News & Events
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QUOTE: After Wresting Tikrit From ISIS, Iraqis Face Sectarian and Tribal Tensions
May 18, 2015
THE NEW YORK TIMES: Zaid Al-Ali, an Iraqi analyst and author of “The Struggle for Iraq’s Future,” said that in the aftermath of the Tikrit battle, the Iraqi government had shifted its focus to military campaigns in Baiji, to the north, and Anbar Provi …
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QUOTE: Iraq Counts on Magic Wands to Stop ISIS
May 18, 2015
THE DAILY BEAST: The U.S. is now training the Iraqi army as it did for almost a decade while the U.S. military occupied Iraq. Yet despite the previous years of training and $25 billion spent on the effort, Iraq’s military collapsed in the face of ISIS’ …
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INTERVIEW: What The Fall Of Tikrit Looked Like From The Inside
May 18, 2015
NATIONAL PUBLIC RADIO: When the self-proclaimed Islamic State occupied the Iraqi city of Tikrit last summer, it was “a disaster without precedent in the city’s modern history,” Zaid Al-Ali writes in the New York Review of Books. Worse yet, the city fel …
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ARTICLE: Tikrit – Iraq’s Abandoned City
May 5, 2015
NEW YORK REVIEW OF BOOKS: On June 11, 2014, Mahmoud, a sixty-year-old employee at a school in Tikrit, Iraq, drove home for his afternoon nap. Thirty minutes later, he received a frantic call from a friend in Baghdad who demanded to know if TV reports t …
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SEMINAR: Seeds of Discord: Constitutional Woes from Iraq to the Arab Spring
April 23, 2015
HARVARD KENNEDY SCHOOL OF GOVERNMENT: A seminar with Zaid Al Ali. What can the countries of the Arab Spring learn from the Constitutional missteps of Iraq? The Arab world has seen a historic moment of constitutional reform on the global stage, but so …
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QUOTE: Amnesty probing reports of Iraqi forces’ abuses in Tikrit
April 5, 2015
AFP: Yet analysts argued the government camp appears to have at least partially succeeded in containing a widespread desire for revenge among Shiite fighters. “The government and the religious authorities in Najaf took this issue very seriously,” said …
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QUOTE: In Tikrit Offensive, Local Sunnis, Shiite Militias Are Unlikely Allies
April 3, 2015
A Human Rights Watch report this week documents looting and burning of civilian homes in Sunni villages — charges the paramilitary commanders vigorously deny. Washington has warned Baghdad of funding cuts if the militias are not reigned in. Baghdad ha …
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QUOTE: Civilians face fresh disaster if Iraqi forces push on north once Tikrit falls
March 16, 2015
THE GUARDIAN: “All life had basically ground to a complete halt even a few months ago,” said Zaid Al-Ali, author of The Struggle for Iraq’s Future, and a frequent visitor to Tikrit before it came under Isis control. “You couldn’t live there because the …
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VIDEO: Tikrit offensive billed as a turning point
March 12, 2015
FRANCE 24:The battle to retake Tikrit, Saddam Hussein’s hometown, is far from over but already optimists are hailing the rebirth of Iraq’s army in the fight against Islamic State militants. But when Republican meeting on Wednesday raised questions abou …
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QUOTE: pro-government forces struggle to topple Isis in Tikrit
March 6, 2015
THE GUARDIAN: Others said the advance was likely to take longer. “There was initial optimism in lots of circles that Tikrit would be liberated within a few days, but that was very unrealistic,” said Zaid al-Ali, author of The Struggle for Iraq’s Future …
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