Iran’s political system has not yet developed stable party structures. Most parties are still loose coalitions of individuals and interest groups that combine their own interpretation of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s legacy with their personal interests. As party affiliation remains relatively weak, members of one party often have run as candidates for another party or are on several electoral lists. Similarly, unregistered parties or electoral platforms also field candidates for both presidential and parliamentary elections on an ad hoc basis.
Kurdish issues have been an important part of the myriad political and socioeconomic problems that have preoccupied the Islamic Republic of Iran since its inception. The Kurdish factor has also been an important determinant of Iran’s regional foreign policy in the past three decades. Shortly after the onset of the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-1988, the Iraqi government began to woo the Kurdish Democratic Party of Iran (KDPI) as potential leverage in its war effort.
How the New Arab Media Challenges the Arab Militaries: The Case of the War between Israel and Hizbullah in 2006
One, Two / the Arab army where are you?/ The Arab army where are you?/The Egyptian Arab Army/ resides in an-Nasr [victory] compound/ Wakes up in the afternoon/ to drink its tea/ The Gulf Arab army/ can do absolutely nothing/ “Strategic silence” indeed/ “cut us some slack, man!”/ The Tunisian Arab army/ is green like parsley/ But ‘Aziza loves Yunis/ the wars can wait/ The Sudanese Arab army/ I can hear its clamor in my ears/ “Damn it!
Social Change Amidst Terror and Discrimination: Yezidis in the New Iraq
Originally posted August 2008
On August 14, 2007, in the largest single terror attack during the war in Iraq, over 350 Yezidis were killed and two entire villages completely destroyed, leaving over 1,000 families homeless. The two villages, Qahtaniya and Jazeera are located in the Sinjar Mountains, an area in northwestern Iraq that is hotly contested by Sunni Arab insurgents, Kurdish peshmergas, US-led coalition forces, and several minority groups.
Palestinian Refugees from Iraq in Critical Need of Protection
Originally posted July 2008
“The twice-displaced Palestinian refugees are one of the worst-off groups in a country full of desperate people. … They have no country to go to, no valid travel documents, no protectors inside Iraq, and hardly anyone prepared to support them outside either. … It is to everyone’s dishonor that these human beings are still rotting [in border camps] and — worst of all — in Baghdad where one or more is being murdered virtually every day.”1
Kirkuk: Constitutional Promises of Normalization, Census, and Referendum Still Unfulfilled
Originally posted July 2008
Many people view Kirkuk as a microcosm of all of Iraq. The ancient city counts among its inhabitants significant numbers of almost all of Iraq’s ethnic and religious groups — Arabs, Kurds, Turkmen, Assyrians, Chaldeans, Sunnis, and Shi‘ites. The last semi-reliable census of Kirkuk’s population, from 1957, indicated a slight majority of Turkmen in Kirkuk City and a majority of Kurds, followed by Arabs, in the province as a whole.
Nur, an Iraqi refugee who has been in the States for four days, is dipping parsley in a china cup of salt water in Bethesda, Maryland. The salt water signifies tears shed over slavery and displacement; the parsley stands for spring and hope. Another interpretation likens the act in the Passover Seder to a biblical moment of betrayal: Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery and dipped his striped garment in blood to feign his death.
