Juan Cole

Shiites, Sunnis, Demonstrate Against one Another over Elections; Five Percent of Ballots Fraudulent: IECI According to Sabrina Tavernise of the New York Times, Sunni Arab cabinet ministers requested that the United Iraqi Alliance donate 10 of their seats to Sunni Arab candidates. Apparently they hoped such a gesture would mollify Sunni Arab activists who believe […]

Iraqi Christians in Peril this Christmas Because of the poor security, Iraqi Christians had to celebrate midnight mass at sundown instead. Many Christians have fled Iraq for Syria and elsewhere, while others are afraid to go to the churches, which have been targeted in the past by bombers. (Ironically, the secular Arab nationalist regimes like […]

Sistani Calls for Government of National Unity According to AFP, Iraqi national security adviser Muwaffaq al-Rubaie met Saturday with Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani and then conveyed the latter’s hope that a national unity government will be formed. Rubaie (al-Sharq al-Awsat/ AFP, Cole trans.:) quoted Sistani as saying, “I urge you to maintain the unity of […]

Interlibrary Loan/ DHS Story a Hoax The story of the interlibrary loan request for Mao’s Little Red Book that produced an interview by the Department of Homeland Security turns out to be a hoax. However, it is one of those hoaxes that bespeaks a reality, which is that the level of unwarranted (a pun!) surveillance […]

Achcar Comments on IC 12/24/05 Gilbert Achcar kindly writes: ‘ Dear Juan Two remarks: 1) re: to the “informed reader” of your “informed comment” who wonders about the independent Sadrist list, Risaliyun, which you translated as “Messengers” (I am sure they would reject such an English label which would put them on a par with […]

20,000 Protest Election Fraud in Iraq Leading Sunnis Scorned as Baathists The question of whether the December 15 elections might contribute to social peace in Iraq (always a chancy proposition) began to clarify on Friday. The guerrilla war raged with full fury, as two GIs were killed in Baghdad by a roadside bomb. A suicide […]

Kashmir Earthquake Victims Tens of thousands of earthquake victims in Pakistani Kashmir are facing winter with inadequate shelter, medicine and food. John Walbridge of Indiana University writes: You might want to inform your readers about how to best support earthquake relief. Apart from the obvious major organizations like the Red Cross, your readers might wish […]

Iraqi Elections: Post-Election Coalition Possibilities An informed reader writes: ‘ “Moreover, a group of Sadrists, the Messengers, ran separately from the UIA in the south and are getting 3% of the seats.” There is no such group in the IECI release in English. [Some have suggested that it might be the “Progressive” party listed by […]

Guest Editorial by Fisher: State Dept. Replaces DoD in Iraq IRAQ RECONSTRUCTION: STATE IN, PENTAGON OUT By William Fisher After a thousand days of widely acknowledged failure in the job of rebuilding Iraq, the Department of Defense has quietly been relieved of that responsibility, with the State Department taking over as America’s lead reconstruction agency […]