Yemen: Ceasefire in the North and Military v. Develop Aid
September 2nd, 2010 by Jason
Brain O’Neill at Always Judged Guilty brings to our attention two recent articles in the Atlantic and the Wall Street Journal on developments in Yemen. The Atlantic article deals with the recent ceasefire between the Yemeni government and Houthi rebels in the north of the country. As O’Neill points out, “…the divisions are not cut-and-dried. This doesn’t fit the normal Sunni-Shi’ite clash we like to read about.” The WSJ article describes a growing gap between military assistance and civilian development assistance that one U.S. official describes as, “… tend(ing) to encourage a negative perspective in Yemen that all we care about is U.S. security.”O’Neill backs up this concern: “This seems on the face to be exactly what many are warning against- pumping in a flood of money to enhance the security services while leaving the massive underpinning structural issues untouched.” He goes on to define the “frustrating paradox of nation-building policies” as, “you can’t build a well while being shot, and the shooting won’t stop until there’s a well.”
On a more hopeful note, the National Democratic Institute has an article out describing their program to bring Yemeni youth together to teach them conflict resolution techniques. According to NDI, “With almost half of Yemen’s population under age 15 and another one-third aged 15 to 29, a significant percentage of the population is growing acclimated to violence as the primary means to address or resolve conflict.” The program focuses specifically the resolution of tribal conflicts and has already seen some success at the local level.
Posted in Civil Society, Islamist movements, Military, NGOs, Yemen, al-Qaeda | Comment »
POMED Notes: Press Conference “Without a Stable and Democratic Egypt, the Future of a Two State Solution is in Jeopardy”
September 1st, 2010 by Jason
Today at the National Press Club, a press conference was held to discuss the Mubarak government’s prominent role in the upcoming negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority. Hosted by The Coalition of Egyptian Organizations and the Egyptian Association for Change-USA and moderated by Tarek Khalil, the event featured a panel of Egyptian activists.
For full notes continue below the fold or click here for PDF
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Posted in Civil Society, Egypt, Elections, Foreign Aid, Freedom, Human Rights, Islam and Democracy, Islamist movements, Mideast Peace Plan, Political Islam, Protests, Reform | Comment »
How Arab Regimes Resist Democracy
August 25th, 2010 by Farid
In a recent piece published by the Carnegie Endowment, Amr Hamzawy writes that the lack of reform and democratization in the Arab world is due to increased and extensive security spending by Arab governments, as well as to regimes’ efforts to discourage reform by warning citizens that change would “threaten order and stability and unleash chaos.” Additionally, Hamzawy points out that opposition leaders have consistently failed to deliver a substantive message of tangible change, while Islamist groups remain more interested in enhancing their “ideological and religious agenda” than in improving people’s lives. Lastly, Hamzawy argues that the small group of Arab elites who dominate these regimes has formed a bond based on “common interests,” limiting the emergence of internal conflicts that would threaten the status quo. In conclusion, Hamzawy suggests that the U.S. and its European allies should push for democratization in the Middle East, asserting that “democracy is the only sustained path for development, moderation, and peace.”
Posted in Democracy Promotion, Islamist movements, Multilateralism, Reform, US foreign policy | Comment »
Islam and Democracy
August 24th, 2010 by Farid
Writing at Comment is Free, Brian Whitaker discusses the Quilliam Foundation’s claim that “violent and nonviolent Islamists broadly share the same ideology and disagree only on tactics.” According to the Quilliam Strategic Briefing Paper, “Preventing Terrorism: where next for Britain?, “Although some Islamist groups have accepted aspects of democracy, political pluralism and the concept of universal human rights, few — if any — Islamist groups have accepted all of these principles either fully or simultaneously.” The paper goes on to say that Islamism constitutes a threat to secular democracy and “tolerant society,” adding that Islamist ideology promotes an “anti-democratic, fascist state” comparable to racial apartheid.
