The country had become an existential threat. It was ruled by a megalomaniac who wanted Israel eliminated. And now he wanted a nuclear bomb.

The leader claimed his nuclear program was purely a civilian program, but Israel knew that was not true. So, it set the program back. Israel undertook covert assassinations of nuclear scientists. And, when that did not work, it blew up a nuclear facility.

But the country wasn’t Iran. This was Iraq under Saddam Hussein who came to power in 1979 and ruled for 24 years. To challenge the nuclear program, Israel used assassinations, sabotage and targeted strikes in Iraq, a signature that is today found in Iran.

Long-suffering Iraqis have legitimate grievances in the post-Saddam Hussein era.

Notably they include rampant corruption, high unemployment, impoverishment affecting millions — the nation’s youths notably affected — and lack of essential to life public services.

Saddam ruled despotically but he wasn’t all bad. According to UNESCO, he established one of the region’s best educational systems that was free to the highest levels.

Healthcare was near-universal, available in nearly all urban areas and most rural ones, according to UNICEF.

Pre-Gulf War, it ranked with the region’s best. Since that time, things changed dramatically for the worst.

For the last 30 years, the US waged wars on Iraq by hot and other means.

The purpose of journalism is to uncover truth – especially uncomfortable truth – and to publish it for the benefit of society. In a free society, we must be informed of the criminal acts carried out by governments in the name of the people. Throughout history, journalists have uncovered the many ways governments lie, cheat, and steal – and the great lengths they will go to keep the people from finding out.

Great journalists like Seymour Hersh, who reported to us the tragedy of the Mai Lai Massacre and the horrors that took place at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, are essential.

Ten years ago last week, Julian Assange’s Wikileaks organization published an exposé of US government wrongdoing on par with the above Hersh bombshell stories.

The one-year anniversary of some of the last major protests in Baghdad saw thousands take to the streets in Tahrir Square, insisting that their demands are still generally unmet after all this time, and that the promises which were supposed to placate them generally didn’t pan out.

As with the last protests, the government sought to handle this rally by sending police out en masse to fire tear gas and put up barricades. Past history suggests this will not work, and will just rile up more people.

The demands have been straightforward for the protesters, who want a break form historic corruption, and free elections in which the candidates are loyal to the Iraqi voters first and foremost, instead of being aligned to either the US or Iran.

Several hundred people came together on Saturday on the southern side of mount Sinjar for a ceremony marking the start of the exhumation process of a mass grave of the Islamic State (ISIS) group victims in the village of Solagh.

“In Solagh subdistrict, ISIL [Islamic State, ISIS] militants committed mass killings of Yazidi women, and buried them in a mass grave. The remains of two such graves will be exhumed to then be matched, based on DNA sampling, with surviving family members who finally get the opportunity to lay their loved ones to rest, appropriately and according to traditions,” reads a press release.

The ceremony, which included Yezidi religious rites, was attended by roughly a hundred Yazidi men and women who lost someone to ISIS, when the group swept across northern Iraq in August 2014, committing genocide against the ethno-religious minority.

On October 22, 2010, WikiLeaks published the Iraq War Logs, a colossal compendium of nearly 400,000 classified U.S. Army field reports revealing what founder Julian Assange called “intimate details” of the war—including war crimes and other serious human rights abuses perpetrated by American and coalition troops, private contractors, and Iraqi government and paramilitary forces.

It was the largest leak in U.S. military history and a stunned world demanded justice. However, in the decade since then, only the whistleblowers who revealed the crimes detailed in the logs were ever seriously punished, while the architects and the perpetrators of the atrocities continue to enjoy impunity.

In a 1996 essay in Foreign Affairs, the conservative authors William Kristol and Robert Kagan proposed a U.S. foreign policy of “benevolent global hegemony.” Scoffing at former President John Quincy Adams’s maxim that America “goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy,” they asked, “But why not? The alternative is to leave monsters on the loose, ravaging and pillaging to their hearts’ content, as Americans stand by and watch.” In Kristol and Kagan’s view, it was the United States’ responsibility to sally forth and slay—an argument they reprised years later as two of the biggest advocates for the Iraq war.

Hundreds of Iraqi boys, many of them Yazidis, were forced to become child soldiers by IS, but few are getting any support to help them move on from their experience

“We want to bring our soldiers home. But we did leave soldiers because we’re keeping the oil,” President Trump stated on November 3, before adding, “I like oil. We’re keeping the oil.”

Though he had promised a withdrawal of U.S. troops from their illegal occupation of Syria, Trump shocked many with his blunt admission that troops were being left behind to prevent Syrian oil resources from being developed by the Syrian government and, instead, kept in the hands of whomever the U.S. deemed fit to control them, in this case, the U.S.-backed Kurdish-majority militia known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).

The United States has drawn up a list of 80 sites in Iraq linked to Iranian-backed groups that it plans to target if it follows through with a threat to close its embassy in Baghdad, Middle East Eye has learned.

The sites include secret headquarters and shelters used by Hadi al-Amiri and Qais Khazali, the respective leaders of the Badr Organisation and Asaib Ahl al-Haq (AAH), as well as sites associated with Kataeb Hezbollah (KH).

All three are Shia armed groups supported by Tehran which are also part of the Popular Mobilisation Forces under the nominal control of the Iraqi government.

Political leaders and armed group commanders told MEE that US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo shared hundreds of satellite images of the 80 sites with Iraqi President Barham Salih during a phone call on 20 September.

Iraqi PM Mustafa Kadhimi has confirmed over the weekend that at least 2,500 US troops have already withdrawn from Iraq as part of what will ultimately be a three year period of pullout from the country.

This came following the recent announcement of US troop cuts during Kadhimi’s US visit, and the more recent threats to close the embassy and withdraw outright after troops came under rocket attack from militias.

Some Iraqi officials have objected to the US threats, and particularly to the way they were made, cautioning that US threats were liable, in such a public way, to have a spillover effect on other nations working with Iraq.

Over the past year-and-a-half, Iraq’s pro-government paramilitary forces have accused Israel of targeting them in air raids on multiple occasions. Tel Aviv has accused ‘Iranian-backed’ militias of using Iraq to ship weapons to Syria, but has declined to comment on whether or not it has carried out any operations inside Iraqi territory.

A Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF) militia unit was bombed by unidentified aircraft west of the town of Akashat, Iraq near the Iraqi-Syrian border, Arab media have reported, citing a security source in Iraq’s western Anbar Governorate.

According to the source, the attack took place shortly after midnight on Sunday morning, with the area struck multiple times. The source said the strikes caused material damage, but no loss of life or injuries.

Trailing Biden by an average of 6.8 points — according to Real Clear Politics as of late September — do Trump strategists intend an October surprise to improve his reelection prospects?

On Monday in response to phony US Middle East anti-terrorism operations, Iranian Foreign Minister Zarif said the following:

“You claim you eliminated Daesh. You killed Daesh’s number one enemy in a wretched act and with utmost bestiality.”

Zarif referred to the Pentagon’s murder of redoubtable terrorist fighter Iranian Quds Force commander General Qassem Soleimani in January.

Tehran-backed Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) commander Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis was killed at the same time — prompting retaliatory rocket attacks against the US presence in the country that continue.

On Sunday, two US convoys were attacked with explosive devices. Iraqis want their country back, Pentagon occupation ended.

We detailed previously that the US State Department is livid over repeat rocket and mortar attacks on both the US Embassy in Baghdad and the high secure 'Green Zone' in which the American compound is located.

This resulted in US officials signaling at the start of this week they are mulling shuttering the embassy altogether and calling all diplomatic personnel home. Multiple reports say "preparations" for just such a retreat are underway, which strongly suggests bigger US military intervention will follow.

Not only was there weekend fire on the US embassy area, but a Monday attack on Baghdad's international airport, which also hosts Western military advisory forces, killed five Iraqi civilians when a rocket slammed into their house on the edge of the airport.

The US State Department has declared itself “outraged” over a Monday rocket strike by an unnamed Iraqi militia near the Baghdad Airport. The strike killed seven civilians. The US is now demanding Iraq take “immediate” action against the militias.

US officials say they consider the “Iran-backed militias” a danger, and expect Iraq to fight them, even though in practice these militias are part of Iraq’s own security forces. Iraq has struggled to exert control over the militias for years.

Iraq has promised a move to create a new special forces unit in the Green Zone meant to allow existing security forces to exit the area, while the new forces focus on protecting embassies in the area. Officials say a number of embassies are asking for Iraqi help protecting them.

For the first time in nearly two and a half years, US jets launched airstrikes in Iraq from an aircraft carrier in the Persian Gulf. The strikes were carried out on September 23rd by two F/A-18F Super Hornets from the USS Nimitz, a spokeswoman for the Bahrain-based US 5th Fleet told Stars and Stripes on Monday.

“The last such strike was by USS Theodore Roosevelt in [March] 2018,” Cmdr. Rebecca Rebarich said. Rebarich only said the attacks were carried out in Iraq and did not elaborate on targets.

Operation Inherent Resolve, the anti-ISIS coalition fighting in Iraq and Syria, reported airstrikes on ISIS hideouts in Kirkuk, Iraq, on that same day. It is likely that these strikes were carried out by the carrier-launched jets, but Stars and Stripes could not confirm this.

Iraqi Premier Mustafa Kadhimi came out of his recent visit to the United States with talk of a US drawdown and potential outright pullout from the country. As it stands today, Iraqi officials are expressing real concern that the United States could be about to start yet another war in the country.

All of the uncomfortable signs are there. The US has been threatening to close its Iraq embassy, and is making preparations to evacuate diplomats over the recent rocket attacks in the vicinity of the site.

The threat to close the site comes with the usual bells and whistles, and ultimatums, about how unhappy the US is with the Iraqi government. Talk of the Shi’ite militias responsible being in league with Iran also makes this a potential proxy war, one the US has oft-threatened.

Over the past months, attacks on convoys of the US-led coalition moving military equipment and supplies have become an ordinary development in Iraq. Local Iranian-backed resistance groups demanding a US military withdrawal from the country have conducted over two dozen attacks so far. The most recent ones took place on September 22 and 23.

The September 22 attack erupted in the district of al-Dujayl, around 60 km to the north of Baghdad. According to Iraq’s Security Media Cell, the convoy was targeted with an improvised explosive device. No casualties were reported. On the afternoon of September 23, a second supply convoy of the U.S.-led coalition was targeted in the district of Awja, more than 160 km north of Baghdad.

Rumors seemed to fly all day Sunday on Mideast social media channels based on unnamed US sources that a major attack on the US Embassy in Baghdad's Green Zone was imminent.

This at the same time it's being widely reported that the State Department is actually considering shuttering the embassy's operations altogether, angry at the Iraqi government's inability to reign in the Shia paramilitary groups likely responsible for repeat mortar and missile attacks on the area.

Iraqi Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein has concluded a two-day diplomatic trip to Tehran, during which he met with top Iranian officials to discuss boosting political and economic ties, and the role of the United States in the region.

On Saturday, Hussein met with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif, and parliament Speaker Mohammed Bagher Ghalibaf.

The United States has threatened to close its embassy in Baghdad if the Iraqi government does not move to stop attacks on American compounds, an Iraqi media report says.

Iraqi24, a Baghdad news site, reported that US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo had warned Iraqi President Barham Salih that Washington was ready to shut its diplomatic mission in Baghdad and take action against anti-terror resistance groups.

“The decision to close the embassy in Baghdad is in President Trump’s hands and is ready. … If our forces withdraw and the embassy is closed in this way, we will liquidate all those who have been proven to have been involved in these attacks,” Pompeo said, naming anti-terror groups of Kata'ib Hezbollah and Asa'ib Ahl al-Haq, which are part of Iraq’s pro-government Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) or Hashd al-Sha'abi.

Following near daily attacks centered in and around Baghdad's Green Zone where the sprawling US embassy is located as well as other multiple American and other international institutions, Washington has put the Iraqi government on notice over the breakdown in security, saying it could shutter the US embassy altogether.

The State Department is livid after repeat rocket and mortar attacks on the embassy, and has blamed a failure of Iraq's security forces and of Iraq's leaders to respond appropriately, also amid the intensified proxy war with Iran:

In a new escalation, US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called Iraqi President Barham Saleh last week to deliver an ultimatum, Iraqi and foreign officials told AFP.

