REGIONAL EYE

Islam and the World

Are terrorist attacks and suicide bombings a betrayal of Islamic teaching? Is the world truly enduring a "clash of civilizations?" Are the world’s one billion Muslims a monolithic community, or is the diversity of Muslim life the key to understanding Islam’s future?

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Arab Justice for Arab Violence

Aryeh Neier Series: Islam

2012-01-17

For months now, it has been clear that no peaceful, even satisfactory, resolution of the conflict in Syria is possible without external intervention. One way to intervene with the aim of securing legitimacy and minimizing further bloodshed would be for the Arab League to establish a tribunal modeled on the International Criminal Court.... read

Comments: 1 Recommended: 0 Read: 6781

What do Arabs Want?

Mansoor Moaddel Series: Islam

2012-01-04

What values are driving the movements that have come to be know as the Arab Spring, and what kind of change do their adherents want? A series of surveys in the Arab world last summer highlights some significant shifts in public opinion.... read

Comments: 5 Recommended: 0 Read: 11636

Iran’s Rattling Saber

Mehdi Khalaji Series: Islam

2011-11-30

As the West ratchets up its economic pressure on Iran to halt its drive to develop nuclear weapons, the Islamic Republic’s rulers are not sitting idly by. Since Iran lacks the soft power and the economic capacity to counter Western pressure, its leaders will resort to threats, and even to force, as the recent attack on the British embassy in Tehran shows.... read

Comments: 6 Recommended: 0 Read: 8897

Turkey’s “Zero Problems” Problem

Sinan Ulgen Series: Islam

2011-11-15

Until the onset of the Arab Spring, Turkey's “zero problems with neighbors” policy meant zero problems with the established autocratic regimes of the Middle East. But, in an increasingly unpredictable environment, Turkey will have to redefine what it means to be a good neighbor.... read

Comments: 1 Recommended: 0 Read: 9551

The Domestic Logic of Iran’s Foreign Plots

Mehdi Khalaji Series: Islam

2011-11-01

Though Saudi Ambassador Adel al-Jubeir is alive and well in Washington, the plot to assassinate him may have succeeded – if its aim was not to kill al-Jubeir, but rather President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s foreign policy. Indeed, the real target may have been Ahmadinejad's efforts to achieve a diplomatic opening with the US.... read

Comments: 2 Recommended: 0 Read: 11708

Qatar’s Source of Arab Springs

Khaled Hroub Series: Islam

2011-10-18

Al Jazeera is not a tool of the CIA, Israel, or Al Qaeda. Rather, it is the sophisticated mouthpiece of the state of Qatar and its ambitious Emir, Hamad Al Thani, for whom the station is integral to the national “branding” of Qatar and its foreign-policy aspirations.... read

Comments: 3 Recommended: 1 Read: 15190

Gaza Shrugs

Mkhaimar Abusada Series: Islam

2011-09-27

Palestine President Mahmoud Abbas has now personally presented the Palestinian bid for full UN membership to Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon. What remains to be seen is whether Hamas, which has controlled the Gaza Strip since June 2007, will eventually support this initiative by its bitter rival, Abbas’s Palestinian Authority.... read

Comments: 2 Recommended: 0 Read: 11960

Saudi Arabia’s Decade of Denial

Mai Yamani Series: Islam

2011-09-07

Ten years after the 9/11 attacks, Al Qaeda has been marginalized, but not by Saudi Arabia, which nurtured the terrorists, or by the US, which waged wars against Bin Laden and his acolytes. Instead, it has been eviscerated by the courage and dignity of ordinary Arabs from Damascus to Tripoli.... read

Comments: 1 Recommended: 0 Read: 10594

Saudi Arabia vs. the Arab Spring

Bernard Haykel Series: Islam

2011-08-16

Saudi Arabia is widely perceived as leading the counter-revolution against the Arab Spring uprisings. In reality, the Kingdom’s response is centered, as its foreign and domestic policy has long been, on “stability.”... read

Comments: 2 Recommended: 0 Read: 22010

The Struggle for Syria	Ribal Al- Assad
As the violence in Syria mounts, the international community’s paralysis has become increasingly jarring. But the role of external regional forces is almost as important in fueling the domestic bloodshed as what is happening internally.... read

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The Battle for Bahrain

Barak Barfi Series: Islam

2011-02-22

Change may be coming to much of the Middle East. But, with Bahrain’s social fault lines too wide to bridge, the regime willing to resort to brutal violence to crush any uprising, and the international community prepared to look the other way, the protesters in Manama should be prepared for defeat.... read

