Globalized Islam: Watching Central Asia

Olivier Roy

Olivier Roy, lecturer at École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS) and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques (Sciences-Po), gave an interesting seminar here at Berkeley on January 25. Roy is the author of several important books on contemporary Islam and Islamist movements, including, most recently, Globalized Islam: the Search for a New Ummah (Columbia University Press, 2004). In his talk here at Berkeley, he presented some of his most recent research, which compares Islamist movements in Western Europe with their counterparts in the former Soviet Union. Here, I will deal less with the comparative aspects of his scholarship and instead summarize some of his observations about the former Soviet republics of Central Asia.

In the decade following the collapse of the Soviet Union, many observers imagined that the Central Asian republics would opt for neo-Communism and/or a strict secularism along the lines of Turkey. There was and remains a consensus that the ex-Soviet -stans would fight radical Islam. At first glance, this is indeed what appears to have happened, with some success. The local Islamist movements that emerged immediately after the USSR's collapse have been largely defeated. But Roy pointed to two separate phenomena which suggest that these societies are increasingly being drawn into the orbits of Saudi Salafism, on the one hand, and Western-exported political Islam on the other. Let me begin with the latter.

By political Islam, Roy means ideologies which advocate the establishment of a pan-Islamic caliphate with borders that might range from Europe to the far East. The main group aiming for this goal in Central Asia is the Hizb-ut-Tahrir (Party of Liberation), which is today an illegal mass youth movement in Uzbekistan, where it boasts several thousand members. Hizb was founded in the 1950s and once had its base in Beirut. However, it now has a center in London, where its members have tried to avoid overt political activity. There is also a significant base in Australia. Roy believes that the Uzbek branch of the movement came from London sometime in 1996 or 1997. It achieved a breakthrough in Uzbekistan, spreading primarily among secondary school students. Unlike the Western European Hizb organizations, it is possible to talk to members of the party in Uzbekistan, whereas in the UK and elsewhere they have gone completely underground and do not publicize their headquarters. However, the movement faces repression from the authorities - repression which often attracts further adherents as family members of jailed or killed members join the party.

The other phenomenon, which is, at least for now, antagonistic to Hizb-ut-Tahrir is that of increasing numbers of Saudi-trained imams and teachers entering state institutions. All of the Central Asian republics kept the muftiat system of the Soviet period, i.e., an official clergy granted a religious monopoly by the state. (In fact, this is actually not all that different from the situation in much of Europe, most notably in France and Germany, where only official "churches" receive state-funding and the right to build houses of worship, while other groups are often classified as "cults").

Ten years ago, Roy says, it was a common place that the Central Asian dictators would want to employ only low-level clergy with relatively little knowledge, basically to maintain a rural Islam untouched by radical ideas - he referred to it as "folkloric Islam." But this is not what has happened at all. Rather, a slew of young, sophisticated, Salafi (or Wahabi) clergy, who speak Arabic fluently after years of study in Saudi Arabia, have entered the official religious institutions. Furthermore, all the money coming to train future Muslim leaders in Uzbekistan is coming from the Saudis. And the Central Asian governments are entirely unconcerned about this. On the contrary, leaders such as the Uzbek Islam Karimov are leaning more and more on Islam as a bulwark against democratization and reform, which they see as their real enemies. Karimov sees the social views of the Salafi clerics as congruent with his own. He is marshaling Islam to promote "authentic, traditional Uzbek values," according to which women should stay at home while men go to work. In Tajikistan, the president Emomali Rahmonov and the state clergy are even discouraging women from going to the mosque.

These two different groups - Hizb-ut-Tahrir and the Salafi clerics - are antagonistic as they basically compete for the same target group. Ideologically, too, Roy explained, the Salafis actually reject Hizb-ut-Tahrir and political Islam as "innovation": "The Prophet does not speak of ideologies" they might say in response to Hizb which describes itself as "a political party whose ideology is Islam." So far, the clerics have also stayed away from activity that might challenge the state. They are not political Islamists but conservative religious leaders. Ironically, according to Roy, a similar tendency can be observed in Western Europe. Here too most of those appointed to the official clergy have been the most conservative and orthodox clerics who are close to the Muslim Brotherhood or to authoritarian Middle Eastern regimes. It is obvious that Roy believes that this amounts to playing with fire - both in Europe and in Central Asia. While a ruler such as Karimov might think that he is co-opting the fundamentalists, he might soon find himself co-opted by them.

