Iraqi authorities are going for the trifecta. They are finally forming a new government, nine months after the March parliamentary elections, to be headed by incumbent Nuri al-Maliki at the head of a Shiite-Kurdish coalition. They have finally gotten UN sanctions on Iraq, implemented after the 1990 occupation of Kuwait, lifted. And they are increasingly […]
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Iraq
Visser: Spin-Doctors and the Changing Nature of Imperial Power in Iraq
Reidar Visser writes in a guest column for Informed Comment: Treaties, Acronyms and Spin-Doctors: The Changing Nature of Imperial Power in Iraq In the 1920s, during the early days of the Iraqi monarchy, a major bone of contention between King Faisal I and Britain concerned the definition of their bilateral relations. King Faisal objected strongly […]
Dec. 6: Top Ten New Wikileaks on Greater Middle East
Here are this weekend’s top ten Wikileaks revelations for the Greater Middle East: The US and India wanted to slap United Nations sanctions on Hafiz Muhammad Saeed and his group, Jama’at al-Da’wa, for terrorism. But Pakistan asked China to block this move at the UN, and Beijing complied. The Jama`at is widely considered a front […]
Map: Religions & Ethnicities of Iraq
Top Ten Middle East Wikileaks Revelations so Far
1. The British government’s official inquiry into how it got involved in the Iraq War was deeply compromised by the government’s pledge to protect the Bush administration in the course of it. 2. Afghan President Hamid Karzai routinely pardons drug dealers and corrupt officials. 3. Karzai’s brother, Ahmad Wali, is called a corrupt drug dealer. […]
Wikileaks on Israel, Iraq and the Iranian Specter
A 2007 cable from then US ambassador to Israel to Secretary of State Condi Rice shows a) that the Israeli leadership did not want the US to withdraw from Iraq and b) that Israeli politicians think that even if Iran never used a nuclear weapon, just for it to have one would doom Israel. Since […]
Swanson: “‘Freedom Watch’ Threw a War and Nobody Came”
David Swanson writes in a guest column for Informed Comment: The Neoconservatives, despite wandering in the wilderness after their Iraq debacle, are trying to keep the dream of serial wars in the Middle East alive. Freedom Watch and the Foundation for Democracy in Iran sponsored a National Press Club event on November 17, in which […]
Allawi Predicts new Iraqi Government will Fall Quickly
Iyad Allawi in London is throwing cold water on the idea that a stable Iraqi government is now being formed. According to Reuters he is saying that the original power-sharing formula (presumably the one worked out with the Americans Nov. 6) has collapsed and is “dead.” He told Reuters, “The formula for power sharing has […]
4 Christians Killed in Mosul, Iraq, as Exodus Continues
From Monday evening through Tuesday, extremists launched several attacks on Iraqi Christians in the northern, mostly Sunni Arab city of Mosul (pop. 2 million), killing four. It should be remembered that attacking Christians is a political tactic of the militants. Otherwise, the Christians were there because they had been tolerated by Muslims, and Iraqi Muslims […]