Terrorism

By Nawzat Shamdeen | Berlin | via Niqash.org All Mosul women must now wear either black or white niqab. A young Mosul man tells NIQASH how his social life, and the lives of others his age, has been cruelly interrupted by the fact that Sunni Muslim extremists now control their city. The young man says […]

Iraq

How does this End? 35 Military Interventions since 1980 and Terrorism Grows

contributors

Brave New Films: “Since 1980, we have militarily intervened at least 35 times in more than 27 countries. We keep bombing, we continue spending trillions of dollars, but we’re no safer as a result.” Brave New Films: “How Does This End?”

Iraq

Terrorism craves an audience and we are playing into Islamic State’s hands by watching

contributors

By Akil N Awan, Royal Holloway The well-known US security expert, Brian Jenkins, famously declared in 1974, that “terrorism is theatre”. And over the last few weeks, the brutal videotaped beheadings of British and American hostages by Islamic State militants have proved the prescience of his statement with horrifying clarity. We are now accustomed to […]

Iran

Coalition Of One: Iran Leads Own Fight Against Islamic State

contributors

By Charles Recknagel, RFE/RL The United States is putting together the first international coalition to try to roll back the Islamic State (IS) militants in Iraq and Syria. But when the nearly 40-state-strong alliance starts operations, it will find that there is already another coalition on the ground whose presence could complicate the U.S.-led effort […]

Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

Gulliver and the Lilliputians: It’s America’s Small Wars that are Unwinnable

contributors

By Tom Engelhardt It’s possible I’ve lived most of my life on the wrong planet — and if that sounds like the first sentence of a sci-fi novel maybe, in its own way, it is. I thought I knew where I was, of course, but looking back from our helter-skelter world of 2014, I wonder. […]

Iraq

Congressman Lloyd Doggett: Don’t be Stampeded into War

contributors

U.S. Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas) House Floor Speech September 16, 2014 The Middle Eastern tragedy, in which this resolution will further entangle America, is directly related to the wholly unnecessary Bush-Cheney invasion of Iraq. Having learned so little from the sacrifices of that conflict, the Congress now approves greater involvement in a Syrian civil war […]

Featured

Should US policy toward ISIL be Containment?

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole The US launched air strikes on Tuesday on ISIL targets, south of Baghdad and also in the north. The ones south of Baghdad were in support of the Iraqi Army, for the first time since the ISIL crisis broke in early June. US close air support to the Iraqi army and the […]

Iraq

Turkey’s Caution on ISIL War: “It’s far away for them but very close to us”

contributors

By Ali Murat Yel, Editor-in-Chief TurkeyAgenda In the United States the public has difficulty in understanding the reluctance of Turkey to join the international coalition that is going to war in the heart of the Middle East. But the answer is simple: it is a matter of geography. I still remember Turkish people’s reaction against […]

Iraq

As Sunni MPs Plea for Precision US Strikes, Iraqi Gov’t Kills 31 in School Shelter

contributors

Human Rights Watch (Erbil) – The Iraqi government should promptly investigate an airstrike that hit a school housing displaced people near Tikrit on September 1, 2014. The attack killed at least 31 civilians, including 24 children, and wounded 41 others. According to three survivors, no fighters from the armed group Islamic State or other military […]