In a future post, I hope to describe another tendency antagonistic to both of these - the inroads made in Central Asia (and the rest of the former USSR) by various Christian groups, ranging from Witnesses to Korean Baptists; this phenomenon finds its counterpart in the conversions to (Salafi) Islam in Western and Eastern Europe. By next year, you should be able to read all about it in Roy's forthcoming book.

Iranians in the Gaza Strip?

Scenes from Gaza

The Israeli government has long maintained that Iran is directly involved in funding and training Hamas's military wing. Debka has frequently made sensationalist claims about the presence of Iranian agents in the Gaza Strip. Today, it was Fatah's turn.

According to members of the Presidential Guard or National Security Force, Fatah succeeded in apprehending 7 Iranians and in seizing large quantities of light and heavy weapons after storming the Islamic University in Gaza this Thursday night. Even if this claim, reported by Ha'aretz and the BBC, turns out to be wrong, and I have a strong feeling that it's a Fatah propaganda campaign, one could well regard tonight as another watershed moment. Both Hamas and Fatah appear to be getting large supplies of weapons - Hamas from Iran, and Fatah from the United States with the consent and passive assistance of Israel and Egypt. Perhaps tonight a "preventive battle" is being fought by one side or the other - Hamas could end up depicting its attacks on the Presidential Guard and the alleged arms convoy as a counter-strike against a planned coup. Fatah, for its part, may be raising the specter of Iranian involvement to galvanize Arab and Palestinian support for itself.

What is clear is that this conflict has intensified greatly in past months, surprising many veteran observers. The details of the clashes that broke out between Hamas and Fatah followers last month in the Gaza Strip were not widely reported. Ha'aretz, with its veteran Gaza reporters, Amos Har'el and Avi Issascaroff, was one of the few news sources to describe the viciousness of the unfolding civil war in detail. They described several cases of Hamas fighters surrounding the houses of Fatah-affiliated people, of executions and of torture (one teenager reported having acid thrown in his face after he was taken prisoner).

One of those targeted was Sufian Abu Zaide, a leading Fatah moderate from Gaza, whom I once had the pleasure of hearing, along with Issascaroff, at a conference organized by the Herzog Center at Ben-Gurion University in 2005. Abu Zaide is a member of Muhammad Dahlan's generation: he spent the first intifada in an Israeli prison in Beer Sheva, learned Hebrew, returned to Gaza in the early years of Oslo and maintained close ties to Israelis. As soon as the second intifada broke out in 2000, Abu Zaide left for the UK to begin studying for a Ph.D., which he eventually completed. Last month, Abu Zaide was kidnapped by Hamas, but was later released. What was supposed to be his future home was also leveled by Hamas members. Since then, he returned to Ben-Gurion another time to speak at another Herzog Center conference.

The latest events, and Hamas's role in breaking off the truce that was supposed to be brokered, first by Damascus, then by Riyadh, serves as yet more proof of the futility of negotiating with the movement at this stage. Contrary to the expectations of a number of supercilious observers, Hamas has not turned into the Turkish Welfare Party to which many compared it. Being allowed to participate in politics did not convince Hamas to disband its militia, just as political participation has failed to convince Hizbullah to disarm. Instead, Hamas has ended up using the weapons of its "resistance" against its political rivals. Contrary to what some British legislators have claimed recently, this development is not a response to the isolation of Hamas by western governments. Hamas is flexing its muscles - perhaps, in its view, pre-emptively - because it can. Even before Hamas came to power, the military balance of power in Gaza was in its favour. If Hamas had wanted to break out of the isolation supposedly imposed on it, it could have done so by renouncing its commitment to the destruction of Israel.

Iranian Involvement in the Karbala Operation?

We still do not know all the details about the bold January 20 attack on a secure American compound, which killed five American soldiers in Karbala. Investigations are ongoing, and it is obvious that the Americans do not want to give away too much information about the tactics used by the attackers and about the compound itself.

