The Battle of Kirkuk lasted less than 24 hours. In a lightning – and mostly bloodless – offensive, the Iraqi Security Forces (ISF) retook control of the North Oil Co. and North Gas Co. headquarters, the K1 military base, the Bai Hassan oil field, and two domes of the Kirkuk oil field on Monday. Baghdad…
In moving to reassert control of the city of Kirkuk from the Kurds, who hitherto had controlled the city under the aegis of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), the Iraqi government has acted in full accordance with its legal and moral rights. The tragedy of the Kurds both of Syria and Iraq is that they…
The US President Donald Trump’s refusal to certify the Iran deal grabbed public attention hitting mainstream media headlines. But the gaze should shift to another flash point as a major war in the Middle East involving many actors can spark at any moment. With Islamic State almost squeezed out from Iraq, the country is being…
Iraqi soldiers have raised their country’s flags over key buildings in Kirkuk, and Baghdad has declared the Kurdish city be under government control. The Kurdish Peshmerga forces called the takeover “a flagrant declaration of war” and vowed that Iraq will pay a “heavy price.” The Iraqi government forces have taken full control of Kirkuk, Al…
Total fiasco. That’s a quick way to characterize the US adventure in Syria in the last six years. The proxy war not only failed to accomplish its goal – removal of Assad – it tremendously weakened the US in the Middle East, strengthened its adversaries, and soured its relations with many allies. If it were…
One week after Kurdish leader Masud Barzani held his referendum on Kurdish independence from Iraq (with both the referendum and independence being contrary to the Iraqi constitution), the blowback has been fierce, angry and almost universal. What may have been conceived as a clever ploy by Masud’s eldest son, Masrour, to bolster the Barzani family’s…
