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US Soldier, 4 Policemen Killed in Afghanistan by Neo-Taliban Resurgent Taliban forces attacked Afghan police and a US patrol on Wednesday, leaving one American soldier and 4 policemen dead. CNN says the US has 18,000 troops in harm’s way in Afghanistan as well as substantial NATO forces. Bin Laden and al-Zawahiri are at large. Parliamentary […]

Racism in Israel The increasing racial tension inside Israel is a worrisome development. But what really struck me is the Israeli government projection that in 2025 inside current Israeli borders, 30 percent of the population will be Arab, and only 70 percent Jewish. That’s only twenty years from now, i.e. as near to us on […]

Iraqi Cabinet More details of the new Iraqi cabinet are now out. The big and rather ominous surprise is that Ahmad Chalabi is the temporary Petroleum Minister. It has not in the past been easy to pry him out of positions once in them. And, in the past, whenever he has been around big money, […]

New Cabinet Al-Hayat says that Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani had pressed for 10 of the cabinet posts in the new government of Ibrahim Jaafari to go to Sunni Arabs. In the end, only 6 did, with 8 for the Kurds and some 16 or 17 (reports differ) for Shiites. Some 7 are women. Al-Hayat was […]

Iraq News Round-Up Guerrillas assassinated an Iraqi female member of parliament Wednesday, women’s rights activist Lamia Abid Khadduri Sakri. Al-Zaman says she was a member of the Iraqiya List of Iyad Allawi, which is dominated by secularists and ex-Baathists. Earlier, failed assassination attempts were made against Iyad Allawi and Mishaan Juburi, both of whom are […]

Abu Muslim Rebels Against al-Mansur When we left the story, it was perhaps late 754, and a conflict was brewing between the second caliph of the Abbasid dynasty, al-Mansur, and his minister, the old revolutionary Abu Muslim. Al-Mansur had his seat in Anbar in Iraq about a decade before the founding of Baghdad. He also […]

Guest Comment: “Bush is Lying” by Kevin McMillan Kevin McMillan of Columbia University writes: “I’d suggest a friendly amendment to today’s post on many Americans’ view that President Bush actively lied to them about WMD in Iraq. You appear to be trying to offer an “interpretation” of that view that “makes sense” of it. This […]

Talabani Fears Baath Military Pentagon: No Military Progress in Iraq in Past Year Jalal Talabani told al-Hayat that he feared that the concerns among the Shiite religious parties about Sunni Arab cabinet ministers being completely free of any Baath association would cause the baby to be thrown out with the bath water. It is this […]

“Bush is a Liar”: 50% of Americans Gallup has found that half of Americans believe that President George W. Bush actively lied to them about Iraq’s possession of weapons of mass destruction in the year leading up to the Iraq War. I am sure that Bush & Co. exercised poor judgment, jumped to conclusions, exaggerated […]