Middle East

Sunni Muslim Militias Decide They Won’t Fight With IS – or The US Alliance By Mustafa Habib | Baghdad | via Niqash.org It is clear to both the current Iraqi government, to the US government and to international and local analysts and observers that it is going to take more than aerial bombardment to weed […]

Iraq

If Baghdad & the Kurds are allied against ISIL, why is Baghdad Starving Kurdistan of Money?

contributors

From a blogger in the region: Following international media reporting, it is easy to think about war only in terms of uniforms, boots and steel. But the war against the Islamic state has a different face in Iraq. Contrary to the popular game where scissor beats paper, paper will be the biggest threat to the […]

Featured

Defying Turkey, US airdrops arms to Kobane Kurds

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole In a step that over-ruled America’s Turkish NATO ally, US jets dropped food, first aid and weaponry into the besieged Syrian Kurdish town of Kobane on Monday morning. Turkey’s president Tayyip Erdogan, in remarks made on Sunday, rejected the idea of arming the Syrian Kurdish fighters, equating them with terrorists. Al-Khaleej [The […]

Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

The Kobane Crisis: Where are Turkey, the PKK and the Kurds Going?

contributors

By Mustafa Gurbuz For many Kurds, Ankara’s spectator role in Kobane is a systematic policy to weaken PKK to get more leverage in the peace talks. The radical ISIL group is besieging the Kurdish town of Kobane in Syria, and so far the Turkish government has done little about it. It is the leftist, separatist […]

Islam

Give Democracy a Chance in the Middle East, include the Muslim Religious Parties

Neil Thompson

London (Informed Comment) – When many Westerners think of the Middle East today they tend to see a region gripped by religious and sectarian violence. What all the many conflicts have in common is the participation of inflexible and fanatical groups of fighters dogmatically opposed to the further modernization and Westernization of their home countries. […]

Featured

Kobane Kurds fight off ISIL Assault, as Shells land in Turkey

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole Kurdish forces at Kobane (Ayn al-Arab) on Saturday fought off an assault by ISIL that sought to cut the city off from Turkey and completely surround it, according to an Aljazeera reporter on the scene (At the moment, there is a corridor between Kobane and the Turkish border). ISIL also subjected Kobane […]

Apartheid

Armed Israeli Squatters attack Jerusalem Home of Returning Pilgrim

contributors

JERUSALEM (Ma’an) — Armed Jewish settlers on Thursday attacked a Palestinian home in the al-Suwanna neighborhood on the Mount of Olives east of the Old City of Jerusalem, removing banners celebrating the return of a family member from the Hajj pilgrimage. Witnesses said settlers from the nearby Beit Orot settlement carrying automatic weapons approached the […]

Arab World

Why is this Man Smiling? Iranian Officials say Confidant of US Deal on Nuclear

Juan Cole

By Juan Cole Ali Akbar Salehi, the head of Iran’s nuclear energy agency, expressed confidence that the few remaining issues between the UN Security Council and Iran will be settled. Earlier this week, Iran’s president, Hassan Rouhani, also surprised the world by expressing the conviction that a deal would be reached between the US and […]

Islamic State of Iraq and Syria

Daily Struggle of 100,000 Kurdish Refugees from Kobane in Turkey

contributors

Vice News “When Islamic State jihadists launched a major offensive on the majority Kurdish town of Kobane in September, more than 180,000 people fled across the border into Turkey. Local authorities struggled to cope with the influx at first, and thousands of refugees were forced to sleep on the streets of the Turkish border town […]