By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – French interior minister Bernard Cazeneuve has extended the French state of emergency, which suspends key civil and human rights, in the aftermath of the gruesome truck attack on Bastille Day in Nice, which at this writing has left 80 dead and over a dozen in intensive […]
A Story of Two Syrian Sieges: Manbij and East Aleppo
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The relatively even-handed Arabic newspaper Oman reports that the Syrian Democratic Forces (a mixed Kurdish and Arab group) advanced further into the city of Manbij on Wednesday. Manbij is a major outpost for Daesh (ISIS, ISIL) in northern Syria, and the likelihood is that the Syrian […]
Is Kerry Right? Are Freemen of Syria and Army of Islam Radical Terrorists?
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Josh Rogin of the Washington Post caused a stir by noticing something Secretary of State John Kerry said at Aspen last month. Kerry slammed Syrian al-Qaeda (Nusra Front) and Daesh (ISIS, ISIL), then said, “There are a couple of subgroups underneath the two designated — Daesh […]
Is Religion really Driving Middle East Violence?
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Pew Research has released a report saying that “As a whole, the region continued to have the highest levels of religious hostilities in the world. In 2014, the median level of religious hostilities in the Middle East and North Africa reached a level four times that […]
Syrian Troops foil al-Qaeda riposte in Aleppo as France warns al-Qaeda could replace ISIL
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Even as the Syrian army defeated a counter-offensive by al-Qaeda in Syria and its battlefield allies at Aleppo, French President Francois Hollande warned that al-Qaeda should not be allowed to replace the declining Daesh (ISIL, ISIS) in Syria. On Saturday and Sunday, al-Qaeda (the Nusra Front) […]
Clintonites in Democratic Party Back Settler Colonialism (Not a 1905 Headline)
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – The Clinton loyalists debating the Democratic Party platform have defeated an amendment that would have called for an end to the Israeli Occupation of Palestine and condemned Israeli squatter settlements illegal. The Democratic Party, in other words, backs the principle of colonialism no less than if […]
8,124 Murders by Firearm in US vs. 29 (144 equiv.) in UK
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Revised The United States continues to be peculiar in handing out powerful magazine-fed firearms to almost anyone who wants one and not requiring background checks on private purchases even if these are made at gun shows. 80% of civilian-owned firearms world-wide are in the US, and […]
If East Aleppo Falls to Regime, is the Syrian War over?
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment) | – – Reuters is reporting that the Syrian Arab Army and its Shiite militia allies have taken Malah Farms to the northwest of the city and so have cut the last remaining road by which the rebel forces in East Aleppo were resupplied with armaments. (Reuters is too […]
A new American Century or a Century of Wars and Refugees?
By Tom Engelhardt | ( Tomdispatch.com ) | – – Vladimir Putin recently manned up and admitted it. The United States remains the planet’s sole superpower, as it has been since the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991. “America,” the Russian president said, “is a great power. Today, probably, the only superpower. We accept that.” Think […]
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