Islamic World

Purim Puzzles

Purim, Judaism's strangest holiday (which this year falls on March 20), is prescribed by what may be the strangest book in the Hebrew Bible, the scroll (m'gilah) of Esther. Two public readings of the book, one at night and the other in the morning, tell a story of Persian palace intrigue in the fifth century B.C.E., a recitation accompanied by the holiday's decidedly unspiritual noisemaking, tippling, and masquerade.

An Open Letter to the Arab Street

First and foremost, congratulations. Even from our vantage point on the other side of a seemingly unbridgeable divide between our peoples, the extraordinary nature of what you have accomplished in recent weeks is obvious.

Follow the Money

The prestigious London School of Economics (LSE) is shocked—shocked—to discover that Muammar Qaddafi is a very bad man. So the once venerable institution is diverting some of the $2.5 million pledged through Qaddafi's son Saif al-Islam into a scholarship fund for Libyan students.

J Street’s Last Hurrah?

In a little over three years, a liberal lobby calling itself "passionately and unapologetically pro-Israel" appears to have either supplanted or co-opted other likeminded groups on the Jewish Left—among them, Americans for Peace Now, the Israel Policy Forum, and the New Israel Fund.

Strange Bedfellows

To the already boiling Middle East cauldron, add the prospect of new bilateral relations between two powers that have historically kept each other at arm's length: Egypt (Sunni, Arab, lately a client of the United States) and Iran (Shiite, Persian, patron of Hizballah and Hamas). One bone of contention between them has long been the Jewish state of Israel.

The Tribes Speak

Unrest is spreading in the Middle East, but everywhere it displays a unique character. Take Jordan. In an unprecedented public letter to King Abdullah II, thirty-six of the country's tribal leaders have warned that "Jordan will sooner or later be the target of an uprising similar to the ones in Tunisia and Egypt."

Cyrus, Ahmadinejad, and the Politics of Purim

Anyone who deplores the politicization of the past should have been apoplectic in September 2010 at the sight of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad receiving the loan of the "Cyrus Cylinder" from officials of the British Museum.

Blood Libels

Among the unexpected consequences of the January 9 shooting tragedy in Tucson has been the introduction into American public discourse of a term seldom used and poorly understood.

Arab Stirrings

On January 14, the strongman of Tunisia, Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali, fled in panic to Saudi Arabia after the astonishingly spontaneous, Facebook-driven crumbling of his corrupt regime.

The Hamas-Fatah Two-Step

Frustrated by the diplomatic deadlock over negotiations with the Palestinians, many Westerners, and some Israelis themselves, have focused on the need to accommodate the demands of Mahmoud Abbas and his Fatah-dominated Palestinian Authority (PA).