Unless Iraq's government puts an end to the rockets raining down on US military and diplomatic sites, Washington would shutter its embassy and recall its troops, the sources said.

Israel has acknowledged the existence of an Arab Israeli ISIS fighter who has languished in solitary confinement at a northern Iraqi prison without trial for more than two years, according to a letter obtained by The National. It says he would be allowed to return home if he can reach Israel’s borders from Iraq, despite a lack of formal ties between the two countries.

When US forces captured Mohammed Khalid in a December 2017 raid in eastern Syria following four years spent fighting for ISIS across the group's self-proclaimed state, Israel kept the case of the Palestinian from Israel's Arab-majority Northern Triangle area, and his whereabouts, in the dark.

The Islamic State’s infamous rule over vast areas of Iraq during 2014 and 2016 not only led to a humanitarian crisis, but also left the country’s economy depleted. Its expansion in Iraq, marked by its control over vast areas of the country, most notably capturing the city of Mosul in June 2014, also allowed the organisation to seize over 121 bank branches according to the Central Bank, in what was described as one of the largest bank robberies the world has ever seen. Across its operations, the Islamic State (Daesh) stole a total of approximately $830 million.

Despite this, some banks, including Deutsche Bank and specifically its US branches, continued to allow money transfers to be sent to Iraq despite the group’s control over large parts of the country.

Iraq’s Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr says Israel will mark its own ending by opening its embassy in Iraq amid some reports about Tel Aviv considering opening its virtual diplomatic mission in the Arab country.

The prominent Shia cleric made the comment during a sermon at the Friday prayers, warning the “enemy of God [Israeli Prime Minister] Benjamin Netanyahu,” who has “evil intentions” toward Iraq, about possible “coming” to the Arab country or even “thinking about establishing an embassy” there.

Sadr’s warning was an apparent reaction to some unconfirmed reports that Tel Aviv is seeking to establish its virtual embassy in Baghdad, which, in turn, allegedly wants to open its own in Israel.

Addressing the Israeli premier, Sadr further warned him that if he took such actions, he would “mark the end” of the occupying entity, “according to the Holy Quran.”

The Syrian Arab News Agency (SANA) reported that the American forces transferred a large amount of oil from eastern Syria to Iraq over the weekend.

The agency quoted local sources as saying that “a convoy of 30 tankers and a tanker for the American occupation loaded with stolen oil from the oil wells it occupies in Syria’s Al-Jazeera left this evening to Iraqi lands through the illegal Al-Walid crossing in the Al-Yarubiyah region in the eastern countryside of Al-Hasakah.”

Trump Administration officials have been saying this for weeks, but on Friday reiterated their intentions to try to enforce a UN Security Council resolution that includes broad sanctions against Iran. Officials say they expect every nation to comply.

The glaring problem with this is that the resolution doesn’t exist, at least not as an active resolution the US wants. The P5+1 nuclear deal gave the US the authority to reimpose sanctions on Iran, but the US had withdrawn from that pact years ago. Though the Trump Administration argued that didn’t matter, the UN has virtually unanimously rejected their interpretation, and rejected the UN Security Council resolution. The US believes the resolution becomes active Sunday, but the reality is it just doesn’t exist legally.

Submitted by South Front,

On September 3, an explosion of an improvised explosive device (IED) targeted a convoy with equipment of the US-led coalition in the southern Iraqi province of Dhi Qar.

Iraqi troops that were escorting the convoy suffered no casualties. According to local sources, no significant damage was caused to the equipment. Following the incident, security forces detained 2 suspects near the explosion site. The investigation is ongoing.

However, it is no secret that the attack was likely conducted by one of multiple pro-Iranian Shiite groups that surfaced in the country following the assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and several prominent Iraqi commanders by a US strike in Baghdad in January.

On September 3, an explosion of an improvised explosive device (IED) targeted a convoy with equipment of the US-led coalition in the southern Iraqi province of Dhi Qar. Iraqi troops that were escorting the convoy suffered no casualties. According to local sources, no significant damage was caused to the equipment. Following the incident, security forces detained 2 suspects near the explosion site. The investigation is ongoing.

However, it is no secret that the attack was likely conducted by one of multiple pro-Iranian Shiite groups that surfaced in the country following the assassination of Iranian General Qassem Soleimani and several prominent Iraqi commanders by a US strike in Baghdad in January.

Republican leadership at the RNC Convention this week talked a big game when it comes to "bringing the troops home" - something Trump has been promising since 2016 - but which has not yet ultimately been realized. But can he deliver now as part of a pre-election promise? It looks like the wheels are finally in motion.

Multiple reports citing Pentagon officials on Friday say up to one-third of all American soldiers will permanently return from Iraq over the next two to three months.

This would bring numbers down from 5,200 to about 3,500 according to Pentagon officials. Trump is in the meantime expected to tout an Iraq withdrawal as a success in ending the wasteful wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The US-led coalition in Iraq has withdrawn the last of its forces from Camp Taji, a base near Iraq’s capital Baghdad that has been the target of recent rocket attacks. The coalition handed control of the base to Iraqi security forces, along with $347 million in military equipment.

The anti-ISIS coalition dubbed Operation Inherent Resolve is hailing the move as a success and says it is part of a “long-range” plan with the Iraqi government.

“Camp Taji has historically held up to 2,000 Coalition members, with the majority departing over the summer of 2020,” the coalition said in a statement released on Sunday. The statement said the force was made up of a Spanish helicopter battalion and “military trainers” from Australia, Canada, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, Turkey, the UK, the US, and NATO.

With Iraqi PM Mustafa Kadhemi set to visit the US this week, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is demanding that Iraq dismantle all Shi’ite militias in the country, calling them a threat to national sovereignty and promising US support on doing this.

The US has long had a problem with the Shi’ite militias, even though in recent wars, like the ISIS War, they were on the same side. This is because the militias are friendly with Iran, and the US sees them as a potential enemy in a future Iran war.

This has been a hassle for Kadhemi since he took power, as he’s seen as a US ally but also needs to try to avoid outright fights with the militia. This has left a tenuous balance, and one the US wants to tip to the scales over.

