Informed Comment Homepage

Thoughts on the Middle East, History and Religion

Header Right

  • Featured
  • US politics
  • Middle East
  • Environment
  • US Foreign Policy
  • Energy
  • Economy
  • Politics
  • About
  • Archives
  • Submissions

© 2025 Informed Comment

  • Skip to content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
Iraq

Top Ways Dan Senor Could have avoided offending Iraqi Muslims

Juan Cole 08/16/2010

Tweet
Share
Reddit
Email

Former Bush administration spokesman in Iraq Dan Senor is against the building of a Sufi Muslim community center in lower Manhattan. He says he is concerned that interfaith understanding may be damaged.

Since Senor is so worried about religion and hurt feelings, he no doubt feels badly about what he and his team did to Iraqi Muslims. So here are the top ways Dan Senor could have avoided hurting the feelings of Iraqi Muslims:

5. He could have avoided lying about the anger in Iraq in 2004, a prelude to the civil war. He say, “I can tell you that the majority of this country, the majority of the population, is returning to normalcy and wants a stable, democratic Iraq to take hold.”

4. He could have told the truth about the horrific security situation in Iraq early on. He once joked off the record to journalists asking about the deteriorating security in Iraq, replying, “Off the record: Paris is burning,’ he told them. ‘On the record: Security and stability are returning to Iraq.’ ”

3. He could, like, stop defending the Bush administration’s having lost track of $9 bn. of Iraqi money

2. He could have avoided being liar in chief for a brutal and duplicitious occupation of a major Muslim Arab country, which has left 4 million displaced, hundreds of thousands dead, hundreds of torture victims, and a country in shambles without so much as a government at present.

1. He could have not been involved in an illegal act of naked aggression against a major Muslim Arab country.

Mr. Senor does not want a Muslim mosque near him? What in the world was he doing in Baghdad then? Or maybe he is a supremacist who only wants to be near Muslims who are under Occupation.

I think he may have done rather a lot of damage to interfaith understanding, from which even Karl Rove admitted it will take us a generation to recover.

Filed Under: Iraq, Islamophobia, Uncategorized

About the Author

Juan Cole is the founder and chief editor of Informed Comment. He is Richard P. Mitchell Professor of History at the University of Michigan He is author of, among many other books, Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires and The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam. Follow him on Twitter at @jricole or the Informed Comment Facebook Page

Primary Sidebar

Support Independent Journalism

Click here to donate via PayPal.

Personal checks should be made out to Juan Cole and sent to me at:

Juan Cole
P. O. Box 4218,
Ann Arbor, MI 48104-2548
USA
(Remember, make the checks out to “Juan Cole” or they can’t be cashed)

STAY INFORMED

Join our newsletter to have sharp analysis delivered to your inbox every day.
Warning! Social media will not reliably deliver Informed Comment to you. They are shadowbanning news sites, especially if "controversial."
To see new IC posts, please sign up for our email Newsletter.

Social Media

Bluesky | Instagram

Popular

  • Israel's Netanyahu banks on TACO Trump as he Launches War on Iran to disrupt Negotiations
  • Iran's Hypersonic Missiles Hit Israeli Refinery, Military Sites, as Israel does the same to Tehran
  • A Pariah State? Western Nations Sanction Israeli Cabinet Members
  • Israel: Will Ultra-Orthodox Jews' Opposition to Conscription Bring down Netanyahu's Gov't
  • Will Iran reply to Israeli Attacks with "War of Attrition?" Will its Nuclear Red Line Hold?

Gaza Yet Stands


Juan Cole's New Ebook at Amazon. Click Here to Buy
__________________________

Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires



Click here to Buy Muhammad: Prophet of Peace amid the Clash of Empires.

The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam


Click here to Buy The Rubaiyat.
Sign up for our newsletter

Informed Comment © 2025 All Rights Reserved