The Mindless Menace of Violence in the Muslim World

December 29, 2007 – 2:18 am

One more act of senseless violence greets us in the Muslim world this week. One more suicide bomber or assassin, or whatever we can call them these days, kills others and himself in a moment of premeditated madness.

The assassination of Benazir Bhutto is tragic. There can be no doubt about that. But what shocks me today, as I am shocked on a daily basis with the stream of murders and suicides in Pakistan, Iraq, Lebanon, Turkey, and so many other countries is this nagging question: Where on earth do they find them?? Where on earth do the plotters and schemers find so many willing men and women of young age to mould into their insane vision of the world? How did those who planned this latest act of violence stumble upon this latest specimen of misguided fervour and convince him (at least it seems to be a him at the time of writing) to go and end his life by assassinating a mother of three children. How did they get through to this guy? And more importantly, why is it so goddamn easy to find self-terminating assassins in our region?

I am outraged as I was outraged on the day I witnessed the mothers, fathers and grandfathers grieving for their loved ones in an Amman hospital after the massacres of the inverted 9/11 (in Jordan, it was 11/9 if one follows the American date method, and proof that the killers and blood suckers infesting our region have a rather bizarre and morbid sense of humour that, I guess, makes some weird sense to the lunatics in our midst).

I am as outraged as I was in the summer of 2005 when a bunch of lunatics in Sharm El Sheikh drove their bomb-laden cars into a crowd of underpaid workers who apparently were not allowed the simple pleasure of a cup of coffee at the end of a long working day.

I am outraged as I was when I heard this last summer that a Jordanian Neurosurgeon thought that the best way to make use of his years of study and research is to go and bomb the world and all that is in it outside the Tiger Tiger club in Piccadilly.

Now, some of the readers will say: “Oh, come on, that’s not totally accurate; you are comparing the murders of innocent civilians with a targeted assassination of a leader who some Pakistanis discredit … etc.” But that is not the point. Read More »

By Nasser Ali Khasawneh | Posted in Columnist, Current Affairs, Religion, islam, south asia, terrorism | Comments (15)

The Oil and the Glory: A Review

December 26, 2007 – 3:00 am

This is a review of Steve LeVine’s The Oil and the Glory: The Pursuit of Empire and Fortune on the Caspian Sea. Random House. 2007.

Steve LeVine has worked as a freelance journalist for The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, The Washington Post, Financial Times, and Newsweek - in places such as the former Soviet Union, Pakistan, and the Philippines. Drawing on his considerable journalistic experience, he sets out to chronicle the history of the Caspian Sea.

Different characters intersect in the book: Nobel family of Sweden, American middlemen acting on behalf of the Soviet Union to make deals with American and British petroleum companies, oil executives begging their government to pressure Soviet leaders to allow drilling, and Central Asian leaders resisting pressure from Moscow to allow Moscow-supported companies to open the oil fields.

However, the central character of the book is oil. It is, perhaps, the only thing (after changes in regimes in ex-Soviet Union republics) that makes Moscow so determined to reclaim its influence in Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan, even threatening the destructions of oil drilling sites in these countries if they do not seek the opinion of Moscow before signing deals with Western companies.

LeVine describes Russia as a troublemaker, which has tried to use pipelines built in the Soviet era as leverage to force its former colonies to submit to the former master. However, the Russian attempt to rebuild influence is contained by the Clinton administration, whose policy on Caspian Sea and oil in Central Asia was shaped by Rosemarie Forsythe - who served as the Director of Russian, Ukrainian and Eurasian Affairs of the National Security Council, and Bill White- the Deputy Secretary of Energy.

The struggle between Russia and the United States for more influence in Central Asia is familiarized by the invocation of the struggle between Britain and Russia in the nineteenth century, when both sides were lobbying Iran, Armenia and Azerbaijan to consolidate the supply of oil to the West or to the Russian empire. The competition between two superpowers is a re-play of an old game. It is only natural for Russia to struggle to secure its backyards against the ex-colonies, who are full of hatred on Moscow due to forced abandonment of nomadic lives and migration imposed by Stalin and subsequent leaders and are therefore siding with another major power in the world, LeVine argues.