As it was expected, the ‘historic’ UAE-Israeli peace deal did not contribute to the stability in the Middle East. Instead, the situation has been slowly, but steadily moving towards a larger confrontation in the region.

Immediately after the announcement of the US-sponsored peace deal, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared that his country is not going to fulfill one of its key provisions – the suspension of the annexation of West Bank territories. The prime minister emphasized that the annexation plan was just delayed, but not suspended.

“There is no change to my plan to extend sovereignty, our sovereignty in Judea and Samaria, in full coordination with the United States,” Netanyahu said adding that “Israel will have comprehensive peace agreements with other Arab countries without returning to the 1967 borders.”

At least two unguided rockets fell inside Iraq's Taji military base that houses US troops, local media has reported, citing the country’s military. No information on damage or potential casualties was immediately available.
Camp Taji, located some 27km (17 miles) north of the Iraqi capital, came under rocket fire late on Saturday. At least two projectiles fell inside the base, Iraqi military confirmed to local media.

While no reports on damage or casualties were readily available, unconfirmed imagery circulating online suggested the attack might have sparked a fire at the base.

No injuries were reported after the explosion took place, according to a report by Al Sumaria TV that cited security sources. An investigation into the incident has been launched.

Following a report by Al Sumaria that an explosion hit a US-led international coalition convoy on Wednesday in Iraq, the US Central Command said it is looking into reports on the explosion and cannot confirm whether an attack took place.

"We are looking into this report," the spokesperson said on Wednesday. "At this time, we have no confirmation of the event."

In the recent weeks the US-led coalition in Iraq experienced a turn for the worse.

On the evening of August 10th, a military convoy carrying equipment for US forces near the Iraq-Kuwait border was reportedly targeted by an explosion. The Iraqi Shiite armed group, Ashab al-Kahf, issued a statement claiming that its forces had destroyed “equipment and vehicles belonging to the American enemy” in a bombing, targeting a border crossing south of the Iraqi city of Basra. The group also released a video purposely showing the attack.

Earlier on Tuesday the Iraqi government condemned a Turkish drone strike in the country's province of Erbil that killed two Iraqi soldiers, slamming "repeated military violations" by Ankara as a "dangerous violation of Iraqi sovereignty, international law and the UN Charter".

Iraq cancelled a 13 August visit by the Turkish Defence Minister, Hulusi Akar, to the country, following condemnation of a Turkish drone strike in the Erbil province that killed two Iraqi border guards, according to an Iraqi Foreign Ministry statement.

The Turkish ambassador in Iraq has been summoned to Baghdad after the Turkish drone attack.

"We are announcing the cancellation of the visit by the Turkish defense minister to Iraq, scheduled for Thursday. The Foreign Ministry will summon the Turkish ambassador and hand him a note of protest in connection with the attack", the Iraqi Foreign Ministry said.

At least two explosions have hit convoys supplying U.S.-led coalition forces in Iraq in the last 24 hours, security sources said, the first on Monday evening near the southern border with Kuwait and the second on Tuesday north of Baghdad.

The explosions, which caused no casualties but did some material damage, are the latest in a string of such incidents in recent weeks. An attack in southern Iraq on Sunday hit a convoy carrying supplies to coalition forces, the military said.

Large explosions have struck an arms depot belonging to the Iraqi Federal Police forces and Popular Mobilization Units (PMU), better known by the Arabic word Hashd al-Sha’abi, at a military compound southwest of the capital Baghdad.

The Security Media Cell said in a statement that the two consecutive blasts occurred at al-Saqr military base, which lies in the Saydiya neighborhood of Rashid district and close to the highway linking Baghdad to the city of Hilla, at 6:40 p.m. local time (1540 GMT) on Sunday, the official Iraqi News Agency reported.

The statement added that the ammunition warehouse exploded due to high temperatures and “faulty storage.” It made no mention of any casualties.

The head of the security and defense committee at the Iraqi parliament has condemned Ankara’s ongoing cross-border operation in the country’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region against hideouts of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militant group, stating that Turkish forces are now deployed more than a dozen kilometers into the area.

“Iraq rejects transgression of its sovereignty or airstrikes within its territory by another state,” Mohammad Reza Al Haider told the official Iraqi News Agency on Tuesday, calling on the Baghdad government to address such issues.

Haider noted that the bilateral agreement between Turkey and Iraq permits hot pursuits between five and seven kilometers from the border, but Ankara has exceeded the limit, and Turkish troops are now deployed along an area stretching some 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) south of the frontier.

The head of the security and defense committee at the Iraqi parliament has condemned Ankara’s ongoing cross-border operation in the country’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region against hideouts of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militant group, stating that Turkish forces are now deployed more than a dozen kilometers into the area.

“Iraq rejects transgression of its sovereignty or airstrikes within its territory by another state,” Mohammad Reza Al Haider told the official Iraqi News Agency on Tuesday, calling on the Baghdad government to address such issues.

Haider noted that the bilateral agreement between Turkey and Iraq permits hot pursuits between five and seven kilometers from the border, but Ankara has exceeded the limit, and Turkish troops are now deployed along an area stretching some 15 kilometers (9.3 miles) south of the frontier.

In a recent report, a United Nations expert found the January killing of Iranian Major General Qasem Soleimani by a US drone strike was against international law. One journalist told Sputnik the killing fit a long pattern of the US destroying places it cannot control, which is linked to the proliferation of poverty in the US.

Kei Pritsker, a journalist with BreakThrough News, told Radio Sputnik’s Political Misfits Tuesday that “for most of US history, we’ve just attacked countries purely out of our interest to extend our sphere of influence for power and take out governments we don’t like, and it’s really the same deal with Qasem Soleimani.”

Hours after the US reportedly tested a defense system that can stop mortars, artillery and small rockets, a rocket was said to be intercepted after it was fired at the Green Zone in Baghdad where the US Embassy is located.

This adds to 24 hours of tension in Iraq that coincided with American Independence Day. There were claims the US had deployed a C-RAM system to confront threats to its embassy and other facilities.