Presenting a different analysis, Whitaker argues that the key issue is not Islamist violence, but the fact that Islamists “believe in the ’sovereignty of God,’” which “conflicts with democratic ideas about the sovereignty of the people.” According to Whitaker, the underlying problem is “an anti-libertarian assumption that linking the state with religion is both legitimate and necessary. Not only that, but religion claims the right, at least in some circumstances, to override the will of the people.” Whitaker attributes the increasing popularity of Islamist groups in the world to Western support of undemocratic regimes, adding that “the lack of scope for political and religious debate means that their basic ideology often remains unchallenged in the public discourse.” However, responding to Whitaker, Inayat Bounglawala points to Turkey as model for reconciliation between Islamic values and democracy. In his assessment, he writes that “across the Islamic world, polls have repeatedly found widespread support in favour of the implementation of both democracy and Islamic values.”
Posted in Islam and Democracy, Islamist movements, Political Islam, Secularism | Comment »
Pakistan: Disaster Relief and Political Disarray
August 23rd, 2010 by Farid
Daud Khattak writes in Foreign Policy that in the midst of the flood crisis in Pakistan, fears of targeted killings by the Taliban have not only sent key secular leaders into hiding, but also contributed to a lack of leadership in the Peshawar province, providing “an opening for religious and pro-Taliban elements to win the hearts and minds of the hundreds of thousands in the area.” Pointing out the ineffectiveness of local and central governments in assisting the victims of the flood, Khattak argues that Islamists have stepped in and “used their relief efforts as a propaganda opportunity,” instructing locals that the flood “occurred because Pakistanis have not obeyed God or implemented sharia.” With the secular parties under threat from the Taliban, Khattar writes that “not a single elected government in Pakistan has completed its five-year term since 1988,” adding that “religious movements that keep secular parties from providing services to their constituents will only help ensure that after the next elections it will be the religious parties governing in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa.”
Posted in Elections, Islamist movements, Pakistan, Political Parties, Taliban | Comment »
Afghanistan: Ulema Calls for Shari’a
August 12th, 2010 by Farid
According to Reuters, about 350 clerics in Afghanistan met this week for three days to discuss their reconciliation with the Taliban. The Ulema called on “President Hamid Karzai to enact sharia, or Islamic law, including punishments such as stonings, lashing, amputation and execution.” Recently this week, a 35-year old widow, accused of adultery, was flogged 200 times and then shot in the head three times by the Taliban. The woman, Bibi Sanubar, was pregnant while she was tried and shot dead during the public trial.
Posted in Afghanistan, Human Rights, Islamist movements | Comment »
Iran: Islamic Repuplic or Iranian Republic?
August 2nd, 2010 by Farid
Majid Mohammadi argues at Gozaar that the Green Movement in Iran has “reshaped the Iranian political factions” inside and outside of the country. Noting two different tendencies both inside and outside of Iran, Mohammadi writes, “One section of the movement pursues its goals within the framework of the existing regime and its constitution, while the other does not believe the regime is capable of reform and aims to overthrow the regime through a series of non-violent actions.” Mohammadi says that those in favor of working within the current system– Islamists –and those against it– secularists –are debating the vision of an Iranian republic vs. an Islamic republic. Describing the secularists as “revolutionary in substance,” Mohammadi explains that they “want regime change.” On the other hand, Mohammadi points out that Islamists do not hold the Islamic Republic responsible for the “misery of the Iranian people,” but rather hold “Khamenei’s regime to be a deviation from the original idea of the Islamic republic.”
Posted in Iran, Islamist movements, Political Islam, Reform, Secularism | Comment »
Turkey: AKP a Threat to Democracy?