LeVine questions whether the United States is genuinely interested in bringing freedom and democracy to the region, and whether it is interested in actually monitoring the business practices of American oil firms in Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan. He believes that the United States helped mobilize support for pro-Western politicians to launch the “color revolutions” in Ukraine and Georgia to overthrow pro-Russia governments. However, when it comes to pro-America allies in Central Asia, the commitment to expanding freedom and democracy becomes secondary to strategic interests, LeVine argues. The book exposes the common practice of paying bribes to despotic leaders in the newly independent republics. Yet the book also urges readers to re-examine what constitutes corruption: Should lobbying of American oil companies such as Chevron and Exxon and Mobil in the Congress and Senate on behalf of Azerbaijan or Kazakhstan be considered as offering bribes to Baku and Almaty?

The book relies on several hundred interviews conducted between 1992 and 2007, as well as autobiographical writings of key political players from the United States, the Soviet Union and ex-Soviet republics. The combination of these primary sources provides first-hand views of officials and businessmen going about their deals, and offering their opinions of the future of the Caspian Sea. However, the lack of sources originating in Russian and Central Asian languages greatly limits LeVine’s scope.

On the whole, the book illustrates the history and importance of Caspian Sea through a series of dramas whose character include oilmen, dictatorial leaders of ex-Soviet republics, Russian politicians who have tried to maintain their influence among their neighbors, and government officials of the United States who have worked to expand their influence in the region since the collapse of the communist party in Moscow. The result is the fascinating account of the region, a region which will continue to become increasingly crucial when it comes to the global supply of oil.

By Jonathan Mok | Posted in Arts & Literature, book reviews, central asia | Comments (1)

Our Culture

December 26, 2007 – 2:30 am

I don’t know if it’s human tendency or just human laziness to sum up a socio-cultural period in a few basic concepts, which may or may not represent the whole. But it sure as hell is human something. We do it, and I doubt our kids will be any different.

In America, a relatively new country, we have had our share of major recent events; it has been quite a chapter in our collective history. Like every other generation, ours has been both battered and lifted up by the tides of time. It’s really quite a story, when you think about it. But that’s for the history books. When my kids look back at my generation, what will they see? Will they see a tattered, burning, but remarkably intact banner flapping in the high winds of the past?

Nope.

When we look at previous generations, we consider a few things: how they dressed, how they talked, what was cool, and what they liked. And usually, we laugh about it. Will our children laugh, do you think? Will they fail to understand our times and circumstances, and remember only the silly things?

Nope, again. They’ll probably get it right, and still find us freaking hilarious. Or, at least, yours will. The first time my kids give me some lip, I’m putting all their toys in a box in the front yard. The box will say: “Joseph Jr.’s Free Stuff! Please Take and Enjoy!” I’ll also only refer to my children as “Mouth to Feed” or “Tax Write-off” until they bring me the pelt of a lion they’ve slain with their bare hands. I want to set high standards.

But that isn’t really my point. My point is, what will future generations remember about this particular decade?

How we dress: From what I can tell – which might not be very much – there are two schools of fashion right now. There’s the Retro camp, where you wear clothes that seem to say “I jumped Marty McFly, stole the De Lorian, and drove it to a dumpster from the early 1980’s”: Read More »

By Joe Hormes | Posted in Entertainment, humor | Comments (1)

Looking Back At Us

December 22, 2007 – 3:21 am

For Kaouther

Arms brighter than the light of a long summer day,
breasts and hair to the taste of Hannibal,
ginger, hale, and supple.

“Has she no part in you, your mother?” I used to wonder aloud.

“Only where you cannot see it,” she would reply dryly while adding: “I do not wear her on the outside.”*

We would then kiss. Or rather Kaouther would kiss me. I, turning deftly, would offer the other cheek to suffer osculation.

Then she would sit and wait in silence. “O, Fool, enough! She is waiting. But what for?” I used to ask myself.

Until one day, Kaouther decided to love me while whispering in my left ear: “You must honor my offer, otherwise. . . .” A gesture, intimate and unthinking, that sealed our fate for the summer. I savored her offer then and there, but only for a brief moment, for I desperately wanted to prolong the pleasure of her visits to my house. Then, on a breezy summer afternoon when everyone was having a siesta, I sensed her arriving. Sweet and wholesome as a carrot, Kaouther bloomed out of a crowd, her nearness, like a miner’s light, going before her. Precocious mistress of the idiom of the Berber language. Virgil thought love a native of the rocks. Or did he? I, however, speak of love, not Eros, born in innocence among the tiny pearls of couscous Kaouther’s mother and the other women made for my family each summer in the High Atlas, while Kaouther and I, even we, shared events, confidences, and embraces, half-undoing months of absence. And from that day we grew up. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Arts & Literature, poetry | Comments (1)

The Death Penalty Staggers

December 18, 2007 – 2:35 am

The tide has turned against capital punishment in America.

