Baghdad
Iraq Is Back on the Brink of Civil War
Sectarian strife is the worst it's been in many years—and Syria isn't helping
The Iraq conflict came back into view in the last week of April, when several areas of northern Iraq exploded in violence on a scale not seen since the height of the 2006-2008 civil war. The carnage began on April 23, with either a botched arrest attempt or a brutal crackdown by government troops, just three days after Iraq held largely peaceful elections for local government. READ MORE >>
How Sectarianism Blinds the Shia to the Horrors of Syria
The Universalist
Before 2013 begins, catch up on the best of 2012. From now until the New Year, we will be re-posting some of The New Republic’s most thought-provoking pieces of the year. Enjoy. READ MORE >>
Stop Saying Our Wars Are Over, Mr. President. They’re Not.
“In America, and in Iraq,” Vice President Joe Biden assured an audience in Baghdad last December, “the tide of war is receding.” For its callowness, this observation was noteworthy. (The tide of war was not receding from Iraq; Joe Biden was.) President Obama, introducing his plan to cut defense expenditures a few weeks later, offered up this analysis by way of justification: “The tide of war is receding.” READ MORE >>
One Year Later: The Failure of the Arab Spring
I. READ MORE >>
TNR On the Most Overlooked Stories of 2011
Lawrence Kaplan: America’s Silent Withdrawal From Iraq War is over. READ MORE >>
Iraq Is a Mess. But Leaving Was the Right Call.
The Invention of Space
Florence and Baghdad: Renaissance Art and Arab Science By Hans Belting Translated by Deborah Lucas Schneider (Belknap Press, 303 pp., $39.95) READ MORE >>
