The United States’ reluctance to become decisively committed to the complex quagmire in Syria is understandable. However, its plan to insert a US-trained-and-equipped “moderate rebel” force into the mix…
Ministers from 21 countries gathered in London on January 22 to discuss the fight against Islamic State (IS). They had their photo opportunity and issued their statements. US secretary of state, John Kerry…
The news that the publication of the findings of the official Iraq war inquiry is once again to be delayed has outraged MPs and the families of the soldiers involved. Familiar accusations of a whitewash…
The brutal attack on the staff of Charlie Hebdo has rightly led to powerful calls to protect freedom of expression, with large demonstrations of support in Paris and other French cities, complemented by…
The New Year always provides an opportunity for both introspection and speculation. So it seems a good time to consider what the big stories are likely to be this year. Some of the five major stories I…
The report published by the al-Sweady Inquiry has found that charges of murder levelled at a number of British troops by Iraqi prisoners were “without foundation”, but that nonetheless there were instances…
The controversy over the CIA torture report has moved on to calls for the UK government to be open about its own involvement. The arguments have also been widened to include other elements of CIA activities…
Among the litany of abuse documented in the War on Terror, the revelations in the US Senate’s recent “torture report” on the treatment of detainees held in CIA “black sites” -secret overseas prisons where…
News reports circulated last week that Israeli warplanes had bombed targets in Syria, leading to widespread fears of yet another knot in an already nightmarishly tangled conflict. This is not the first…
After overrunning Mosul in June 2014, Islamic State (IS) hastily and brutally occupied soft targets in poorly protected areas of ethnic minorities – the villages of Kurds, Christians, and Yezidis on the…
As the Kurdish town of Kobane continues to defy Islamic State (IS) forces, many pundits have condemned Turkey’s unwillingness to help the People’s Protection Units (YPG) keep the forces of “evil” at bay…
Some Australian special forces have entered Iraq but more than half the contingent is still to do so. As US president Barack Obama said on Monday he was having conversations with Australia and other Coalition…
To explain the disaster befalling Iraq, as well as the rise of Islamic State (IS), you have to go back a century – before modern Iraq even existed. That’s not to discount the shared culpability of Iraq’s…
During his October visit to the UK, Qatar’s Emir Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad al Thani had to fight to convince the British government that Qatar stands firmly against Islamic State (IS). Despite his efforts…
A specter continues to haunt the Arab world – the specter of regionalism. The idea that illogical national boundaries, drawn by colonial overlords divided what should have been a pan-Arab region has been…
Women and girls living in Syria and Iraq have been subject to gross sexual violence, economic strife and the psychological trauma of a war that, to them, seems endless. But women in these countries are…
A year after the 2003 invasion of Iraq, the University of California, Berkeley, conducted a postmortem of the media coverage of the so-called “Iraq war”. The conference included academics, journalists…
America prefers its wars short, sharp and decisive – unfortunately, what some are already calling the third Iraq war is likely to be long, murky, and indecisive. With his September 2014 announcement of…
Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi proclaimed Islamic State (IS) as a Muslim caliphate on June 29, 2014, with himself as caliph, a term reserved for a successor to the prophet Muhammad (PBUH). His would be the newest…
The dreadful events in Iraq and Syria and counter-terrorism raids in Australia have alarmed Australians, including the 500,000-strong Muslim community. These incidents represent a new episode of the “third…