The New Jersey legislature abolished its death penalty last week after years of moratorium and state-commissioned study. New York’s death penalty has been paralyzed by its courts and left for dead by its legislature – its death row shut down last month. Maryland came close this year to passing repeal legislation, and succeed in the next legislative session. An abolition bill passed the senate in Montana earlier this year, and the state of Nebraska came within one vote. In the meantime, with the protocols of lethal injection currently frozen under scrutiny by the Supreme Court, the country has not gone this long without a single execution in decades.

But all of this is happening not because the American populace has experienced some sort of moral rebirth, like a cowboy learning mercy. No, the new discomfort with executions actually has little to do with the ethics of crime and punishment. Rather it has everything to do with whether the death penalty works – and, if it doesn’t work, whether it’s actually dangerous and harmful to those whom the justice system is meant to protect.

Indeed, a majority of Americans still believe that our worst criminals deserve to be put to death. But when asked whether in practice it might be better to simply send them away for a life in prison, a slim but growing majority of Americans prefer this simpler, more consistent version of justice. And a large majority support a moratorium on executions.

The primary reason for this sea change is the alarming streak of exonerations that rippled throughout our justice system after the advent of DNA testing decades ago. Over 200 people have been exonerated by DNA evidence that proved their innocence. And as of this writing, 124 people have been exonerated from death rows in 25 states.

Their stories are shocking: forced false confessions, eyewitness misidentification, prosecutorial misconduct, incompetent or fraudulent forensic analysis. Some of these failures occur due to people with great power, under great pressure, doing bad things; some of it is just due to plain old (and inevitable) human error. But regardless of why, it is clear to many that if our justice system can go this wrong, we can’t allow it to continue as is – especially not with the irreversible act of execution.

A broken system

Behind the spectre of wrongful execution, many other reasons to abandon capital punishment pile up. So many that the American Bar Association called for a moratorium this year.

The death penalty is arbitrary – a given state will likely see the vast majority of its capital sentences come from a tiny minority of its counties. Crimes of similar magnitude will receive different sentences depending on any number of external factors.

The death penalty is biased – almost all of the people who typically receive the death penalty are dirt poor, and often mentally unstable. Crimes of the same magnitude committed by persons with the resources to get a good lawyer typically do not result in death sentences. Crimes in which the victim was black almost never result in death sentences.

The death penalty is harmful to family members of victims of crime, who must endure years, even decades of entanglement with the legal system as the case winds the long road from sentencing to execution.

Last and perhaps least is the cost of the death penalty: counterintuitively, a capital case costs the state many times more than a life in prison. With innocent people being exonerated from death row every year, who could suggest that the justice system cut more corners to make the trial process cheaper? Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Current Affairs, death penalty, human rights, north america | Comments (1)

The Muslim Love Affair with Autocracies

December 13, 2007 – 1:47 am

While the world moves ahead with democratization, the Muslim world moonwalks like Michael Jackson back into authoritarianism.

The Facts:

In the third wave of global democratization that occurred during and especially after the decline of the Soviet Union the only civilization that resisted the trend is the Islamic world. The figures are particularly embarrassing; “since 1974 the absolute number of democracies in the world has nearly tripled, while the percentage of the world’s states that are democratic has doubled.” (1) Even in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union “the number of democracies has gone from none to 19, or 70 percent of the 27 states. In Latin America and the Caribbean, 30 of the 33 states are democracies… In Asia… the number of democracies has increased from 5 in 1974 to 12 in 2002, or about half of the 25 states… Even in Sub-Saharan Africa, which came late to the third wave, the number of democracies has increased from 3 to 19, about two-fifths of the 48 states.” (1)

Where as the number of democratic Muslim countries is a paltry 7 out of 43. And this includes countries with minimal (read: dubious!) democratic credentials like “Bangladesh, Mali, Niger, Senegal, Indonesia, Turkey and Albania” (1). The case of Middle Eastern countries is particularly shameful; there were 3 democracies in 1974 – Israel, Turkey and Lebanon. Now only the former two remain and even Turkey has had military interventions in various regimes over the years.