Sometimes listening to the morning news on television is a bit like entering into an alternate universe. Last Wednesday, the day after primary elections in New York State, CBS News reported that New York Congressman Eliot Engel was “facing a challenge” from Democratic Party challenger Jamaal Bowman. NBC News reported that Engel was “trailing.” The reality, according to the New York Times tally of the results that morning was that Bowman had beaten Engel by a margin to 60.9% versus 35.6% with more than 82% of votes counted. Even though it posted the numbers, the Times felt compelled to describe the apparently impending lopsided loss as if it were something less than that, as a “stiff challenge” for Engel.

A security spokesman for an Iran-backed militia issued a statement on Friday threatening Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi, describing him as an “American agent,” following an overnight raid on the group by security forces.

The Iran-backed Kata’ib Hezbollah security spokesperson threatened al-Kadhimi with punishment, or “torture” after the raid that led to the arrest of over a dozen fighters, which sent a strong message to militias, warning against attacking Iraqi facilities.

The Turkish military has begun an air and ground operation against Kurdish PKK militants in northern Iraq, calling it an act of self-defense to weed out “terrorists” in the area.

Named Operation Tiger-Claw, the incursion involves Turkish commandos supported by warplanes, helicopters and armed drones. The Defense Ministry said on Wednesday that its planes had struck Kurdish targets in northern Iraq’s Haftanin region, and that troops were already on the ground.

In a statement released on Twitter, Turkey’s military described the attack as “legitimate self-defense” against PKK forces and “other terrorist elements” accused of carrying out attacks on Turkish personnel in the region.

Now, the ICC’s chief prosecutor, Fatou Bensouda, looks poised finally to give the court some teeth. She is threatening to investigate two states – the US and Israel – whose actions have been particularly damaging to international law in the modern era.

The court is considering examining widespread human rights abuses perpetrated by US soldiers in Afghanistan, and crimes committed by Israeli soldiers in the occupied Palestinian territories, especially Gaza, as well as the officials responsible for Israel’s illegal settlement program.

An investigation of both is critically important: the US has crafted for itself a role as global policeman, while Israel’s flagrant violations of international law have been ongoing for more than half a century.

The US is the most powerful offender, and Israel the most persistent.

Both states have long dreaded this moment – the reason they refused to ratify the Rome Statute that established the ICC.

After months of the world's attention focused on the pandemic and resulting national shutdowns and economic pauses, the fact that the US and Iran were only months ago almost at war in Iraq seems a world away. But a proxy war pitting Iranian-backed Shia paramilitary fores in Iraq against US interests and allies has continued unabated, threatening once again to draw in American military intervention.

In the latest instance, multiple rockets were fired on the US embassy in Baghdad Tuesday morning. "A rocket struck Baghdad’s heavily fortified Green Zone, the seat of Iraq’s government, early on Tuesday morning, according to an Iraqi military statement, the first attack on the area since a new prime minister was sworn in earlier this month," AP reports.

A rocket landed on an empty house in the Green Zone near the US embassy in Baghdad early on Tuesday morning.

According to the Iraqi Security Media Cell, the Katyusha rocket, which was launched from an eastern district of Baghdad, landed on an empty house inside the Green Zone, but did not cause any casualties. The rocket caused "minor damage to the wall of the house."

The Green Zone is an "international zone" in the Karkh district of central Baghdad, which served as the governmental center of the Coalition Provisional Authority following the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq.

A leader in Iraq’s Badr Organization said US forces have transferred Daesh (ISIL or ISIS) terrorists from Syria into Iraq amid Washington’s attempts to reinforce the American presence in the Arab country.

US hostility toward Iran is all about its sovereign independence — free from US control.

It’s also because of its large hydrocarbon resources the US seeks control over, along with wanting Israel’s main rival neutralized.

Hostile US policy toward Iran reached a unprecedented level under Trump and hardliners surrounding him.Earlier the Obama regime falsely claimed that the US can “seize any .com, .net and .org domain name because the companies that have the contracts to administer them are based on United States soil.”

Cyberspace is the last frontier of press freedom. Without it, the Internet would be like cable TV, controlled by corporate giants.

Truth-telling would be marginalized and silenced, speech and press freedoms consigned to the dustbin of history — where things are heading without redoubtable resistance.

Republicans and Dems are hostile to free and open expression.

American forces in the Persian Gulf have greatly bolstered their ability to respond to Iran at a moment President Trump has renewed trading threats and barbs with the Islamic Republic, ordering the US Navy "to shoot down and destroy any and all Iranian gunboats if they harass our ships at sea."

This includes the Pentagon bolstering its AC-130 gunships and Apache attack helicopters to target and destroy small surface threats in the Arabian Sea. Tehran has meanwhile responded with its own threats to 'destroy' American vessels of course.

It was apparently this beefed up presence that led to the April 15 confrontation about which Trump was responding by ordering destruction of boats that "harass" American vessels.

Two so-called 'rogue states' recently targeted for US-imposed regime change are helping each other fight coronavirus as well as Washington-led sanctions.

Late last week it was revealed Venezuela received a huge boost in the form of oil refinery materials and chemicals to fix the catalytic cracking unit at the 310,000 barrels-per-day Cardon refinery, essential to the nation's gas supply.

This as a fuel and food shortage crisis has driven protests and clashes with police, especially in hard-hit rural areas, over the past month.

“Thanks to the support of our allies in the Islamic Republic of Iran... We will overcome our difficulties,” Erling Rojas, vice minister for refining and petrochemicals in Venezuela’s Oil Ministry, stated when the much-needed refinery parts arrived last Thursday.

He further underscored in colorfully provocative rhetoric that Iran’s support is “driving the gringos in the White House crazy.”

Daesh* are plotting to hand out contaminated masks in Iraq through pseudomedics as the country struggles to fight the coronavirus pandemic, Lebanon’s Al Mayadeen channel reported on Friday, citing Iraqi sources.

The militants are planning to do this in a number of villages that are out of firm control of the government forces.

The security forces aim to thwart this plot and urge Iraqis to stay away from strangers.

As of Thursday, Iraq confirmed 1,434 COVID-19 cases, including 80 fatalities. The country declared a victory over Daesh on its soil back in December 2017, but still continues fighting terror sleeper cells.

