Sarah Parkinson

I'm going to put my head through this desk if I bang it any harder.

US forces land in Iraqi western desert, clash with Iraqi troops, leave one dead: Sources A US special force has landed in desert areas in Iraq’s Anbar, Najaf and Karbala provinces, resulting in reported clashes with Iraqi forces that left one soldier dead and two others wounded, according...

Secretary of Lethality Maxxing doing a bang up job

"A US special force has landed in desert areas in Iraq’s Anbar, Najaf and Karbala provinces, resulting in reported clashes with Iraqi forces that left one soldier dead and two others wounded, according to Iraqi officials and security sources."

Iraq's first lady, Shanaz Ibrahim Ahmed, a political/humanitarian figure from a prominent (& very political) Sulimaniyah-rooted Kurdish family closely tied to the PUK, coming in hot with a free history lesson for people who think Iraqi Kurds might be unquestioningly game for more US bait-and-switch.

Iranian Kurdish groups have long been in Iraq. Now their installations are being bombed (they were occasionally targeted before).

This could be a case of US & Israeli officials, along w/ specific actors on the ground, trying to prompt or force mobilization by acting like it’s already happening.

Spent hours talking to friends & Iraqi contacts who know far more a/b Iraq than I do. All of us are getting mixed messages. Neither federal Iraq nor KRI want to get involved in a regional conflict. KDP & PUK would be risking a lot to back this kind of plan. The Turkish reaction issue is huge.

Good plan, there’s no way that the US would ever betray Kurds who fought on their behalf, or that Turkey would be upset by and seek to frustrate any US-backed Kurdish forces, or that an invasion from Iraq would trigger Iranian nationalist opposition. None of those things have ever happened.

Effects on air freight and insurance markets. Qatar Energy declaring force majeure is a big deal.

Screenshot of usembassydoha Instagram account post with US flag at the top and the headline "Guidance for Americans in Qatar (as of 4pm EST on March 3): The U.S. government is ready to help Americans return home safely from the Middle East if you choose to take advantage of the options available. *Hamad International Airport suspended all aircraft movements due to the temporary closure of the Qatari airspace, and Qatari maritime routes remain closed. *The Salwa land border crossing to Saudi Arabia is open. The U.S. government cannot guarantee your safety if you choose to depart using this option. *Receive the latest security updates by enrolling at http://step.state.gov *For consular help, call 24/7: +1-202-501-4444 (from abroad) or +1-888-407-4747 (from the U.S. and Canada)" Post caption reads "usembassydoha: Event (Update #5): on March 3, the Department of State ordered non-emergency U.S. government employees and their family members to leave Qatar due to the threat of armed conflict. If safe to do so, Americans should leave Qatar now."

Today in US Department of State Catch-22s, FUBAR extreme, "there are only idiots at the wheel of this monumental disaster" edition: "Leave Qatar now, there's no safe way out."

Congress confirmed as SecDef an unqualified Islamophobe w/ Crusader & white supremacist tattoos, a raging disdain for the professional military & civ-mil relations, & unchecked gender issues and is now shocked that he's at a podium speaking like a commander in the Uruk Hai a/b "warfighters"

Look, Hizb Allah has mortgaged Lebanon to engage in symbolic resistance politics when they had to know that Israel was looking for any pretext. Netanyahu has been waiting to move more aggressively into S. Lebanon & would have eventually done so anyways, he's like Begin/Sharon in 82 in that sense.

Israel was already in Lebanon; it's been occupying five villages in the South since the ceasefire (which it has repeatedly broken). Settlers have been permitted to take day trips up into the area at times.

Which of course also gave Hizb Allah all kinds of pretext as well.

So many words to avoid saying what's dead obvious.

Now a country's map has been deemed "political." Specifically, Ukraine's.

(Of course all maps are political, but have a funny feeling a map of Brazil or France wouldn't have been banned).

"It said the renewed offensive formed part of what it described as an “enhanced forward defence posture”."

Four words to obfuscate the fact that that's just occupation.

Dying Abroad Cambridge Core - Social and Cultural Anthropology - Dying Abroad

And Osman Balkan’s “Dying Abroad”—deeply original and at times quite moving.

www.cambridge.org/core/books/d...

States of Subsistence | Stanford University Press On any given day in Jordan, more than nine million residents eat approximately ten million loaves of khubz 'arabi—the slightly leavened flatbread known to many as pita. Some rely on this bread to avoi...

Obsessed with Ciro-Martínez’s “States of Subsistence.” Brilliantly theorized, creative research siting, teaches well.

www.sup.org/books/middle...

Allianz Field banner with the rebel loon and the phrase we have friends everywhere

Anyways I’m crying

IOC clears FIFA president Gianni Infantino of breaching political neutrality rules (Gift Article) Infantino was seen at the inaugural Board of Peace meeting on Thursday wearing a red Donald Trump-themed 'USA' cap.

IOC to Ukrainian skeleton racer w/ helmet featuring photos of dead Ukrainian athletes: "Disqualified."

IOC to Catalan skimo fans waving the Estalada and Senyera: "Those are banned propaganda & we're confiscating them"

IOC to Gianni Infantino, wearing a red USA 45-47 hat: "Looks good on you buddy"

The Epstein files document what many women researchers have long experienced but rarely seen laid bare so starkly: exclusion operating behind closed doors, shaping who gets funded, invited, mentored, and taken seriously. How many of these networks, norms, and gatekeepers remain in place?

University PR is gonna be on me if I make a cutthroat joke

They are gorgeous, yet vicious birds.

Honestly, credit due to @davulis.bsky.social (another Bluejay fwiw), for absolutely insisting over dinner on Friday that I had to see "Send Help" within 24 hours.

I don't think I've actually thrown up the sign of the horns during a movie screening before.

The floor plan for the planned ICE concentration camp in Social Circle, Georgia:

I think “Send Help” did for me what “Barbie” did for a lot of other women.

There should be a bonus medal for dropping a perfect f-bomb faster than the NBC censors can catch it

Between Oct. 7, 2023 & June 2025, Israel killed hundreds of Palestinian athletes & destroyed 288 sports facilities. 437 of the dead were footballers. FIFA & UEFA continue to allow settlement clubs (which are on illegally occupied land & bar access to Palestinians) to participate in UEFA competitions

From @wired.com: “Federal records reveal ICE is secretly expanding into 150+ facilities across nearly every state — many near schools, medical offices, and places of worship… DHS asked the General Services Administration to hide lease listings and bypass normal procedures…”🤔

Applied for NSF SBE to support in-person training program for grad students who will be doing fieldwork in conflict-affected spaces. So: people skills. Advanced methods for working w/ vulnerable populations.

Part of the feedback was that we should incorporate AI.

Visiting Fellows Our visiting fellows program welcomes leaders from diverse sectors — including civil society, government, industry, media, and the arts. Learn more.

Knowing that a lot of fantastic, dedicated journalists in DC are looking for opportunities: JHU's Agora Institute has a call out for Visiting Fellows. The 2026-27 theme is Democracy and the Media.

It's nonresident & carries a modest stipend (unfortunately no benefits). It's open to practitioners.

Join The 51st The 51st is a worker-led nonprofit news source for D.C. Our reporting is rooted in our conviction that local journalism is meant to make people’s lives better — no paywalls, ever. But that's only…

6/ The Post has lost over 375,000 subscribers in just over a year. If 10% of those readers subscribed to The 51st instead, we could hire 10 reporters and five editors, dramatically scaling our coverage of the city at this critical time. 51st.news/signup

"Why Women Rebel"