August 2nd, 2010 by Farid
Writing in the National Review, Barbara Lerner argues that the current ruling political party in Turkey, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s AKP, is indeed Islamist and that “a ‘moderate Islamist party’ is a Western fantasy, a contradiction in terms, concocted by people who are blind to the fundamental differences between Islam and Christianity.”Assessing Turkish foreign policy under the AKP, Lerner argues that Turks “are now just part of the Middle Eastern mob,” adding that the party pretends to believe in freedom, democracy, and equality while in reality the government consists of “closed-minded, hate-spouting xenophobes and anti-Semites.” Comparing the current Turkish government to the Ottoman empire, Lerner says, “Ottoman emperors were the opposite of the narrow, hate-filled ideologues who govern the Arab and Persian states and, alas, Turkey today,” adding that the regime is “anti-western, anti-Christian, or anti-Jewish.” Lerner expresses four concerns: one, that the Turkish secular military has failed in its duties due to its fear of jeopardizing Turkish membership in the EU; two, that the AKP has infiltrated all secular institutions with its Islamist followers in order to consolidate its power; three that anti-American and anti-Israeli sentiment amongst Turks is growing; and four, that the West has failed to hold the AKP accountable for its “extreme hostility to our legitimate and vital security interests.”
In another analysis of political developments in Turkey, Soner Cagapatay writes in Newsweek that “Turkey is heading toward a European model, but it is neither modern nor liberal.” Instead, he argues that Turkey is moving towards the East European model of the 1940’s, “when communist parties took power in democratic elections, only to subvert democracy and veil their nations behind the Iron Curtain.” Cagapatay equates communism with Islamism, saying, “both movements, rooted in an illiberal ideology, see democracy as a means to an end and espouse a Manichaean, us vs. them mentality.” He moves on to propose that the AKP will continue to support Islamist leaders in the region and “trample on free media, gender equality, and democratic safeguards such as an independent judiciary” in its own country. However, like Lerner, Cagapatay is hopeful that Kemal Kiliçdaroglu of the secular Republican People’s Party may gain public support, which Cagtaptay argues can only be achieved through “grassroots politics.” He adds that “the West must stand with democracy by ensuring free and fair elections and maintaining a level political playing field.”
Posted in Elections, Islam and Democracy, Islamist movements, Political Islam, Political Parties, Reform, Secularism, Turkey, US foreign policy | Comment »
Lebanon: What Does Fadlallah’s Death Mean for Iran?
July 9th, 2010 by Farid
According to an interesting new op-ed by David Schenker in The Christian Science Monitor, Grand Ayatollah Seyyed Mohammad Hussein Fadlallah’s passing will “pave” the way for increasing Iranian influence in Lebanon, and a change in Islamic ideology will take place in on the ground. With Fadlallah gone, there remain very few contrasting views against the Iranian-supported Hezbollah militia, implying that a more militant ideology of Islam will gain momentum in Lebanon, Schenker explains. “With Fadlallah gone, and Sistani nearly 81, Iran and Hezbollah hope to nudge Lebanon’s Shi’a toward Tehran and Khamenei,” which means that U.S. influence in the region will “erode,” he says. Hezbollah is currently pushing for Sheikh Afaf Nabulsi to fill Fadlallah’s shoes, but even if no one emerges as his incumbent, Schenker argues that Tehran will still gain significant political, religious, and ideological influence within the Lebanese Shi’a population. Schenker also makes the assessment that Iranians have been “cultivating Muqtada al-Sadr” in Iraq and argues that the same thing is likely to take place in Lebanon. However, as Schenker himself notes, it is quite “ironic, though, that Fadlallah – a man who Washington labeled a terrorist in 1995 – stood as the last bulwark against near total Iranian hegemony in Lebanon.”
