Juan Cole

Bush to Sistani: Good to Have you Working with Us It turns out that President George W. Bush did meet on Thursday with four members of the Iraqi Interim Governing Council. All 24 had been invited to a Thanksgiving Day event at the Baghdad Airport, but they were not told the nature of the event. […]

Two Us Troops Killed; US kills Sisters Guerrillas in Mosul killed a soldier with mortar fire that hit the 101st Airborne Division HQ on Friday. On Thursday, a US soldier had been shot to death inside a military base in Ramadi. The CPA is strongly denying a wire service story (earlier mentioned here) that US […]

Bush Sneaks in and Out of Baghdad W. must have envisaged his triumphal first trip to Baghdad very differently. Last spring, before the war, he was told by Ahmad Chalabi via Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, Paul Wolfowitz and Doug Feith, that the Iraqi people would welcome him this November with garlands and dancing in the […]

Sistani’s Fatwa to the Americans In the meantime, Bush’s team at the Coalition Provisional Authority were scrambling to respond to Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani’s critique of their plans for Iraq. Sistani dislikes the plan to base voting on caucuses hand-picked by Iraqis who were in turn hand-picked by the US. Why, the ayatollah wants to […]

Sistani Raises Objections to Latest Coalition Plan According to al-Hayat, Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq and a member of the Interim Governing Council, met with Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani on Tuesday, and then held a news conference in Najaf on Wednesday. He revealed that Sistani has substantial […]

2 US troops wounded in Mosul; Italian Embassy in Baghdad Hit by Rockets Guerrillas fired a rocket or mortar round into the second floor of the Italian embassy in Baghdad on Wednesday. The attack caused structural damage, but no casualties were reported. Two weeks ago, guerrillas killed 19 Italians in suicide bombings at their police […]

Iraq War damaging US War on Terror Warren Strobel of Knight Ridder points out that many counter-terrorism analysts are convinced that the real war on terror is being hurt by the drain of resources to the Iraq war.

Khamenei: ‘America Sinking into Quagmire” “ Iran’s Supreme Jurisprudent, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, said in a radio address that: ‘The American nation should know that Iraq is America’s quagmire and America is sinking deeper into it by staying longer in Iraq . . . The Americans are so desperate that they are bombing an occupied country…this […]

Norwegian troops in Iraq fear for safety Norwegian troops appear to be surprised to find that they are not actually in a peacekeeping role in Iraq, but rather are in a combat role. They nevertheless don’t get the combat pay their colleagues receive in Afghanistan. The Norwegian press reports: “Military Officers’ Association have received several […]