Noah expressed concern earlier about the change in U.S. policy on Iranian operatives in Iraq. It is possible that these policy changes came in response to intelligence about increased Iranian involvement on the ground in attacks against American forces. In the wake of the Karbala raid, speculation immediately mounted about the possibility of direct or indirect Iranian involvement - mainly because of the mission's success and precision. Sunni insurgents were ruled out from the get-go, as it is highly unlikely that they would have been able to operate in the area.

But the evidence for Iranian involvement - at least those bits released to the press - is highly circumstantial. It revolves, on the one hand, around the use of SUVs, uniforms, and weapons that only American troops in Iraq employ, and, on the other, around the ease with which the convoy of 9 to 12 operators were able to penetrate the compound (New York Times). Some of this information has been released by Iraqi officials rather than the U.S. government. This makes it all the more suspect.

It is possible that the Iranians had a hand in this. But it seems far more likely that Iraqis orchestrated the attack. One of the details that emerged in press reports was that the militants spoke "perfect English" and looked like Americans, leading Iraqi guards to wave them through without questions. It seems rather more likely that they were waved through by Iraqi soldiers involved in the attack. American investigators on the ground are heavily leaning toward this policy, as statements by an unnamed U.S. military official in the NYT suggest:

"We’ve got to be very careful as to who we define as our allies, and who we trust and who we don’t,” the military official said. “Was the governor involved? Were the Iraqi police that were on guard complicit or just incompetent?”

It is, however, far more convenient for the Bush administration and the Iraqi government to blame the attack on the Iranians. No doubt the Iranians are up to no good in Iraq; but using them as a smoke-screen to protect the administration of al-Maliki (for whom Mahdi Army involvement would be a profound embarrassment) seriously endangers the lives of American soldiers.

If Iran was indeed involved, the U.S. should bide its time and pick the right moment for an appropriate response - perhaps a response that could be blamed on Sunni militias or al-Qaeda. In any case, given the nature of the evidence released so far, the Karbala incident must not be used in arguments for a war with Iran.

The Future Vision of the Palestinian Arabs in Israel

A Jewish and democratic state - for now

About a month ago, the National Committee for the Heads of the Arab Local Authorities and the Supreme Follow-up Committee of the Arabs in Israel released a report on "The Future Vision of the Palestinian Arabs in Israel" (החזון העתידי לערבים הפלסטינים בישראל). It has been almost unanimously rejected by Jewish Israelis from across the political spectrum, although the kind of explosion that one might have expected from its contents has not yet taken place. Among others, Yossi Alpher and Ze'ev Schiff (here is the Hebrew version) have criticized it in the strongest terms. On the other hand, in an op-ed published in the Daily Star, Amal Helow hails the report as a sign that the "Palestinian community within Israel has taken its first steps toward full empowerment."

I have now had a chance to read the report in its entirety, and I want to use this opportunity to kick off a discussion on its substance that will be informed by perspectives from history and political science on democracy, ethnic minorities, and nation states.

I believe that the "Future Vision" report articulates a consensus about the State of Israel - among its Arab citizens as well as its Arab neighbors, and among many in the Western academy - which must be subjected to rigorous critique. It is unfortunate that those who reject the report are likely to be tarred with the brush of intolerance or anachronistic nationalism, and that the only ones who will challenge its conclusions are likely to be Jews. But it seems that the Jews are perpetually out of step with the prevailing forces of the day. Just as they were once too liberal and cosmopolitan when it was fashionable to believe in integral nationalism, they are now too particularistic and nationalistic when the enlightened lords of European pseudo-liberalism have announced the end of the nation state. Of course, as readers of the report will quickly see, its authors can hardly be said to embrace the ideals of their champions in the West. But that is no problem, for exceptions can be made for the oppressed, the subaltern, and the colonized. And at the same time, one can hold the Jews to a higher standard.

Here is the report in English (PDF), Hebrew (PDF), and Hebrew (HTML). I have not seen an Arabic version.

Michael Oren's New Book

Image: MichaelOren.com

Max Rodenbeck, the Economist's Middle East correspondent, has reviewed Michael Oren's new book Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present. But I'd recommend skipping his review and looking at Zach's piece about Oren's appearance on The Daily Show with John Stewart instead. Zach also has some interesting thoughts on the challenge that Oren's book might present to the orthodox Saidians who unfortunately run the American academy.