Matthew Hoh is a Senior Fellow at the Centre for International Policy. He resigned in protest from his post in Afghanistan over US strategic policy and goals in Afghanistan in September 2009. Prior to his assignment in Afghanistan, Matthew served in Iraq; first in 2004-5 in Salah ad Din Province with a State Department reconstruction and governance team and then in 2006-7 in Anbar Province as a Marine Corps company commander. In his extensive interview with Parsi Policy, he explored the chances of a US coup in Iraq and warns of flip-flop policies of White House.

Iraq has designated a new Prime Minister that, contrary to his two predecessors, apparently enjoys inclusive support from the various political blocs in a development that suggests the defeat of the United States’ attempts at forcing its choice on the Arab nation.

On April 9, President Barham Salih tasked Mustafa al-Kadhimi, director of Iraq's National Intelligence Service, with forming a new government in a month. The president said Kadhimi was a “fighter and intellectual who is well known for his integrity, moderation, and keenness [to honor] the rights of the Iraqi people.”

The presidential ceremony was attended by several high-ranking politicians and public figures, something that reflected Kadhimi’s across-the-board popularity with Iraq’s political groupings.

The New Arab or al-Araby al-Jadeed, a London-based pan-Arab media outlet, interpreted the broad guest list as “a sign that Kadhimi will likely find success at forming a government.”

Throughout five years of war Yemen has been considered by the UN and health agencies to be the 'world's worst humanitarian disaster' — but few Americans have heard much about the war or its over 100,000 dead, including tens of thousands of civilians, given that it's the US-Saudi coalition doing the bombing.

But now Yemen is about to rip back into the headlines, given the first confirmed COVID-19 case in the country, with health officials fearing "one million" could be infected if the outbreak takes hold in the war-torn country.

This as already some 25 million civilians are in dire need of humanitarian aid, including basic food, medicines, and other staples. The Saudis have essentially imposed a complete land, sea and air blockade of the country for years. Its health system also long ago collapsed.

Under its effective leader, firebrand ultra-nationalist cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, Iraq is theoretically committed to not allowing itself to become overly dependent on any one country. That was the rallying call of al-Sadr’s ‘Sairoon’ (‘Marching Forward’) power bloc during the last general election in Iraq in May 2018 that saw him and his grouping win the most seats of any party. For a while, this theory seemed to be in effect, with Iraq playing off Chinese and Russian interests against those of the U.S. All the time, though, in practice, Iran continued to dodge and weave around any and all sanctions aimed at preventing it from continuing to wield the deciding power in its neighbour through the leverage of its military, militias, and pro-Iran politicians in Baghdad. The surest sign yet that the U.S. has had enough of this situation came in the shape of the latest waiver granted just over a week ago by the U.S.

The US-led Coalition has been repositioning forces in the last weeks, handing over several key posts, and training of Iraqi forces is temporarily wrapping up.

Reports indicate that Iran, the US and Iranian proxies are all preparing for a conflict in Iraq after a year of rising tensions, rocket attacks and airstrikes.

OPEC’s second-largest oil producer hit record production figures in August with an output of 4.88 million barrels per day (bpd), according to the latest figures from S&P Global Platts.

Iraq’s highest-ever production count has contributed to what may be OPEC’s first monthly output rise of the year, throwing a wrench into the 14-member organization’s plans to limit global oil supply and keep a floor under declining crude prices.

“The recent increases in Iraqi production turned what was a sort of minor headache for OPEC into a fully-blown migraine,” Dave Ernsberger, global head of commodities pricing at S&P Global Platts, told CNBC on Thursday.

Al-Kastan is located near the town of Jisr al-Shughur, controlled by the Al-Qaeda-linked Turkistan Islamic Party. The exploded weapon depot likely belonged to the terrorist group or persons affiliated with it.

On the same day, the Turkish military established three new ‘observation posts’ around Jisr al-Shughur. They are located at the villages of Baksariya, al-Z’ainiyah and Furaykah. Idlib militants see Turkish positions as an important defense line that would allow containing possible Russia- and Iran-backed anti-terrorist operations in the area.

The 46th Regiment Base of the Syrian Army in western Aleppo came under Turkish artillery shelling. In response, Syrian forces struck position of Turkish-backed militants near Kafr Amma. The attack on the 46th Regiment Base became a third incident between the Turkish military and Syrian troops in less than a week. On April 3, two Syrian soldiers were killed in a Turkish artillery strike on their positions near Tell Abyad.

Several Iraqi factions issued a joint statement on Saturday in which they vowed to target the U.S. forces until they fully withdraw from Iraq.

According to the statement, eight Iraqi factions – including Asaib Ahl al-Haqq, Liwaa Imam ‘Ali, and Harakat Al-Nujaba”Movement – vowed to attack the U.S. forces in Iraq, while also condemning the newly appointed Prime Minister, ‘Adnan Al-Zurfi.

The factions called on parliamentarians to get Zurfi to apologize and back down, in order to thwart the alleged “conspiracy.”

In the past, the Iraqi factions like Asaib Ahl Al-Haqq and Kata’ib Hezbollah have targeted the U.S. forces in Iraq, prompting the latter to carry out retaliatory strikes near the Syrian border and other governorates.

Over the past week or so, China has eased quarantine measures in Wuhan – the city in which the global coronavirus pandemic began – with the entire lockdown scheduled to end on 8 April. With China’s President Xi Jinpiang having visited the city just a few days ago, the industrial economy across China as a whole is back working and operating at levels even above the pre-coronavirus rates, although the service sector remains more cautious.

For the oil industry, this means that China is back and busy taking up where it left off in terms of exploring and developing new field opportunities.

This is at a time when the U.S. is just beginning to see the full onset of coronavirus mayhem.

In late March, the US military deployed its Patriot missile defence system to the Ayn al-Asad base in Iraq in a move to "protect against another potential Iranian attack”.

Reuters on Monday reported, citing its sources, that missiles hit near sites of foreign and state-run oil companies in Basra, Iraq. No casualties have been reported so far.

According to police, the missiles were Katyushas launched at around 3 a.m. local time and hit the Burjesia residential and operations headquarters west of Basra.

At the same time, the Iraqi military stated that the rockets hit near US-based Halliburton company site.