Posted in Hezbollah, Iran, Islamist movements, Lebanon, Political Islam, US foreign policy | Comment »
Open Letter To Prime Minister Erdogan From A Turkish-American Citizen
July 1st, 2010 by Farid
In an open letter to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a Turkish-American and tenured academic writes: “You have successfully entered the final stages in your efforts to transform Ataturk’s Turkey into an Arab-style Islamist dictatorship.” Condemning Erdogan’s public announcement that Hamas is not a terrorist organization, the writer pleads for the Turkish Prime Minister not to “send the 13 million people of Istanbul to be ‘martyred’ in Gaza for the love of Hamas.” He goes on to ask Mr. Erdogan, “do you even care about the ordinary, normal Muslims of your own country and of the world? If you do, then why have you successfully established such frightening friendships and contact with some of the most dangerous and brutal dictators of the so-called Islamic world?”
The writer also criticizes Erdogan for claiming Turkey is democratic by saying that “when it come to demanding more freedom for Islamism, you talk big, Mr. Erdogan, by defending and using democracy. In reality, you have a conveniently narrow understanding of the concept of democracy,” adding that anyone who expresses opposition to the current government is imprisoned. He goes on to say that Erdogan and his Islamist partners have pushed Turkey into medival darkness under the democratic banner.
Posted in Islamist movements, Political Islam, Turkey | Comment »
Egypt: Muslim Brotherhood Searching For Direction
June 15th, 2010 by Farid
In a recent issue of Current Trends in Islamist Ideology — published by the Hudson Institute — Ibrahim al-Houdaiby, previous member of the Muslim Brotherhood, was interviewed about the role of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egyptian society and its future in the Egyptian political arena.
According to al-Houdaiby, the movement has not been able to capitalize on its electoral successes in 2005. He argues that the Brotherhood is now in crisis due to a lack of a coherent and unified orientation. He explains that the recent feud over the internal elections in the Muslim Brotherhood is based on the contesting forces of three distinct schools of thought: intellectualism, Qutbism, and Wahhabism.
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Posted in Egypt, Elections, Islam and Democracy, Islamist movements, Muslim Brotherhood, Political Islam, Political Parties, Reform | Comment »
Egypt: Opposition Falls Flat in Poll
June 2nd, 2010 by Josh
Although the officials results are not expected until Thursday, early returns from yesterday’s Shura Council elections indicate a landslide victory President Hosni Mubarak’s ruling National Democratic Party. The Muslim Brotherhood, which currently holds no seats on the Council, appears to have been shut out in its bid to gain representation even though many of its candidates ran in districts that Brotherhood members won in the 2005 parliamentary elections — prompting one MB leader to accuse the government of blatant electoral fraud. The Islamist group also announced that it would begin a campaign to collect signatures in support of constitutional reforms to enable a Mohamed ElBaradei presidential bid next year.
But these electoral results are not at all surprising, according to Shadi Hamid, who contends that the “regime’s ability to repress with impunity is, in part, the result of the still dismal state of the country’s many opposition groups, whose perpetual inability to get along continues to confound observers.” The difficulty of cultivating unity among distinct opposition movements in the Arab world often precludes democratic reform, and Hamid believes that the current power imbalance between liberals and Islamists mandates a “transitional period” that would both open political space for weaker parties and, in the words of former presidential candidate Ayman Nour, “establish the foundations for a civil state, a new constitution, and open the door to all political groups.”
Posted in Egypt, Elections, Islamist movements, Muslim Brotherhood, Political Parties, Reform | Comment »
Lebanon: Disentangling Hezbollah from Shi’a Communities
May 27th, 2010 by Josh
Over at the Middle East Channel, Randa Slim of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund offers a fresh perspective on the deeply entrenched relationship between Hezbollah and Lebanese communities. Dismissing the utility of either internal or external military force as a means to disarm the popular Shi’a movement, Slim presents an alternative rooted in an “intra-Lebanese process of political dialogue.” Her recommendation also includes a prominent role for the international community, one that eschews its traditional projection of force in favor of new policies intended to create the “political, security and economic incentives and atmosphere in Lebanon and in the region that help promote and support disarmament.” All actors must reorient their focus away from the “Iranian provider” and toward the “Lebanese consumer,” meaning that the key to marginalizing Hezbollah’s military capacity lies in the ability to create upward pressure from the Shi’a community to demand change. According to Slim, cultivating such an environment requires an approach with four components:
- Maintaining U.S. military support of the Lebanese army: Presenting the Lebanese Armed Forces as a “strong and capable institution” would engender confidence and encourage the Shi’a community to move away from Hezbollah as its source of protection.