I refer to Rodenbeck only because he directs several barbs at Oren, including this one:

Important context is missing from some of the book’s pages ... There is much gory detail about the Armenian genocide, but scant mention of the fact that Ottoman Turkey faced repeated invasion by a Russia whose czars, disastrously for the Ottomans’ Armenian subjects, claimed leadership of all Orthodox Christians. At several junctures, Oren paints Europe as stubbornly resistant to American policy, without adequately substantiating the charge or explaining European motives. We hear nothing of how America’s fateful, post-World War I decision to restrict immigration helped push desperate Jewish refugees toward Palestine.

Rodenbeck's "missing context" is a non sequitur, as the Russian czars' claims to leadership over Orthodox Christians was irrelevant to the large majority of Ottoman Armenians who belonged to the Armenian Apostolic Church, not the Eastern Orthodox Church. As for America's decision to limit Jewish immigration in the interwar period - it was as morally reprehensible as the British refusal to allow those desperate Jewish refugees to immigrate to Palestine in order not to antagonize the local Arab population.

Rodenbeck also "calls out" the "American-born Israeli scholar" Oren for getting the causes of the 1982 Lebanese war wrong:

Commendably, in a work of such scope, there are very few errors of fact or omission. Yet, as a reserve major in the Israeli Army, Oren ought to know that Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon was not provoked by the P.L.O. “regularly striking” at Galilee. Yasir Arafat’s group was certainly an elemental threat to the Jewish state, but had actually been observing a long, American-brokered cease-fire before Ariel Sharon’s drive to Beirut.

Indeed, as a reserve major in the Israeli Army and a veteran of that war who served in the paratroopers brigade, Oren ought to and probably does know a lot more than Rodenbeck about the causes of Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon. For example, he probably knows about the PLO's numerous violations of the 1981 cease-fire, which made life in Israel's north increasingly intolerable.

Suicide Bomber Strikes Eilat

A View of Eilat (Photo: Henrik Reinholdson)

Israel was due for another suicide bombing. At around 9:40 AM local time a suicide bomber blew himself up in an Eilat bakery. So far, the attack has claimed the lives of 3 people (Ynet, Ha'aretz).

The targeting of a bakery (talk about a soft target) and the choice of Eilat, a resort town on the Red Sea, across from the Jordanian port of Aqaba and far from the center of the country, suggest just how difficult it has become for the terrorist organizations to mount suicide attacks inside Israel.

Islamic Jihad and the Al-Aqsa Brigades have taken responsibility. It is possible, however, that this was not the work of a group from the territories but of militants from Egypt or even Jordan.

There were some doubts about whether the bombing had a terrorist or a criminal background. In its initial dispatch from the scene, Ynet quoted a resident of the neighborhood named Shosh, who told reporters that she feels "like I am in Texas or the Wild West," (!) adding that she had often heard shouting from the houses nearby. Ynet readers were also quick to cast blame on local mafia elements. A reader who identified himself as Alperon from Yafo, declared that "this is what happens when you don't pay protection money on time." The Alperons are one of Israel's most infamous organized crime families.

Lebanese National News Agency: Israel Using Toxic Balloons

The "toxic" balloons

Jeha has already reported on this, but the story seems to be spinning out of a control, with even Bad Vilbel asking, "What the hell? And then Israelis wonder why there is so much fear and paranoia about the IDF and Israel's intentions in Lebanon." I'm quoting the article from Naharnet in full:

Eight people were hospitalized Saturday after inhaling toxic gases from poisonous balloons dropped by Israeli warplanes over Upper Nabatiyeh in southern Lebanon, the National News Agency reported.

NNA said among those who were rushed to hospital suffering from nausea and fatigue were a Lebanese staff sergeant, a recruit and An Nahar reporter Rana Jouni.

The agency said Israeli warplanes dropped at least 10 poisonous balloons with Hebrew markings over Upper Nabatiyeh at about 9 am Saturday.

NNA said contacts have been made between the Lebanese army command and the U.N. Interim Force in Lebanon, which has instructed an Italian peacekeeping unit to take samples from the balloons for examination. The agency said the results are likely to come out on Sunday.

NNA had earlier said that the Lebanese army's engineering unit headed to the area and destroyed the balloons by explosives.

The army, in a communiqué issued Friday, warned civilians against messing with the balloons and urged them to report finding them to the closest army unit.

