Iraq

Baghdad (Niqash.org) – Locals in Al Qaim, Anbar, worry that the current stable security situation can’t last. It’s being upheld by US troops and Iran-allied militias, whose antipathy toward one another is becoming more overt all the time. Iraqi troops searching a secret IS base near Al Qaim. (photo: Iraqi Ministry of Defence). The people […]

Iraq

With Some Sunnis Voting for Shiites, is Iraq After ISIL Becoming Less Sectarian?

Karl Kaltenthaler

Cleveland, Oh. (The Conversation) – The results of May 2018 the Iraqi parliament election shocked many. The surprising results could mean a different phase in Iraq’s political trajectory has begun. Most observers were expecting an easy win for Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi‘s slate of candidates from all 19 of the country’s provinces. As an analyst […]

Iraq

Why Muqtada al-Sadr’s Shocking Victory in Iraq Elections isn’t that Shocking

Mustafa Habib

Baghdad (Niqash.org) The results of the Iraqi elections were surprising. But in fact, the way Iraqis were feeling about local politics beforehand indicates that nobody should actually have been all that surprised. The morning after the preliminary announcements about who had won and who had lost in the Iraqi elections, it was clear that Iraqis […]

Iraq

Still not Bush’s Iraq: Anti-American Cleric, Pro-Iran Militia and Communists ahead in Election

Sarah Benhaida

Baghdad (AFP) – An alliance spearheaded by nationalist cleric Moqtada Sadr, whose fighters once battled the United States, led Monday in surprise preliminary results from Iraq’s first poll since the defeat of the Islamic State group. In a further political upset, a rival bloc of pro-Iranian former fighters appeared to be coming in second, squeezing […]

Iraq

Now Iraq is regularly bombing Syria . . . to Blast ISIL Remnants

AFP

Baghdad (AFP) – Iraqi warplanes carried out a raid Sunday targeting Islamic State group commanders in eastern Syria, in the second such strike on the jihadists since mid-April, the premier’s office said. Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi ordered the “painful strike” which targeted “a meeting of IS commanders south of Al-Dushashiya in Syrian territory”, a statement […]

Elections

Iraqi Journalist Who Threw Shoes at Bush Running For Parliament

TeleSur

After the incident that made him famous worldwide, Muntazer Zaidi started a foundation aiming at providing relief to Iraqi victims of the U.S. occupation. Ten years after he threw both his shoes at George W. Bush during a press conference in Baghdad, making worldwide headlines and sparking a small diplomatic crisis, journalist Muntazer Zaidi is […]

Elections

How Troll Farms & Fake News are being Weaponized against Iraq’s Women Politicians

Niqash

Special Correspondent | Niqash.org | – – (Baghdad) As Iraqi elections near, the epidemic of disturbing and divisive fake news on local social media only gets worse. But who exactly is behind it? And are they motivated by profit, popularity or a political agenda? Last week, a rumour swept social media in Iraq: The authorities […]

Iraq War

Iraqi Oil for Israel? 15 Years later, new Light on the Iraq War

contributors

By Gary Vogler | ( University of Kansas Press Blog) | – – April 24 marks the 15th anniversary of my initial entry into Baghdad as the senior oil advisor to retired Lieutenant General Jay Garner, our US government civilian leader in Iraq. It was the beginning of my six plus years in Iraq working […]

Bush

Will Bolton and MEK pull an Iraq War-like Chalabi-type Scam on Iran?

contributors

By Nadejda K. Marinova (Author of Ask What You Can Do For Your (New) Country: How Host States Use Diasporas (Oxford University Press, 2017).[1] Informed Comment | – – On the fifteenth year anniversary of the Iraq war, several things are evident. One is the carnage that the war inflicted, with over 500,000 and by […]