- The National Dialogue led by Lebanon’s President Michel Suleiman, which includes Hezbollah and other political parties, must formulate and agree on a national defense strategy.
- The Lebanese government must initiate a program of economic empowerment for underprivileged Shi’a communities
- Working toward an Arab-Israeli comprehensive peace in order to assuage the ever-present concern of a violent confrontation with Israel
“Only pressure from its Shi’a constituency will change Hezbollah’s cost-benefit calculations,” Slim says. “This pressure will come only after Lebanon’s Shi’a believe that the Lebanese state institutions are the best guarantors of their economic and physical security.”
Posted in Hezbollah, Islamist movements, Lebanon, Military, Public Opinion, Reform, Sectarianism, US foreign policy | Comment »
Egypt: Is ElBaradei “Flirting” With the Muslim Brotherhood?
April 5th, 2010 by Josh
In a skeptical look at Mohammad ElBaradei’s rapid ascent within Egypt’s opposition movement, Ilan Berman, vice president of the American Foreign Policy Council, accuses the former IAEA chief of courting the Muslim Brotherhood to serve as a pillar of his political coalition. Berman claims that ElBaradei may be seeking to address his primary point of weakness — lack of constituency — by initiating a “dangerous flirtation” with the prominent Islamist movement. “For ElBaradei,” he says, “such outreach might simply be good retail politics,” although Berman fears that the Brotherhood might exploit a prospective political relationship to further its “radical, exclusionary” platform.
However, Issandr El Amrani rejects this analysis and chides Berman for his “completely baseless assertion” that ElBaradei is actively pursuing a political union with Islamists. “It’s all terribly shoddy,” he writes. “If he was so interested in the Brothers, why does he endorse secularist positions such as not putting religious restrictions on eligibility for public function? Just because he went to the mosque one Friday?”
Posted in Egypt, Islamist movements, Muslim Brotherhood, Political Parties | Comment »
Libya: Snapshot of the Regime, Prospects for Reform
February 24th, 2010 by Josh
In an interesting feature for Reason’s March issue, Michael Moynihan draws upon his recent trip to Tripoli in order to elucidate what he views as Libya’s continuing stagnation despite both its tremendous oil wealth and recent efforts to engage in dialogue with the West. Highlighting notable contradictions between the government’s rhetoric of reform and ground-level realities, Moynihan recounts a number of conversations with ex-terrorists who, although touted by the government as fully rehabilitated, were actually taken off death-row or promised reduced prison sentences in exchange for renouncing political violence and aiding anti-terrorism investigations. One such individual, claiming he “saw the light” and had abandoned Islamism to work for Colonel Qaddafi’s government, defended Libya’s freedom of the speech and journalistic diversity — but when asked if one would be allowed to print an anti-Qaddafi slogan, he recoiled questioned why anyone would do that, which Moynihan interprets as an unintentional barometer of Libya’s true level of liberalism.
Despite these encounters, Moynihan retains some hope that Saif Qaddafi, Muammar Qaddafi’s son and presumed heir, will issue in a new generation of leaders that will “loosen their chokehold on power in exchange for a seat at the adult table of international politics.” But the current wave of superficial and cosmetic reforms, he says, “have brought [the Libyan people] no closer to the representative democracy Qaddafi promised 40 years ago.”
Posted in Diplomacy, Human Rights, Islam and Democracy, Islamist movements, Libya, Terrorism, US foreign policy | Comment »
Arab Reform Bulletin: New Format, New Release
February 19th, 2010 by Josh
After two years as a monthly publication, the Arab Reform Bulletin, a product of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, has altered its format and will now issue one or two articles per week. Its two most recent releases focus on the Muslim Brotherhood’s newly elected leadership and how Iraq’s forthcoming elections have exposed gaps in U.S. policy.