Three doctors “closely involved in the testing process” told Reuters on Thursday that Iraq has “thousands” of confirmed coronavirus cases, far more than the 772 infections reported by the government.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) has confirmed the deployment of new Patriot missile systems to Iraq amid calls for the withdrawal of American troops from the Arab country.

In a statement on Thursday, Bill Urban, spokesman for CENTCOM confirmed the deployment, saying the US military would not provide further status updates on its ongoing movement of Patriot missile systems into Iraq for security reasons.

“The US military continues to coordinate the effort with its Iraqi partners,” he said, adding, "The Iraqi Government is well aware of our collective need for air defense protection of service members within Iraq".

Also, Pentagon spokesman Commander Sean Robertson said Thursday that "for operational security reasons, we are not providing status updates as those systems come online."

In the wake of the great escalation of January 2020, ultimately resulting in the retreat of United States forces, situated across Iraq, down to a few key bases around Baghdad that now come under regular rocket attack by local anti-occupation resistance groups, American strategic planners are confronted with only two choices: leave Iraq or launch a full-scale shock attack operation in the country's west and subsequent occupation of the area to regain the strategic initiative.

The US finds itself in its current position in Iraq, for the first time since the North Korean army invasion of South Korea in 1950 - an event which nearly threw American troops, at Pusan, into the sea and forced them to fight a protracted defense.

President Trump said Wednesday that Iran is planning a "sneak attack" on U.S. troops or "assets" in Iraq, warning the country will pay a "heavy price" if this happens.

The president made the abrupt announcement in a tweet Wednesday afternoon, coming amid lingering tensions between the two countries over past confrontations as well as the coronavirus pandemic.

Can anyone think what our society might have spent six and a half trillion dollars on instead of 20 years of war in the Middle East for nothing? How about the trillion dollars per year we keep spending on the military on top of that?

Invading, dominating and remaking the Arab world to serve the interests of the American empire and the state of Greater Israel sounds downright quaint at this point. Iraq War II, as Senator Bernie Sanders said in the debate a few weeks ago, while letting Joe Biden, one of its primary proponents, off the hook for it, was “a long time ago.” Actually, Senator, we still have troops there fighting Iraq War III 1/2 against what’s left of the ISIS insurgency, and our current government continues to threaten the launch of Iraq War IV against the very parties we fought the last two wars for. This would almost certainly then lead to war with Iran.

By Robert Inlakesh

In the wake of the great escalation of January 2020, ultimately resulting in the retreat of United States forces, situated across Iraq, down to a few key bases around Baghdad that now come under regular rocket attack by local anti-occupation resistance groups, American strategic planners are confronted with only two choices: leave Iraq or launch a full-scale shock attack operation in the country's west and subsequent occupation of the area to regain the strategic initiative.

The US finds itself in its current position in Iraq, for the first time since the North Korean army invasion of South Korea in 1950 - an event which nearly threw American troops, at Pusan, into the sea and forced them to fight a protracted defense.

For a military force whose historical doctrine has been to 'attack, attack, attack', America’s current position in Iraq is terribly awkward and uncharacteristic of the usual predicament of total superiority it generally finds itself in.

Recent US fighting with Iraqi militias has seen bases in the country hosting US troops coming under rocket fire, and this has led to the US trying to get more Patriot missiles into Iraq to intercept such rockets. The first missile systems are now set up, at Ayn al-Assad base, and in Irbil.

The US appears to be trying to move away from having troops scattered around Iraq, closing multiple bases in the west, and reportedly has missiles in Kuwait ready to be sent to two more US bases inside Iraq in the days to come.

Details on the diplomacy with Iraq on these deployments are unclear. The US has talked about wanting the missiles in Iraq since January, but it has never been confirmed that Iraq signed off on such deployment. Since the deployment is roughly intended to thwart attacks by Iraqi paramilitaries who are essentially part of Iraq’s security forces, this is potentially problematic for Iraq.

Initially announced weeks ago, the US withdrawal of troops from western Iraq and concentration in the east looks more and more like preparation for another confrontation with neighboring Iran. Recent reports suggest that is one policy being advocated.

On Friday, reports suggested that the Pentagon had been ordered, by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, to start planning to wipe out certain Iraqi militias which they believe are Iranian proxies. Officials say the administration is increasingly divided on the plan.

Lt. Gen. Robert White was very averse to this idea, saying it would require the US bring in thousands of more troops, and divert from existing missions. He also warned it risks starting a war with Iran, which at least some of the proponents consider very much the point.

US and coalition troops have left an airbase in Kirkuk, Iraq, and given a million dollars-worth of equipment to Iraqi security forces. However, the full-scale withdrawal demanded by the Iraqi government has still some way to go.

With the Covid-19 pandemic grabbing headlines at home, US forces in Iraq have been engaged in a quiet retreat abroad. Despite President Donald Trump’s insistence on leaving troops in Iraq following a series of clashes with Iranian-backed militias, coalition forces have withdrawn from three bases in the country this month.

The third withdrawal, from the K1 Airbase near the northern city of Kirkuk, was announced on Sunday by coalition spokesman Col. Myles Caggins. Claiming that the coalition’s goal of defeating Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS) was “successful,” Caggins said that the base’s 300 coalition soldiers and sailors would be “repositioned to other locations to continue the anti-ISIS partnership.”

According to local reports, at least three explosions were heard at the Camp Taji military base north of Baghdad late Tuesday. The base houses both Iraqi and US forces.

A reporter with Sky News Arabic said on Tuesday night that three explosions had been heard at Camp Taji, an Iraqi military installation that also houses a large number of US troops.

According to local reports, at least three explosions were heard at the Camp Taji military base north of Baghdad late Tuesday. The base houses both Iraqi and US forces.

A reporter with Sky News Arabic said on Tuesday night that three explosions had been heard at Camp Taji, an Iraqi military installation that also houses a large number of US troops.

An Iraqi security source says the US military intends to construct a new military base in the country’s western province of al-Anbar for the deployment of Patriot missile systems.

“US forces intend to establish a new base in Umm Samij area north of al-Baghdadi district in the city of Hit in order to deploy a Patriot anti-missile system, and protect Ain al-Assad air base as well as other locations in western regions against possible attacks,” the unnamed source told Iraq’s Arabic-language al-Ahad news agency on Monday.

