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Archives for March 2013

Iraq War
BBC Journalists accidentally Bombed by US Air Force during 2003 Invasion of Iraq (Video)

BBC Journalists accidentally Bombed by US Air Force during 2003 Invasion of Iraq (Video)

Juan Cole

BBC crew accidentally bombed by US Air Force during 2003 invasion of Iraq: Video at Youtube:

Afghanistan
Kerry Cajoles Afghanistan and Iraq, as Bush’s former colonies decline to Toe the Line

Kerry Cajoles Afghanistan and Iraq, as Bush’s former colonies decline to Toe the Line

Juan Cole

Secretary of State John Kerry just made trips to Afghanistan and Iraq, the Bush administration’s two trophy states, in an attempt to shore up rapidly declining American influence in the two. In Afghanistan, the mood is turning against a US troop presence after 2014. In the last couple of weeks, President Hamid Karzai successfully insisted […]

Afghanistan
US Drone Campaign in Pakistan: Amazing Infographic (Serle)

US Drone Campaign in Pakistan: Amazing Infographic (Serle)

Juan Cole

Jack Serle writes at the Bureau of Investigative Journalism Pitch Interactive have visualised every CIA drone strike and every casualty in Pakistan. A new interactive graphic, which uses the Bureau’s drone data, has brought a fresh perspective to the CIA’s nine-year drone campaign in Pakistan. A team of developers has pulled together every known drone […]

Uncategorized
Viral Video on America's Incredibly Skewed distribution of Wealth

Viral Video on America’s Incredibly Skewed distribution of Wealth

Juan Cole

A fascinating video on America’s incredibly skewed wealth distribution, with the top 1% owning 40% and the bottom 40% almost nothing: and it’s getting worse over time! h/t WaPo’s Ezra Klein

al-Qaeda
Guantanamo Hunger Strike: Attorney: "Shocked at Conditions," "Animal Cages"

Guantanamo Hunger Strike: Attorney: “Shocked at Conditions,” “Animal Cages”

Juan Cole

Russia Today reports on the hunger strikes among Guantanamo prisoners, 166 of whom are said still to be living in small “animal cages” and to lack any hope of ever coming to trial. They are “condemned, dead men who just happen to breathe” according to one attorney. This, despite the fact that the vast majority […]

Israel/ Palestine
Palestinians Alarmed at Obama’s New Christian Zionism, Failure to Push for Settlement Freeze

Palestinians Alarmed at Obama’s New Christian Zionism, Failure to Push for Settlement Freeze

Juan Cole

Aljazeera English reports on Obama’s failures and successes on his recent Mideast trip. Below, I quote translations from the Palestinian press showing for the most part extreme dismay by Obama’s courting of Israel and his surrender to the Israeli Right on the issue of new settlements on the Palestinian West Bank. Although Obama did mildly […]

Drones
Air Power is horribly Expensive and Inefficient, and Drones are no Different (Astore)

Air Power is horribly Expensive and Inefficient, and Drones are no Different (Astore)

Juan Cole

William J. Astore writes at Tomdispatch.com: Today’s unmanned aerial vehicles, most famously Predator and Reaper drones, have been celebrated as the culmination of the longtime dreams of airpower enthusiasts, offering the possibility of victory through quick, clean, and selective destruction.  Those drones, so the (very old) story goes, assure the U.S. military of command of […]

Israel
The Top other thing Netanyahu Needs to Apologize For: The Gaza Blockade

The Top other thing Netanyahu Needs to Apologize For: The Gaza Blockade

Juan Cole

The one diplomatic success of President Obama’s mainly pro forma visit to Israel and Jordan was Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu’s pro forma apology to Turkey’s Tayyip Erdogan for killing 8 Turkish nationals and 1 American citizen of Turkish heritage aboard the Mavi Marmara aid ship trying to succor the Palestinians of Gaza in 2010. The […]

Environment
Global Warming is making the Arid Middle East Even Drier, threatening Water Wars

Global Warming is making the Arid Middle East Even Drier, threatening Water Wars

Juan Cole

Middle East is getting drier because of climate change, impelling people to replace lost rain water with underground fossil or aquifer water that cannot be replaced. From 2003-2009, enough of this aquifer water was permanently drained off to meet the needs of 100 million people. Some Middle East specialists are afraid that wars over water […]

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