In trying to analyze the significance of a reconfigured Brotherhood, Husam Tammam writes that Mohammed Badie’s ascension to General Guide empowered a conservative MB faction that is “more interested in working from within to cultivate a strong, disciplined movement than in engaging with other political forces and intellectual currents in Egyptian society.” However, the Brotherhood has long been known for its “steadiness and pragmatism,” and Tammam is convinced that “the group’s major strategic choices—renouncing violence as a tool, participating in politics, and adopting a gradualist approach—are unlikely to shift suddenly.”
Brian Katulis worries that the U.S. has yet to articulate a “strategy for the broader Middle East,” and, more precisely, how Iraq fits into this regional approach. Iran’s international belligerence only heightens Iraq’s geopolitical importance, and Katulis wants the Obama administration to “more clearly define how it sees the bilateral relationship with Iraq fitting into a larger plan to deescalate tensions and foster stability in the broader Gulf region.”
Posted in Egypt, Elections, Iraq, Islamist movements, Muslim Brotherhood, Publications, US foreign policy | Comment »
Islamism: Can the U.S. Prevent Islamist Electoral Victories?
February 18th, 2010 by Josh
An article [PDF] from a recent edition of the FAO Journal answers this question in the affirmative, and attempts to identify mechanisms to “defeat Islamists at the ballot.” Co-written by Khairi Abaza of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies and Dr. Soner Cagaptay from the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, the piece dismisses the notion that engaging or empowering moderate Islamists can be a useful counterbalance toward those who subscribe to a more extreme Islamist brand. “The term ‘moderate Islamist’ is offensive to all Muslims,” the authors claim. “It does not matter how Washington qualifies Islamists; once it acknowledges them as partners, parties who believe in liberal democracy will see this as a sign that Washington has allied itself with the Islamists,” which ostensibly creates an environment of disaffection and perhaps stagnation.
Using the history of post-WWII U.S. policy toward Italy as a guide, Abaza and Cagaptay analyze the tools used by U.S. officials to discourage and eventually reverse the proliferation of popularly-elected Communist politicians, and modify them to fit a Middle Eastern context. This leads them to four general recommendations:
- Do what Islamists do, and do it better. Fund what the Islamists fund, and fund it better. To combat the pervasive influence of Islamist groups, who use their phenomenal level of financial support to marginalize and squeeze out competition, the authors believe that the U.S. should sufficiently resource secular and liberal groups so they can establish quality educational and healthcare facilities to challenge the Islamist monopoly on social services.
- Apply different speeds: The piece maintains that the U.S. must understand the political and cultural differences among Arab countries in order to appropriately identify entry-points for engagement.
- Create a cost for being Islamist: Piggy-backing off the U.S. approach toward mid-20th century Italy, the authors advocate banning the immigration of Islamists to the U.S. “Immigrating is a privilege that should be granted only to America’s friends.”
- Take bold steps at home: This includes restructuring the U.S. government to meet the challenges of “Muslim-majority countries” and investing heavily in “area and language studies of Muslim countries” to “create tens of thousands of experts who are fluent in the politics and languages” of the region.
Posted in Diplomacy, Elections, Islam and Democracy, Islamist movements, Political Islam, Political Parties, Sectarianism, US foreign policy | 1 Comment »
Egypt: New Government Crackdown on MB Leadership
February 8th, 2010 by Jessica
Al Jazeera reports that Egyptian security forces have detained at least 13 members of the Muslim Brotherhood. The arrests are widely seen as the start of an effort by the Egyptian government as an effort to crackdown on Egypt’s most powerful opposition group ahead of parliamentary elections. Those arrested included Essam el-Erian, Abdul-Rahman el-Bir, and Mahomoud Ezzat, the organization’s newly elected deputy leader. Though a banned political entity, the Muslim Brotherhood won one-fifth of the seats in the 2005 parliamentary elections, running as independent candidates. An anonymous police official acknowledged that detainees were arrested for engaging in banned political activity.