I'm not sure what the origins of the balloons are - העיר [Ha'ir, "The City"] is the name of a local sort of newspaper with branches in different cities that features classifieds. I'm assuming this was some sort of promotion in the north and that the balloons simply drifted across the border. I have a hard time understanding how this story made the headlines, given the many questions it immediately raises.

How exactly did this reporter and the 7 other people get sick? Did they inhale the helium in the balloons? And how do warplanes drop balloons? Maybe these were more like beach balls? Well, I'm glad the Lebanese Army made sure to send its engineering units over to blow them up.

In conclusion, if you see any other objects with "Hebrew markings" on them, please stay away. And make sure the Jews don't come near the wells again.

April Fool's is more than 2 months away, guys!

Korean Perceptions of Israel

Sattar Kassem and Hong Mi Jung, near Nablus (pressian.com)

Korea has not entered the Israeli imagination in the same way as Japan and China have. Although Samsung cell phones, LG washing machines, and Kia compacts have become consumer staples, Israelis generally have no real mental map of Korea and its place in East Asia. If they did, they would probably discover many commonalities, in addition to the obvious differences between the countries and their cultures. Indeed, many South Koreans, and not only the zealous evangelicals who send missionaries even to Iraq, see themselves as a chosen people whose fate bears strong resemblances to that of the Jews.

Koreans point to their long history of suffering and to the miraculous rise of the Republic of Korea in the past half-century as bases of comparison. They also view the millions of Koreans dispersed in China, the former Soviet Union, and America as diaspora communities with striking similarities to their Jewish counterparts in the world. In the U.S., Korean-Americans, even more than Chinese- or Indian-Americans, resemble American Jews in terms of their occupational patterns and their investment in education - with the Koreans following a pattern set by the Jewish immigrants nearly a century earlier.

For a long time, Korean perceptions of Israel were overwhelmingly positive. When South Koreans encountered Israel and the Jewish people in their school textbooks and in the media, they were presented with a heroic narrative about Israel's perseverance against all odds in the 1948 and 1967. For Koreans of a certain generation (now in its late 30s and early 40s), the word kibbutz still has romantic resonances.

But Israel's stock is rapidly dwindling. The last half-decade has perhaps done more damage than anything else. As in Europe and elsewhere, Israel is now Goliath with the Palestinians (or even the Arabs as a whole) playing David. Some Koreans now identify more with the Palestinians, and see the experience of the latter as akin to their own history under Japanese occupation - never mind that by any objective standards this is a disturbing fallacy of judgment.

A feature that appeared in a Korean internet newspaper yesterday about the the Hamas-Fatah clashes and the anniversary of Israel's "40-year-long occupation" speaks volumes about current Korean attitudes toward Israel. The article was written by a Korean scholar at the Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, Hong Mi Jung, who has developed close friendships with Palestinian academics and professionals, mostly in the West Bank. Its headline asks,

이스라엘 검문소가 관대해진 이유는?
Why have the Israeli checkpoints been eased?

A certain professor Sattar Kassem, a political scientist at Al-Najah University, who spoke to her in Nablus, told Hong that the checkpoints from Ramallah to Nablus had been relaxed due to the Palestinian infighting but that there had been no change in the number of checkpoints on the reverse route from Nablus to Ramallah.

She also investigated the report of gunfire directed at the Canadian mission in Ramallah, and she asked passersby in the city why they were no longer displaying portraits of Abbas. They respond that

"압바스는 이스라엘과 미국에 협력하고 있다"
Abbas is cooperating with Israel and America.

It should hardly come as a surprise that the article is sympathetic to the friends and acquaintances of the writer. But what is most disturbing is that Israelis only appear as soldiers, and that while Hong talks to many ordinary Palestinians, there is no such investigation of life in Israel. Obviously we shouldn't make too much of this - reporters have limited amounts of time, resources, and connections. However, the net effect of stories like Hong is predictable and disturbing: Koreans are getting a vivid sense of Palestinian society by sympathetic reporters and very little in the way of journalism about ordinary Israelis' fears and hopes.

Growing anti-American sentiments in Korea have only exacerbated views of Israel, which has become increasingly linked in the Korean imagination to the U.S. Combine all this with the fact that Korea, just like China and Japan, will depend heavily on Arab and Iranian oil, and the outlook for the future of Korean-Israeli relations might look grim.

