There are few areas in the world more entangled in historical deceit and betrayal than northern Iraq, where the British, the Ottomans, and the Americans have played a deadly game of political chess at the expense of the local Kurds. And now, because of a volatile brew...
Kurdish Powder Keg
Crocodile Tears
What happens when one and a half million human beings are imprisoned in a tiny, arid territory, cut off from their compatriots and from any contact with the outside world, starved by an economic blockade and unable to feed their families? Some months ago, I described...
Rise and Fall
of the Bizarro Empire
When the history of the Iraq war is written, the question of who lost it and how it was lost will be paramount, yet the answer is clear enough even today. The seeds of defeat were sown long ago, and not just by the policymakers and authors of our present disastrous...
Monday: 2 GIs, 149 Iraqis Killed; 320 Wounded
Updated at 2:00 a.m. EDT, June 19, 2007At least 149 Iraqis were killed or found dead and 320 were wounded during the latest attacks. Scores were killed or wounded during two major battles between militia and security forces in southern Iraq. Meanwhile, Sunni families...
Sunday: 4 GIs, 74 Iraqis Killed, 56 Wounded
Updated at 12:15 a.m. EDT, June 18, 2007Curfews were lifted today in Baghdad and Basra. At least 74 Iraqis were killed or found dead and another 56 were wounded during various incidents. Also, four American soldiers were killed and one was wounded in separate...
Things Fall Apart
What we are seeing in the Middle East, highlighted by the ascension of Hamas in Gaza and a looming civil war among Palestinians, is the virtually complete unraveling of the American enterprise and the country's influence in the region. Wherever the hand of George W....
Bush Faces Crises from Palestine to Pakistan
Four years after the emergence of the first signs of a serious insurgency in Iraq, US President George W. Bush finds himself beset with major crises stretching from Palestine to Pakistan. With US-backed Fatah forces routed by Hamas in Gaza this week, Bush's...
Saturday: 2 GIs, 1 Briton, 26 Iraqis Killed; 40 Iraqis Wounded
Updated at 10:52 p.m. EDT, June 16, 2007Due to continuing curfews, Baghdad newspapers have ceased operations for the third day in a row. However, reports on Iraqi casualties still managed to get out. At least 26 Iraqis were killed and 40 wounded in today’s...
After The Retaliation
According to former Secretary of Defense (1994-97) William Perry co-author of the op-ed "After the Bomb" for the New York Times the probability of a nuclear weapon "going off" in an American city is greater today, than it was five years ago. Going off?...
US Losing Ground Through Tribal Allies
RAMADI - US attempts to win over tribal collaborators in al-Anbar province have won it more enemies instead. The US military has launched one of its biggest operations to date to regain control of the province, to the west of Baghdad. It had lost control over the...


