Juan Cole

Bin Laden’s Audio: Threat to States? A complete English transcript of the Bin Laden audiotape released last week has now been posted by al-Jazeera. The Arabic text, for those who can use it, has also been posted. A re-interpretation of the speech, put in motion by the neoconservative organ, MEMRI, has been flying around the […]

20 Killed or Wounded at Education Ministry Bombing 6 Hostages Taken Guerrillas detonated a car bomb outside the Ministry of Education in Baghdad on Monday, killing at least 5 persons and wounding at least 15. It badly damaged the government building and destroyed several vehicles in the street outside. Guerrillas invaded the office of a […]

What’s at Stake The Revolutionary vs. the Statesman The decision between Bush and Kerry will shape the world Americans live in during the next four years. Even though Bush has been called the “CEO President,” that isn’t how he has behaved. Bush has overthrown two governments and announced the imminent demise of several others. Bush […]

At Least 24 Dead, Dozens Wounded AP reports that guerrillas fired a rocket into the Sunubar Hotel in Tikrit, leaving 15 Iraqis dead and 8 wounded. Guerrillas in Fallujah responded to days of bombings by the US by firing mortar rounds and rockets at US Marines. The Marines fired artillery back and called in air […]

9 Marines among 31 Killed in Iraq The news from Iraq on the last Saturday before the US elections was truly horrible, with an orgy of death and explosions. More US troops were killed in one day than at any time since last May. The Iraqi national guards behaved in a way that demonstrates they […]

Towers of Beirut Readers have asked me to what Bin Laden was referring when he said he first conceived the idea of attacking US skyscrapers when the Israelis destroyed the “towers” of Beirut. Beirut had been among the more advanced cities in the Arab world. I saw it in 1968 and 1974 before the civil […]

Elections and Religious Tensions in Iraq Al-Hayat reports that Shaikh Sadr al-Din Qubanji, a Friday mosque preacher for the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, criticized “religious figures who doubt” everything and “threaten” to boycott the elections, which will “make manifest the rights of the Shiites.” He asked the doubters if they wanted “the […]

The Other Shoe Drops: Bin Laden Weighs in It is interesting that Usamah Bin Laden explicitly said that it doesn’t matter to al-Qaeda whether Bush or Kerry is president. Only the degree to which the US gives “liberty” to the Muslim world matters to al-Qaeda, he says. [I’ll have things to say about this diction […]

Pentagon Briefing on Missing Explosives I just watched the Larry DiRita host a Pentagon briefing on the issue of the missing explosives at al-Qaqaa. I was disgusted by the political spin DiRita was putting out. The Pentagon should be serving the military needs of the whole United States, not of the Bush administration. DiRita kept […]