However, there is some hope. Unlike Europe, Korea has no history of antisemitism and no Muslim immigrant population to appease. The country's large Protestant population is also likely to continue supporting Israel - although its fantasies about the Holy Land may actually distort bilateral relations more than fostering them. But what Israel really needs to do is to embark on a campaign to win the minds of Koreans by appealing directly to their history, values, and interests. Israelis ignore Korea at their peril. There are obvious cultural bridges that can be built - for example via comparative studies of Korean Confucian philosophy and rabbinic literature, or through exchanges about diaspora experiences. In less lofty domains, the Korean and Israeli economies have a great deal in common and opportunities abound for partnerships that can benefit both countries.

Thanks to Jun for his translations and for teaching me the Korean alphabet among many other things.

Hizbullah Stumbles, for Now

From the FPM website: apparently the guy on the groundis a 65-year-old (Aoun supporter?)
being kicked by a Lebanese Forces member (tayyar.org)

The latest attempt by Hizbullah and company to bring down the Siniora government in Lebanon has failed - at least for now. On the streets, Christian pro-government forces held their own against the anti-government Christian backers of Michel Aoun's FMP, while Sunni activists flexed enough muscle to thwart Hizbullah and Amal. But the key was outside intervention, including perhaps a restraining order by the Iranians, after pressure from the Saudis (see Ha'aretz). Or maybe it was the overt backing of King Abdullah as well as the U.S. (which is intent on preventing the victory of the Syrian-Iranian proxies) and France for the government. In any case, Siniora et al. seem to have acquired a new lease on life.

Meanwhile, most of the Sunni Arab world viewed the latest showdown in Lebanon as a must-win confrontation in the regional Sunni-Shi'a showdown. With Iraq in Shi'a hands and Syria in Iran's pockets, the Saudis can capitalize on widespread support from Sunnis who are still fuming about the execution of Saddam Hussein. This, in turn, has emboldened the Sunni supporters of the Lebanese government. Nasrallah has taken notice and trying to tread carefully.

On a related note, the Jordanian Mohammed al-Masri has an op-ed in the Daily Star about Jordan's position on the Sunni-Shi'a rift. The article is about Jordanian encounters with Shi'a Iraqi expatriates in their midst. Apparently, the Jordanian state is following a "zero-tolerance policy toward the public practice of Shiism." However, al-Masri concludes that the real threat to Jordan is not the practice of Shiism in the country or the specter of mass conversions by its Sunni population; rather, the real danger is

political Shiism: support for Shiite political organizations and acceptance of their political paradigms

Al-Masri goes on to say that

the sweeping support for Hizbullah during the war in Lebanon last summer was a clear manifestation of political Shiism,

which is a sneaky way of criticizing the wide-scale support for Hizbullah in the Arab world during the war. Ultimately, he blames Israel for the rise of "political Shiism" - i.e., for the increasing threat to regimes like Jordan by Iran and its proxies:

As much as events in Iraq and interaction with Iraqi communities within Jordan lead to Jordanian antipathy toward Iraqi Shiites and Iran, the Israeli factor and potential conflict between Israel and Hizbullah still encourage support for Hizbullah-style Shiite organizations. Therefore it might be misleading to assume that new anti-Iranian feelings in Jordan are sustainable, when the Israel factor in regional developments could undermine them

Shots Fired in US-Iran War?

David Petraeus faces one tricky task after another in Iraq (Photo: msnbc.com)

President Bush's recent announcement of a naval buildup in the Persian Gulf and the deployment there of Patriot missile batteries was seen in some circles as evidence that a war, however low-intensity, has already begun between the United States and Iran. Those kind of suspicions can only be stoked by today's announcement in the Washington Post by the administration and the National Security Council that US forces are now authorized to kill Iranian operatives, military and intelligence, working in Iraq. This is a change from the old policy of "catch and release," whereby the US military detained Iranian operatives for a few days to spook them. The idea is to ultimately change the diplomatic as well as the overall strategic equation with Iran, to strip Teheran of its triumphalism.