He noted, “Identification of a location for the deployment of the Patriot missile system is the first of its kind in Iraq. Such measures are indicative of US forces’ intention to stay in their bases in the western regions of Iraq for a long period of time.”

Following Iraqi president Barham Saleh’s nomination of Adnan al-Zarfi (Zurufi or Zurfi) as the new Prime Minister, Iraq has entered a critical stage. The Shia block is divided. The 30 days given to al-Zarfi to nominate his cabinet will lead either to a quorum of the parliament recognising his new cabinet and in consequences to a bloody future that could lead to unrest and even partition of Iraq or absence of a quorum. Why did President Saleh nominate al-Zarfi?

In what appears the first significant US foreign policy alteration due to the coronavirus pandemic, President Trump reportedly nixed plans for a large-scale attack on "Iranian proxies" in Iraq last week amid a tit-for-tat following rocket attacks on a US base there, which killed two Americans.

The Commander-in-Chief specifically cited coronavirus as reason for holding off on such a major attack, which would surely bog American forces down further in an ongoing battle against Iran inside neighboring Iraq, which Washington fears has long come under the control of the Shia clerics in Tehran. More importantly, the president thought it would "look bad" at the moment of a global pandemic.

Last week, the US military confirmed that they had staged “defensive precision strikes” on weapons storage facilities of the Iraqi Shia paramilitary group Kataib Hezbollah in retaliation for the group’s previous attack on the Camp Taji military base in Iraq that killed at least two American servicemen.

NBC News has cited several unnamed US sources as saying on Thursday that the coronavirus pandemic prompted President Donald Trump last week to refrain from ordering a more aggressive response to an Iraqi paramilitary group’s recent attack on American troops in Iraq. The US sees Kataib Hezbollah as an Iranian proxy.

According to the sources, Trump told his senior national security advisers that such a retaliation could tarnish the US’s image now that Iran is grappling with COVID-19, which has already claimed the lives of more than 1,000 people in the Islamic Republic.

The US State Department issued a statement Friday declaring themselves “enormously disappointed” by the Iraqi government’s failure to fulfill US demands to protect US and coalition forces in the country.

The US made a big deal of this last week, after US forces were hit with rockets at Camp Taji. The US attacked several bases belonging to Iraqi militias, then demanded Iraq make sure no one retaliated. There was some limited retaliation, which is why the US is so disappointed.

Iraq, for its part, has promised to investigate the rocket attack, but since they haven’t had time to do that and the US immediately started attacking people they thought might’ve conceivably done it, Iraq is also struggling to keep the situation calm, at a time when the government is crumbling and trying to get ready for early elections.

US forces stationed in Iraq to aid ISIS and overthrow the Syrian government, said Tuesday that it had transferred the al-Qa’im military base on the border with Syria to Iraq and transferred responsibility for the base to the Iraqi military.

According to the Iranian news site Pars Today, the forces of the international coalition said they had withdrawn their troops from the al-Qa’im military base on the border of Iraq and Syria, located in the west of Al-Anbar province, and transferred responsibility for the maintenance and control of the base to the Iraqi military.

This comes after several decades-long occupation, where the US’ stated reasons for being in the region has gone through multiple transformations. Following the defeat of the US strategy to remove Assad under the pretext of fighting the very same ISIS which in fact they were supporting, despite that Assad was leading the fight against ISIS, the US’s ability to maintain a foothold in the ravaged region has deteriorated.

"If there remained any doubt that the Trump administration's hostility towards the court is fundamentally punitive and callous in nature, these doubts have now been dispelled."

by Andrea Germanos, staff writer

Amnesty International on Wednesday rebuked Secretary of State Mike Pompeo over new comments bashing the International Criminal Court and threatening court staff—and their family members—investigating alleged war crimes committed by United States forces in Afghanistan.

Pompeo suggested retaliatory actions would be in store.

The US assassinated Qasem Soleimani, long-time commander of Iran’s elite Quds Force military unit, in January, prompting Iran to launch a massed rocket strike on a pair of US bases in Iraq, and leading Iraq-based militias to carry out sporadic strikes on American bases and the US Embassy Green Zone in Baghdad.

Iran will continue to respond to the January 3 assassination of Commander Soleimani, President Hassan Rouhani has warned, one day after a coalition base holding NATO troops came under rocket fire.

“The Americans assassinated our great commander. We have responded to that terrorist act and will respond to it,” Rouhani said in a televised address Wednesday.

AFP is reporting that the US military is withdrawing US troops from 3 Iraqi bases. They are al-Qa’im in the far north on the Syrian border, Qayyarah near Mosul, and Kirkuk.

AFP quotes Coalition spokesman Operation Inherent Resolve spokesman Col. Myles B. Caggins III as saying “A transfer ceremony is taking place today to hand over the facilities to Iraqi forces, and the intent is that all coalition troops will be leaving Qaim … It’s historic.”

The new Iraqi prime minister-designate is a religious moderate who rose to prominence in the 2000s under a US-installed order that largely succumbed to the influence of Iran.

A presidential decree, made public on Tuesday, announced that Adnan Al Zurfi, a former grocery owner in Detroit, will form a government to replace that of caretaker prime minister Adel Abdul Mahdi.

However, Mr Al Zurfi’s perceived closeness to the US is likely to be a significant obstacle in gaining a vote of confidence during the 30-day time frame set by parliament.

Iraq’s legislative body is dominated by political associates of the Iran-backed militias that hold considerable sway in Iraqi politics and want to end US influence in the country.

Late on March 17, at least three rockets struck the area near the US embassy in Baghdad’s fortified Green Zone. This was the fourth such attack in the span of a week. A day earlier, a pair of rockets struck the Besmaya base south of Baghdad. This military facility is the second largest military base operated by the US-led coalition in Iraq after Camp Taji.

The threat of rocket attacks already forced the US military to announce that it is evacuating some of its bases in the country. The al-Qaim base, near the Syrian-Iraqi border, is among them. The al-Qaim facility has been an important logistical and operational hub employed by US forces for operations in western Iraq and eastern Syria. Its presence there, as well as in Syria’s al-Tanf, has allowed the US to project its power along the Syrian-Iraqi border more effectively and to support Israeli military actions against Iranian-backed forces in the area.