On the 7 point Freedom House scale where 7 is the least free and 1 is the most, Muslim countries have the unenviable position of ranking last. Furthermore the Muslim world is the only “region” of the world to have become less free since 1974 – its rating fell from 5.29 to 5.33. Back in my day as a Muslim youth I experienced first hand the rampant corruption and the draconic curbs on political participation and freedoms. As a troubled patriot, the childish panacea of our humiliating condition was always the thought that we were better off than someone else. In this case Africa, but sadly not even that is true any more! Sub-Saharan Africa is now ranked at 4.33, up from 5.51 in 1974, which means it is freer than the Muslim world!

I feel baptized in the waters of a shameful reality. Don’t you?

You can check the latest Freedom House ratings of individual countries here.

The Theories:

While these statistics are damning, unfriendly critics of Islam and the Muslim world derive over-arching, anti-Islamic social theories from them to suit their own political agendas. But their theories have major anomalies and discrepancies; of the 27 non-Arab Muslim countries, roughly a quarter of them are democracies. A closer examination of these democracies shows an unusual occurrence; the level of economic development usually thought to be necessary to sustain democracy is not yet achieved. Therefore these democracies are what we call “electoral overachievers” (1). Somehow I have the faintest suspicion that the Muslim world might not erupt onto the streets in jubilation at these statistics. Read More »

By Feature Writer | Posted in Religion, Society, human rights, humor, islam | Comments (7)

Dirty Old Men

December 10, 2007 – 12:58 am

This article was originally published in Jordan’s Living Well magazine

How could I not write about this? Would I let this one pass and be able to live with myself? You know me too well by now. This is too classic to let go of.

You see, Arabs and Muslims have solved all their intractable problems. They live in peace with each other and in harmony with the rest of the world. Poverty and illiteracy are things of the past. Unprecedented economic prosperity is coupled with an individual drive for scientific innovation that dwarves all the inventions of Thomas Edison and Leonardo Da Vinci combined.

Our universities are oozing with hordes of promising generations, our factories are exporting marvels to the world, our theatres are beaming with cultural talent, and our cities are virtual gardens of earthly delights. Foreigners are queuing at our embassies begging us to live in our midst. The new UNDP report is composed of only one paragraph that describes us as a perfect people.

We’ve conquered life and grabbed our destiny by the balls, and we have become a model for all nations to emulate.

But there is one lingering problem that we are yet to overcome before we herald the inauguration of heaven on earth. Our men and women are mixing at the work place, and this blasphemy is abominable in the eyes of God; it may actually threaten to destroy everything we have achieved so far. But Dr. Izzat Atiyeh, the Chief of the Hadeeth Department at the Azhar University, would not sleep at night before unearthing a way to deliver us from evil. From his influential post at the Vatican of the Muslim world, salvation would be rendered. Rejoice, for redemption is forthcoming.

You may be familiar with this story already, but it deserves a retrospective look. Read More »

By Zaid Nabulsi | Posted in Columnist, Religion, humor, islam | Comments (6)

Electrical Hammers and Unholy Ninjas: The Diary of One Gamer

December 10, 2007 – 12:57 am

I’m terrified of video games. I feel them too much.

They stress me out, they scare me, they show me the several million different ways in which I could die. I’ve seen so much bloodshed, so much explosive chaos that ends in ‘Game over,’ that I’m just not sure I can take it anymore. My hands shake when I try to eat.

Whenever I see a commercial for a new game on TV, I have flashbacks.

When I come to, I find myself threatening family members with the neck of a broken bottle, screaming things like “I’m wearing level 48 armor and an invisibility cape! Nobody come near me!”

This has been the subject of several family conferences, but I’ve been trying to find different ways to cope, and the one that has worked best has been a diary. It’s not the “manliest” thing in the world. It’s certainly not something that would convince girls that I’m “the one.” It might even be the sort of thing that causes other guys to “shove my head in a toilet,” and “pee in my shoes,” and then make me “wear my pee-shoes around all day.” You know, hypothetically. Anyway, let me show you some of what I’ve written.