Mohamed el-Katatni, a member of the Muslim Brotherhood’s guidance bureau commented on the arrests, “This is part of the state’s campaign against the group. The group is now getting ready for parliamentary elections and this campaign is to stem such activities.” Mohammed Badie, the Muslim Brotherhood’s General Guide, fears that the recent arrests will negatively affect the ability of the organization to succeed in upcoming parliamentary elections.
Gregg Carlstrom at the Majlis reports that this is likely the first wave of arrests according to a police official who asked to remain anonymous. Muslim Brotherhood lawyer Abdel-Moneim Abdel-Maksoud has issued as statement saying, “the campaign of arrests is unjustified and we expect that more people have been arrested as Brotherhood lawyers are still receiving the names of those detained from the various provinces.” Carlstrom speculates that the arrest of Ezzat, a conservative, was a message to Mohammed Badie, the organization’s new General Guide. Via twitter, Shadi Hamid supports Carlstrom’s theory saying that Ezzat’s arrest has one of two meanings: either the start of wide crackdowns or that the current regime “has no idea” what it is doing. This is the first high-profile arrest of Brotherhood members since the election of Mohammed Badie as the group’s General Guide.
Posted in Egypt, Human Rights, Islamist movements | 1 Comment »
POMED Report: “Strategies for Engaging Political Islam”
January 29th, 2010 by Josh
Political Islam is the single most active political force in the Middle East today. To offer insights into this critical issue, the Project on Middle East Democracy partnered with the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung to bring together scholars and experts from the Middle East, the United States, and Europe. Moderated by Nathan Brown, Director of George Washington University’s Institute for Middle East Studies, guests discussed the topic “Strategies for Engaging Political Islam: A Middle East, U.S. and EU ‘Trialogue.’” Panelists included Ruheil Gharaibeh, Deputy Secretary-General of Jordan’s IAF; Mona Yacoubian, Special Adviser to the Muslim World Initiative at the United States Institute of Peace; Zoé Nautré, Visiting Fellow at the German Council on Foreign Relations; and Shadi Hamid, former research director and current vice-chair of POMED’s Board of Directors, and also currently the Deputy Director of the Brookings Doha Center.
To read the full report, which draws upon the participants’ observations and recommendations, click here. Otherwise, continue reading below the fold.
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Posted in Democracy Promotion, Diplomacy, Elections, Foreign Aid, Freedom, Islam and Democracy, Islamist movements, Multilateralism, Muslim Brotherhood, Political Islam, Reform, Reports, US foreign policy | Comment »
POMED Notes: “Bahrain’s Vision Amidst Regional Realities”
January 29th, 2010 by Josh
The Middle East Policy Forum along with the Distinguished Women in International Affairs Series sponsored an event featuring Houda Ezra Ebrahim Nonoo, Bahrain’s Ambassador to the United States. Ambassador Nonoo presented remarks on the relationship between the United States and Bahrain and commented on Bahrain’s role in the Persian Gulf.
Ambassador Nonoo began with an overview of Bahrain’s diplomatic posture towards a number of pertinent issues. She echoed Bahrain King Hamad bin Isa Al Khalifa’s call for a fresh start to peace talks and quoted the king as saying: “The biggest mistake has been to assume that you can simply switch on peace like a light. We should move towards real peace now by consulting our people and by reaching out to Israelis to highlight the benefits of a genuine peace.”
For POMED’s notes in PDF, please click here. Otherwise, continue below the fold.
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Posted in Bahrain, DC Event Notes, Human Rights, Islamist movements, Israel, Mideast Peace Plan, Palestine, US foreign policy | Comment »
