stretched […]