Middle East Quarterly articles from September 2000

Middle East Quarterly archives from September 2000

Will Bashshar al-Asad Last?(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... The first week of June 2000 found Damascus bustling with activity in preparation for the Ba`th Party congress opening on June 17. That was no ordinary party conclave but the first in fifteen years and the occasion for the planned investiture of...

Israel's Security Zone in Lebanon--A "Tragedy"?(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... In the midst of Israel's election campaign in 1999, then-prime ministerial candidate Ehud Barak pledged to "bring the boys home" within one year of the inauguration of his government. And he did just that. On May 24, 2000, Israel completed its...

"We Don't Need Syria in Lebanon".(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... Syrian forces first entered Lebanon in July 1976; nearly a quarter-century later, they are ensconced there as firmly as ever. Does this mean they will be there for the indefinite future? Or do recent events point to their possible expulsion and...

The Palestinian Predicament in Lebanon.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... What to do with the Palestinian refugees has been a core issue the Arab-Israeli conflict since 1948. And of all the countries hosting Palestinians, Lebanon probably confronts the most sensitive and serious problems. Lebanese authorities...

Internet Myths in the Levant.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... An impressive array of analysts are predicting that Internet-based technologies will change Middle Eastern politics. Thomas L. Friedman of The New York Times asserts that Middle Easterners today are bypassing government surveillance via the...

Afghanistan: As Bad as Its Reputation?(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... Only Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates (and the breakaway Chechen government) recognize the Taliban state, but the self-styled Islamic Emirate is a fact of life. Taliban rule began in 1994, when students from madrasas...

Taslima Nasrin: "They Wanted to Kill Me".(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... Born into a middle-class Muslim family in the town of Mymensingh in north Bangladesh in 1962, Taslima Nasrin received a liberal education. She studied medicine and received her degree at the age of 23, when she began working as a doctor in the...

Al-Quds: The Place of Jerusalem in Classical Judaic and Islamic Traditions.(Brief Article)(Review)
September 1, 2000... Al-Quds: The Place of Jerusalem in Classical Judaic and Islamic Traditions. By Mohammed Abdul Hameed Al-Khateeb. London: Ta-Ha, 1419/1998. 213 pp. 4.95 [pounds sterling]. Al-Khateeb, in a typical example of Islamist pseudo-scholarship,...

Ambiguity, Coping and Governance: Israeli Experiences in Politics, Religion and Policymaking.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Ambiguity, Coping and Governance: Israeli Experiences in Politics, Religion and Policymaking. By Ira Sharkansky. Westport, Conn.: Praeger, 1999. 217 pp. $59.95. "Creative ambiguity" has become one of the buzz-words of the Arab-Israeli...

The Breakdown of the State in Lebanon, 1967-1976.(Review)
September 1, 2000... The Breakdown of the State in Lebanon, 1967-1976. By Farid el Khazen. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2000. 432 pp. $49.95. The Lebanese war that began in 1975 has been massively studied but el Khazen breaks new ground by...

Constructing Boundaries: Jewish and Arab Workers in Mandatory Palestine.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Constructing Boundaries: Jewish and Arab Workers in Mandatory Palestine. By Deborah Bernstein. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2000. 277 pp. $71.50. It would seem obvious that Arabs and Jews formed separate communities in...

Economic Crisis and the Politics of Reform in Egypt.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Economic Crisis and the Politics of Reform in Egypt. By Ray Bush. Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press, 1999. 184 pp. $55. Protests in recent months against the international economic institutions--the World Trade Organization, the World Bank,...

Let's Go Middle East 2000.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Let's Go Middle East 2000. Edited by Zahr Said. New York: St. Martin's Press, 2000. 719 pp. $22.99. A new title in the Let's Go series of student-oriented travel guides, Middle East 2000 offers an original vantage point on the region's...

Rebels With A Cause: The Failure of the Left in Iran.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Rebels With A Cause: The Failure of the Left in Iran. By Maziar Behrooz. London: I.B. Tauris, 1999.239 pp. $55. The political left in Iran has long played an active though not very effective role in Iranian politics, through such...

Revisiting the Yom Kippur War.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Revisiting the Yom Kippur War. Edited by P.R. Kumaraswamy. London: Frank Cass, 2000. 249 pp. $45. (paper, $24.50). At the conclusion of the October 1973 war with Egypt and Syria, Israel's forces stood on the west bank of the Suez with very...

Russia and the Middle East: Towards a New Foreign Policy.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Russia and the Middle East: Towards a New Foreign Policy. By Talal Nizameddin. New York, N.Y.: St. Martin's Press, 1999. 296 pp. $49.95. Nizameddin, in a book based on his doctoral dissertation at the University of London, has written a...

Syrische Religionspolitik unter Asad.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Syrische Religionspolitik unter Asad. By Annabelle Bottcher. Freiburg i. Br.: Arnold-Bergstrasser-Institut; 1998.258 pp. DM 30. Too many Western analysts of Syria tip-toe around the awkward but inescapable fact that the dominant tension in...

Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Taliban: Militant Islam, Oil and Fundamentalism in Central Asia. By Ahmed Rashid. New Haven: Yale University Press, 2000. 274 pp. $27.50. Rashid, the Far Eastern Economic Review's outstanding journalist covering the South Asian beat, is in...

Yemen: The Unknown Arabia.(Review)
September 1, 2000... Yemen: The Unknown Arabia. By Tim Mackintosh-Smith. Etchings by Martin Yeoman. Woodstock, N.Y.: Overlook, 2000. 280 pp. $35. Rave reviews in the British press refer to Yemen as a travel book but it is more accurately described as a...

"We Teach Our Children to Express Anger with Muscle".(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... Members of the Palestinian Authority (PA)'s security forces, including Chairman Arafat's personal guard, have assaulted, and in certain cases shot, high-ranking officials, including ministers and legislators, sometimes under order from other...

Canadian Intelligence: Americans Must Beware of Islamists.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... The Canadian Security Intelligence Service issued its ninth annual Public Report in June 2000, "a brief overview of the current global threat environment."(1) The report deals with every sort of challenge to Canadian public safety, including...

U.S. Anti-Terrorism Panel: Get Serious.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... When the National Commission on Terrorism released its report, Countering the Changing Threat of International Terrorism,(1) in early June 2000, media attention dwelt nearly exclusively on one recommendation calling on the president and...

"All Syrian Forces Must Leave Lebanon".(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... The Middle East Forum published in May 2000 a study group report(1) surveying the Syrian occupation of Lebanon and making suggestions for U.S. policy. It landed at precisely the right moment--as Israeli troops withdrew from south Lebanon and as...

Not a Parody.(Brief Article)
September 1, 2000... This picture, taken July 3, 2000, shows Edward Said... launching a stone against Israeli soldiers on the other side of Lebanon's border with Israel, from the southern Lebanese village of Kfar Kila. Said, who is on a private visit to Beirut,...