Juan Cole

Demonstrations over Saddam in Baqubah, Baghdad Al-Hayat reports that hundreds of Iraqis demonstrated in the eastern city of Baqubah on Sunday in favor of Saddam Hussein. They carried placards ridiculing his trial as “staged.” Some in the crowd were masked gunmen. They chanted, according to the BBC, “We will never give up on Iraq or […]

Shiites and the US Army in Karbala and Sadr City Ken Dilanian of Knight Ridder has a piece on how the 37th Armored Regiment’s 1st Battalion fought an ideal battle in the Shiite holy city of Karbala against the Mahdi Army, defeating them without damaging the shrines of Imam Husayn and Abu’l-Fadil Abbas. The article […]

Al-Haeri Breaks with Sadr An informed reader writes from London: Sayyid Muqtada Al-Sadr has now been officially renounced by Ayatullah Kadhim Al-Haeri. He has been stripped of his “wukala”(representation) and also denied the right of accepting and using any religious dues on behalf of his father as well as Ayatullah Haeri. This is a big […]

4 Marines, 5 Iraqis Killed Guerrillas operating near Fallujah killed four Marines on Saturday. AFP reports other incidents: US Marines in Ramadi engaged in a firefight with 7 black-costumed guerrillas, killing two of them. Five Iraqis were wounded in the incident. The US military spokesman explained, “Those seven fired on the marines from the taxi […]

Iraqi Economy Limping Along Because of Poor Security The Financial Times has a suggestive story on the Iraqi economy and its continued woes. One conclusion I draw from it is that a lot of the new money in people’s hands is going right out of the country for the purchase of electronics and automobiles from […]

Anti-Occupation Forces Reject National Congress A National Congress of 1,000 notables will be held for 3 days later in July. It will elect an advisory body of 100, which will have a veto power over some decisions of Prime Minister Allawi. This weak, Duma-like council was proposed by UN envoy Lakhdar Brahimi as a means […]

Iraqi Women Being Dragged Backwards Trudy Rubin of the Philadelphia Inquirer brings back grim news about the situation of women from her recent trip to Iraq. She writes, ‘during my recent trip to Iraq, middle-class women spoke to me about their fears of moving backward after the U.S. invasion. A temporary code of law drafted […]

Feith Cell Under Attack from Senate The Telegraph points out that the annex to the Senate Intelligence report on failures leading to the Iraq war takes singular aim at Undersecretary of Defense for Planning, Douglas Feith, for having set up a cell in the Pentagon that briefed the White House on Iraq without the knowledge […]

Fatal Mortar Duels in Baghdad, Samarra Senate Tries to Make CIA the Fall Guy Correpondents in Iraq report that guerrillas launched mortar fire at the area around Sadeer Hotel, a favorite of foreigners on Friday. They killed a child and wounded three hotel guards. In Samarra to the north of Baghdad, mortar fire took the […]