Entry 1

0800 hours. My eyes are darting all over the screen. Lights and sounds assault at me at several hundred miles a minute, and I find myself envying the epileptics that get to have a seizure and just get the business over with. I’m pretty sure this is what it feels like to either be an anime character, or take heroin.

Ever hear of a game called “Splinter Cell”? It’s somewhat older, and the basic premise is as follows: you control a spy that has to sneak around in the shadows, gathering intelligence and silently killing a series of malcontents planning some rather seedy crap. The key in this game is to creep silently and slaughter stealthily, without getting detected.

When I play, I try to do the things I’m supposed to do, but my sneaking isn’t terribly sneaky – guards catch me all the time. They greet me with search lights and high caliber weapons (but once, just once, I wish it would be a surprise party). You know, sometimes, while going around a corner, I’ll pause the game just so I can wipe my hands on my jeans/the tears out of my eyes. But I have to press on. But I can’t press on. My bladder hurts.

The guy on the screen didn’t sign up for all of this! I think to myself. He’s just waiting for me to give him commands, but I’ve frozen up. The chain of command hasn’t just been broken, it’s been dipped in liquid nitrogen and drunkenly thrown against the neighbor’s garage. He creeps forward, and suddenly it’s carnage on the screen; my man looks like a straw that sky-dove right into the middle of a fireworks extravaganza. He might be digital, but I feel for him. All he wanted was to serve the stars and stripes. Every time I touch that controller, another good, 128-bit man dies. I imagine I feel the same way that many seasoned generals do: guilty, haunted by my mistakes, and sort of wanting to write a book about myself.

Entry 2

I’m in combat for 20 minutes – or maybe 20 years. I just can’t tell anymore. Time seems to shrink and dilate. I don’t measure time in minutes anymore, but rather in game deaths – by the hundreds. I’m playing “Halo 3″ online, and while I believe the good Lord made me to do many things, such as taking my shirt off for the ladies, he definitely didn’t make me for this. Read More »

By Joe Hormes | Posted in Entertainment, Science & Technology, humor | Comments (1)

The American Muslim Teenager’s Handbook

December 5, 2007 – 1:11 am

Continuing this week’s tradition of cool interviews, I bring you a conversation with Dilara Hafiz, one of the authors behind The American Muslim Teenager’s Handbook, a recent publication that has received praise from the likes of Reza Aslan. This book was a family effort: Dilara co-authored with her son and daughter, Imran and Yasmine Hafiz.

Natalia: When did you first get the idea for this book? Did anything in particular spur you on?

Dilara: First of all, my teenage daughter was browsing in a bookstore and found lots of books for Christian, Jewish, Buddhist youth, even Wiccan youth, but nothing for Muslim teens. Also, my son’s classmates at school taunted him and said that he was in the Taliban - but they basically didn’t understand what the difference between Muslim and Taliban was.

Life as a Muslim in post 9/11 America is challenging to say the least! It’s an uphill battle to counter the stereotypes perpetuated by a xenophobic media whilst simultaneously countering the narrow, intolerant version of Islam perpetuated by some fanatical Muslims and mosques in America! My family decided to take some positive steps to make sure our voice, the voice of Moderate Muslims, was heard - we decided to write a book - entertaining, educational, and empowering for Muslims and non-Muslims alike. Hence The American Muslim Teenager’s Handbook was born. Librarians and educators have welcomed it as a much needed resource to combat ignorance & shatter stereotypes about Muslims in the West.

Natalia: Was it difficult to write such a book? What was the creative process like?

Dilara: We first sent out a survey in 2002 to over 40 Islamic schools in America to assess teen viewpoints on various issues including: the 5 pillars of Islam, role-models, culture clash, life in post 9/11 America etc. Over 150 responses are included in our book to show the diversity of Muslims in America.

We covered as many important issues as we came up with - we worked on several chapters simultaneously, we all wrote, edited, discussed, and then re-wrote passages - it’s not easy to get 3 different people to agree! But we offer the mainstream, moderate viewpoint without, judging anyone. We always encourage dialogue, further study into Islam, inter-faith dialogue, and so on.

