Fact Checking Juan Cole

Via Jeremy Brown, who’s filling in for Michael Totten – Ali at Iraq The Model, discovers he doesn’t know as much about his country’s history as he thought.

[Juan Cole] also provide a link to another article by a professor of Arab studies in the university of Colombia and use it as a reference to back up his theory. What Dr. Cole was trying to tell us, as you can see in his article, is that Fallujah is celebrated in Iraq’s history as a symbol for the large rebellion/revolution against the British back in 1920.

[…]

After reading the two honored professors’ articles I scratched my head vigorously (I’m sure I looked stupid because I felt so!) trying to remember my country’s history as I read it in school. Well, my memory is not that strong to help me remember all those poets and decorated writings about our ancestor’s bravery that I read in the fifth grade, but I sure do remember the only Iraqi movie that was produced about that rebellion. The director of the movie used a huge budget (Iraqi standards) and hired some British actors including Oliver Reed. He (the director) was rewarded generously By Saddam for showing the truth about that historical event.

[…]

Anyway, I don’t know which is worse; that the two experts in Arab world didn’t know about Dr. Al Wardi and his writings or that they knew but chose Sadam’s version of Iraq’s history!?

I suspect there’s more of this than we know.

FILED UNDER: Iraq War, Middle East, , , , , ,
Kate McMillan
About Kate McMillan
Kate McMillan is the proprietor of small dead animals, which has won numerous awards including Best Conservative Blog and Best Canadian Blog. She contributed nearly 300 pieces to OTB between November 2004 and June 2007. Follow her on Twitter @katewerk.

Comments

  1. Bithead says:

    Well, we’ll eventually find out, given that history is re-written by the victors.

  2. Dave Schuler says:

    Could it be that Iraq as Ali experiences it is different than the Iraq that Dr. Cole has studied?