The American people and its elected representatives should be asking a lot of questions about this policy. Is this the best way to pressure an Iran that is frighteningly recalcitrant on the nuclear issue? What is the endgame? One thing that is far too unclear -- even to Condoleezza Rice, it seems -- is the nature of political oversight here. On the other hand, to what extent are US military personnel on the ground willing and prepared to implement the strategy? Most troubling is the program's origins in heady planning sessions led by, among others, the national security advisor Elliot Abrams, the Administration's notorious pointman on the Middle East. The notion of pushing an image of Iran on the public as a central foe in the War on Terror, with tentacles stretching from Kabul to Beirut, occurred to Abrams et. al. during last summer's Lebanon War. Not that these "tentacles" don't exist, but I confess, I'm not entirely intoxicated by this...what a way to proceed with one of the fundamental foreign policy challenges of our time!

What Does Jerusalem Have on Athens?

Political Hebraists kibbitzing at a Shalem Center conference in 2004 (Photo: Shalem Press)

It was the second-century church father Tertullian who famously asked, "What does Athens have to do with Jerusalem," in a polemical attack on the supremacy of classical, Graeco-Roman paideia (learning) among literate men of his time. Christians had no need of pagan intellectual traditions, Tertullian argued, they had their own body of texts to scrutinize and venerate -- they had "Jerusalem."

Behind Tertullian's strident objection, of course, lies the reality that Athens has a lot to do with Jerusalem. The Graeco-Roman and the Judaeo-Christian have never been far apart in the history of ideas. Modern scholars of various stripes have long noticed this, but, apparently, not until now in terms of the history of political thought. In December, the Shalem Center in Jerusalem, hosted a conference called "Political Hebraism: Jewish Sources in the History of Political Thought." (The Chronicle of Higher Education reviewed it this week). The meeting was organized by the political theorist Yoram Hazony. He and his fellow-travellers have a journal, Hebraic Political Studies, which

"aims to evaluate the place of the Jewish textual tradition, alongside the traditions of Greece and Rome...explore the political concepts of the Hebrew Bible and rabbinic literature, the significance of reflections on Judaic sources in the history of ideas, and the role of these sources in the history of the West."

There seems to be a heavy emphasis on early modern thinkers, but the Hebraizing tendencies of medieval politicians and political theorists receive treatment too. I wonder what's to be said for the ancients...

al-'Arabiyya

I tuned into Saudi-owned Arab satellite TV station al-'Arabiyya on the internet about an hour ago to watch some Lebanon-related news to find out that they were screening an Israeli documentary about Palestinian prisoners in Israel. The documentary has long interviews with a female Islamic Jihad activist who smiles broadly as she talks about the suicide bombing on the Jerusalem Sbarro, even after she is told that it killed 8 children. The documentary focuses on different Palestinian prisoners, affiliated with Hamas and Fateh and their political views. It's quite a fascinating story, but the fact that this documentary, which includes scenes of Israeli prison guards and Palestinian prisoners shaking hands and getting along, is being aired on an Arab satellite station is very significant. I've been impressed by previous broadcasts on al-'Arabiyya that dealt with terrorism and jihadism in a very critical manner, but this was a very big surprise.

Israel's Lolita Complex

The marketing executives behind Israeli ads, like those in other Western nations, have a tendency to portray scantily-clad females in order to draw attention to the products they are promoting. There is nothing new or unique about this. In one important aspect, however, I think Israeli ads do differ from North American ones. Many times, these overtly sexual images either feature minors or women just above age who are purposefully made-up and accessorized in order to seem younger. In either case, I find it despicable. I feel Israeli advertisements have many times crossed the line and border on child pornography if one follows its strictest definition.

Israeli readers may remember the "Ceif" bath product campaign and the teenaged Luisana Lopilato showering. At the same time, she would cry out, "Muy Ceif"'! [How fun!] in a baby-ish tone. She, or the ad, was subsequently ridiculed on Eretz Nehederet, one of Israel's leading (satirical news) shows.

A milder version of that commercial can be viewed on YouTube. The constant switching back and forth of childish and then at once grown-up, sexual behaviour is puzzling.