We start each chapter with a verse from the Quran, which is the starting point for the serious discussion, followed by a more modern way of incorporating the lesson of the verse into your daily life. Each chapter also contains a more light-hearted, ‘fun’ element, - either a quiz, list, do’s & don’t’s, etc. It took us from 2003-2006 to actually write the book, then another year for graphic design, layout, editing, and publishing. Read More »

By Natalia Antonova | Posted in Arts & Literature, Religion, books, islam, north america | Comments (9)

Power, Faith, and Fantasy: A Review

December 4, 2007 – 2:30 am

This is a review of Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East 1776 to the Present by Michael Oren. W.W. Norton, 2007

It is believed that America only began to get involved in the affairs of the Middle East after the Suez Crisis in 1956, which caused the decline of the influence of the British in the region. For most people, America intensified its influence after the Yom Kippur war, when Richard Nixon agreed to export American weapons to help Israel defeat Egypt and Syria.

Michael Oren has some different ideas wherein America’s role in the region is concerned. Oren is a historian and author whose latest book aims to help readers understand the motives driving American politicians, Christian leaders, and members of the media, to get involved in Middle Eastern affairs. He also concerns himself with the eternal question of whether or not American involvement is positive or negative.

Modern scholars suggest that the first direct conflict between America and the Islamic world, barring the Hizbollah attack that killed 240 American troops in 1983, was the attack against Saddam Hussein in 1993. Oren challenges this notion. The first conflict between the two civilizations took place from 1776-1815, he asserts. Barbary pirates from Morocco, Libya, and Algeria attacked American business ships and held sailors captive. Oren believes that the decision of James Madison to send dispatches to attack ports in North Africa affirmed American status as a global power. Success in stopping the attacks also boosted American confidence in using force to protect overseas commerce, Oren claims.

The book also rebukes what Oren calls “the myth of the Israel lobby”, which has become a much-debated issue. Oren believes that the American support for Israel is not simply tied to Jewish lobbies, which have been accused of using millions of dollars to influence Washington D.C to establish a pro-Israel policy. Neither, he says, is America pro-Israel due to the work of John Hagee, Pat Roberston, and other right-wing Christians.

The influences of the above preachers and lobbyists are real and cannot be ignored. Yet Oren ultimately offers a different explanation for the seemingly unconditional American support to the Jewish state: which is what Oren describes as a grown-up, realist view of the right of Israel to exist, stemming from American desire to protect Jews from persecution following the pogroms and the Holocaust.

Oren also suggests that the Arab attacks against Jews, militarily or rhetorical, further serve Israeli interests on the ground. Arab assaults, Oren says, are portrayed as a fundamentalist Islamic jihad against people of different faiths and civilizations, creating an image of Arabs as a people who do not desire peace.

Oren only devotes one section to the history of American attachment to the Middle East after the Second World War. He focuses on a general interpretation on the nature of the U.S - Middle East relations. He is right to predict that the United States will have much more challenges ahead, especially from Iran, as well as the al-Qaeda terrorist network. Overall, Oren finds years of American involvement positive in that modern education and health care are funded and/or encouraged in the region, and in the belief that America is a nation that strives for peace and security for the Middle East.

Praise for America’s good intentions is obviously Oren’s most controversial statement. America’s intentions may be as good as Oren claims, but so far, the results are rather mixed (as evidenced by poor political, economical, and educational conditions in many Muslim countries); Oren could have done a better job addressing the present situation.

This book drew upon a wealth of materials from various archives and literature. However, these materials were all written in English, which may have limited the author’s scope. In addition, the book suffers from a lack of source materials on more recent events. Oren claims that it would have been difficult to obtain diverse resources, but the book would provide a more multi-dimensional view of how people in the Middle East perceive American involvement if at least secondhand resources in French, Arabic, or Hebrew were consulted.

Despite such shortcomings, my ultimate pronouncement is that this book is terrific. It is a must-read manual for diplomats and peacemakers who have been puzzled by the “seemingly irrational actions” successive American governments have displayed when Israel-related issues appear at the UN Security Council. It provides a great deal of explanations for the continuous American vetoes on resolutions demanding Israeli withdrawal from West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem.

Oren’s highlighting of the fact that American involvement in the Middle East can be traced back to 1776 is by itself an invaluable reminder of how short our memory can be wherein American foreign policy is concerned. People interested in a refresher course would do well to pick up Oren’s book.

By Jonathan Mok | Posted in Arts & Literature, book reviews, christianity, islam, middle east, north america | Comments (1)