Iraq

Bob Dreyfuss betrays Syria in The Nation

As Syrians put their lives on the line to oppose a genocidal regime, Bob Dreyfuss in The Nation calls on the US to back Bashar Assad to beat back ISIS.

Iraq

Iraq: great power convergence against ISIS

The US and Iran alike are sending drones to Iraq to help the government beat back ISIS, while Russia has followed Washington in sending warplanes and military advisors.

Iraq

Iraq: cultural cleansing in Mosul

The ISIS militants that have seized Mosul are engaged in a campaign of cultural cleansing—targeting not only the citiy's inhabitants, but its artistic and historical treasures.

Iraq

Iraq: Sufis resist ISIS in Kirkuk

Fighting erupted between ISIS and militants of the Naqshbandi Sufi Order in Kirkuk governorate, as the Sunni rebel coalition that has seized a third of Iraq starts to fray.

Palestine

ISIS behind West Bank abductions?

Hebron and the West Bank are heavily militarized as Israeli troops hunt for three youths whose abductions have now been claimed (somewhat dubiously) in the name of ISIS.

Iraq

ISIS: too radical for al-Qaeda?

Ayman al-Zawahiri purged ISIS from al-Qaeda and confered the local franchise on the rival Nusra Front. But with the old Qaeda leadership moribund, ISIS now controls much of Iraq.

Iraq

Kurds take Kirkuk, ISIS press offensive

Iraq's contested northern city of Kirkuk was taken by Kurdish forces after being abandoned by the army—while the ISIS offensive is halted just 75 miles outside Baghdad.

Greater Middle East
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Talk about strange bedfellows! This week witnessed the surreal spectacle of US National Security Adviser John Bolton, the most bellicose neoconservative in the Trump administration, visiting Turkey to try to forestall an Ankara attack radical-left, anarchist-leaning Kurdish fighters that the Pentagon has been backing to fight ISIS in Syria. "We don't think the Turks ought to undertake military action that's not fully coordinated with and agreed to by the United States," Bolton told reporters. Refering to the Kurdish YPG militia, a Turkish presidential spokesman responded: "That a terror organization cannot be allied with the US is self-evident." Bolton left Turkey without meeting President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who then publicly dissed the National Security Adviser's stance as a "serious mistake." YPG spokesman Nuri Mahmud, in turn, shot back: "Turkey, which has been a jihadist safe-haven and passage route to Syria since the beginning of the conflict, has plans to invade the region end destroy the democracy created by blood of sons and daughters of this people." (Photo: ANF)