But it goes beyond that and it seems that everyone is in on the act. This includes TNT, an Israeli clothing chain popular among teenagers. Their winter 06 catalog was aptly titled, Shit Happens. The catalog, which was layed out like a calendar with a different ad on each month included some pretty disturbing images featuring very young models, or ones at least deliberately made to look so. These images include a young man in a bath tub, apparently about to commit suicide, and a topless guy with a beer bottle in hand who is grabbing his scrotum and has the words, "I'm shy but I've got big dick" [sic] written on his bare chest. There is also the young woman on her bicycle with her underwear and her right nipple partially exposed. Let's not forget the cover page: a baby-ish looking girl but dressed in a short skirt with lace socks and hooker boots. Oh, and just in case we didn't get the point, she has a toy horse on a stick stuck between her legs.

Another case in point. This advertisement below was taken from Rosh 1, a magazine which is published by Yediot Ahronot, also one of Israel's leading newspapers. The magazine is explicity intended for teenagers, as it says on the cover. The ad, from the October 2006 edition, might look pretty standard at first. But if one reads the text, it becomes pretty sickening. A rough translation to English would be, "The male teachers at school say that I'm a great student. Too bad the female teachers don't agree with them." The word "school" (Beit Sefer) in Hebrew is never used to refer to university, as it sometimes is in the US. It is clear that "school" refers to elementary to high school. Young girls, the prime readers of the magazine, are getting a frightening message here.

The magazine sets out to socialize them, and teach them to socialize each other, in some more ways. Below is an advice column, titled, "Yes, you got fatter." The column teaches girls how to relay to their girlfriends all that is wrong with them. Here are some sample problems it sets out to solve: "you dress terribly," "your haircut is horrible," "he doesn't want you," and "you eat too much."

"Yes, you got fatter"

Israeli advertisements have crossed the line on too many occasions. It seems like young women are being turned into sexual targets at earlier and earlier ages. The messages they are bombarded with on a daily basis are frightening and I, for one, have had enough. Hopefully, a public backlash will contain some of this trend, but so far I have seen no indications of it.

The Hrant Dink Assassination as a Turning Point

Hrant Dink (Source: European Academy Berlin)

There are two ways to read the recent murder of the Armenian-Turkish journalist Hrant Dink. Some fear that this is the beginning of an open season on those who, like Dink, challenge the ultra-nationalist vision of Turkey. On the other hand, the public and literary condemnations of the murder may also signal the self-assertion of Turkish liberals.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan condemned the murder in the strongest terms, but critics objected to the manner in which this condemnation was framed, especially in parts of the Armenian diaspora.

"A bullet has been fired at democracy and freedom of expression," Erdogan announced shortly after news of Dink's assassination reached him. But Dink had been prosecuted for exercising his freedom of expression under the infamous article 301 of Turkey's penal code. Prior to his murder, Dink and other Turkish citizens who spoke out against the denial of the Armenian Genocide, discrimination against Kurds, and the lack of tolerance in their society more generally, had been attacked in many of the same newspapers who now claimed that the murder had been a strike against Turkey. These declarations also masked the truth that Dink was singled out as an Armenian by his killer.

But the Turkish media also contained reflections on Turkish society's wider responsibility for Dink's death. Mehmet Ali Birand wrote in the Turkish Daily News that "301 killed Hrant Dink." Omer Taspinar, in Today's Zaman, declared that

We are all complicit in Hrant Dink’s murder. Turkey’s conspiracy-prone public debate is increasingly producing an anti-European, anti-American, anti-Kurd, anti-Armenian and anti-liberal nationalism.

He denounced the witch-hunt against Turkish liberals:

Our incorrigible sense of insecurity has turned the founding ideology of the republic into an aggressive reflex against perceived enemies - -- enemies that we often create in our own imagination. How else can one explain the trials of Orhan Pamuk, Elif Safak and Hrant Dink in 2006? What about the shameful treatment of Professor Atilla Yayla for simply voicing an opinion?

And called out Justice Minister Cemil Cicek

who not too long ago blamed the organizers of a conference on the Armenian question for “stabbing the Turkish nation in the back.”

Nevertheless, the more liberal voices in Turkey are well aware of the real and imaginary threats firing nationalist passions in their country. PKK terrorism in southeastern Turkey continues to worry the country's leaders, and the week before the Hrant Dink assassination, Turkey saw a marked escalation in the rhetoric about Kirkuk, from where Iraqi oil is pumped to Ceyhan (see SPIEGEL for more).