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Morocco’s Veiled Feminists

Fatima Sadiqi Series: Islam

2006-05-25

It is often assumed that modern feminism has no place, and thus can make little headway, in societies undergoing a religious revival, particularly in the Islamic world. But the real progress made in recent years on women’s rights in Morocco suggests otherwise: a unique combination of activism by secular and religious women, the calculations of political parties, and a significant role for the King has led to real progress.... read

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Islam’s Forsaken Renaissance

Mahathir bin Mohamad Series: Islam

2005-11-07

Children often play a game where they sit in a circle. One whispers something to his neighbor, who then whispers that information to the next child, and so on, around the circle. By the time the last child whispers the information to the first, it is totally different from what was originally said.... read

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Kuwait’s Parliamentary Revolution

Mai Yamani Series: Islam

2006-02-01

The world has been transfixed by the victory of Hamas in the Palestinian election. But a different assertion of democratic and parliamentary power, this time in the Gulf sheikdom of Kuwait, which possesses 10% of world oil reserves, may prove to be equally important. Every sign indicates that the wave of democratization in Kuwait is irreversible, and the impact of these changes extends beyond Kuwait to all the other oil-rich Gulf countries, which are also ruled by emirs and sheikhs. ... read

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Islam as a Tool of Modernization

Kee Beng Ooi Series: Islam

2005-08-31

A big worry in Iraq and the wider Middle East is that Islam and modernization are enemies. But Malaysian history over the past three decades shows that this belief is mistaken. In fact, Islamization has proved to be an effective political means of reconciling the majority of Malays to the country’s rapid economic development.... read

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Jihad or Murder?

Abdou Filali-Ansary Series: Islam

2005-07-28

It is remarkable that some of the most critical concepts of Muslim religious terminology have now become part of the international language of current affairs. Questions drawn from Islamic theology are discussed freely by the world public, engaging specialists and non-specialists, Muslims and non-Muslims. Theological disputation has moved far from Islam’s religious academies.... read

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Engaging the Islamists

Saad Eddin Ibrahim Series: Islam

2006-02-07

The massive victory of Hamas in the Palestinian parliamentary elections stunned much of the world, but the outcome should not have been so surprising. Indeed, Hamas’s moment of triumph is part of a growing regional pattern. ... read

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The Hamas Earthquake

Mkhaimar Abusada Series: Islam

2006-01-28

Hamas’s crushing defeat of Fatah in this week’s elections brings the Palestinian people to a crossroads. An Islamist political party that previously abstained from national politics and rejects Fatah’s policy of negotiations with Israel, is now in charge in Palestine. ... read

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The Hour of Hamas

Mkhaimar Abusada Series: Islam

2005-09-07

Israel’s unilateral withdrawal from all 21 Gaza settlements and four in the West Bank has created a new reality for Palestinians. How the Palestinians choose to respond to these changed circumstances may well determine whether or not they at last achieve an independent state. So this moment may prove to be the Palestinians’ greatest opportunity. Or, in the words of Abba Eban, it may be yet another opportunity to miss an opportunity. How the Palestinians respond depends largely on how the Palestinian body politic deals with the growing power of Palestinian Islamic movements, which undoubtedly expect a significant share of power in post-withdrawal Gaza. Will armed groups resume their fight against Israel, or will the Palestinian Authority act to defuse or combat the attacks? To what degree are Fatah, the secular movement controlled by Palestine President Abbas, and the Islamist Hamas ready to reach an understanding about how to proceed after the disengagement?... read

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The Error of the War on Terror	George Soros
Israel’s failure to subdue Hezbollah demonstrates the many weaknesses of the war-on-terror concept. One weakness is that even if the targets are terrorists, the victims are often innocent civilians, and their suffering reinforces the terrorist cause. ... read
The Return of the Radicals in Iran	Jack A. Goldstone
Twenty-six years after the Islamic Revolution, just when the West had expected Iran to settle down and become more pragmatic, the regime of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad seems to have lurched back toward radicalism. By looking at earlier revolutions, we can perhaps come to understand what is happening in Iran, for recent events there have clear historical precedents.... read

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REGIONAL EYE

Islam and the World

Arab Justice for Arab Violence

What do Arabs Want?

Iran’s Rattling Saber

Turkey’s “Zero Problems” Problem

The Domestic Logic of Iran’s Foreign Plots

Qatar’s Source of Arab Springs

Gaza Shrugs

Saudi Arabia’s Decade of Denial

Saudi Arabia vs. the Arab Spring

The Battle for Bahrain

Morocco’s Veiled Feminists

Islam’s Forsaken Renaissance

Kuwait’s Parliamentary Revolution

Islam as a Tool of Modernization

Jihad or Murder?

Engaging the Islamists

The Hamas Earthquake

The Hour of Hamas

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