Latest Articles about Middle East
Sufi Insurgent Groups in Iraq
The mystical approach to Islam known as Sufism has deep roots in Iraqi society. Adherents to Sufism normally stress prayer, meditation and the recitation of the various names of God as part of their effort to create a mystical communion between themselves and Allah. Yet... MORE
Jailing Jihadis: Saudi Arabia’s Special Terrorist Prisons
Saudi Arabia is nearing completion of new purpose-built prison facilities for its program of rehabilitation and counseling for Islamist militants. Under this program five new specialized prisons have been built in Riyadh, Qassim, Abha, Dammam, and Jiddah over the span of approximately nine months. These... MORE
Back with a Vengeance: Turkish Hezbollah
In a recent report submitted to the country’s National Security Council (NSC), Turkish police warned that the most powerful militant Islamist group in recent Turkish history has now recovered from the killing of its founder and the arrest of a substantial proportion of its armed... MORE
MEDVEDEV, MILITARY PROMOTE DIFFERENT OUTLOOKS FOR RUSSIA
On Saturday, January 19, the first deputy defense minister and chief of the General Staff, four-star general Yuri Baluyevsky, announced that Russia must build an armed force that will be ready to meet the challenges of the modern world. Baluyevsky sent a stern-sounding warning to... MORE
Al-Qaeda Completes its Organizational Mission in Iraq
This is the second of two articles assessing the content of Osama bin Laden’s December 29 statement. Since 2003, al-Qaeda has had dual but independently achievable goals in Iraq—the two can be termed “Islamist” and “organizational”—and each is assessed in bin Laden’s December 29, 2007... MORE
PUTIN’S SUCCESSOR LAYS OUT AMBITIOUS PLANS, BUT CAN HE DELIVER?
On January 22 Dmitry Medvedev laid out what are apparently the main planks of his presidential election campaign platform in an address to the Civic Forum, a gathering of representatives from some Russian non-governmental organizations and other groups sponsored by the Public Chamber, a Kremlin-appointed... MORE
TWO SETBACKS FOR THE KREMLIN AT THE COUNCIL OF EUROPE
On January 21 the Council of Europe’s Parliamentary Assembly (PACE) protected its reputation by eschewing the election of Mikhail Margelov as PACE president. Apparently, many members realized that PACE could have discredited itself irreparably by electing a Kremlin-affiliated figure as president of Europe’s leading democracy-promoting... MORE
U.S. Applies Terrorist Designation to Kurdistan Freedom Falcons
Following a full month of Turkish military strikes on bases of the rebel Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in northern Iraq, the movement appears to have signaled a switch to urban warfare with the January 3 Diyarbakır bombing in southeastern Turkey that killed seven (Anatolia, January... MORE
PUTIN AND MEDVEDEV OPEN THE BULGARIAN GATE FOR GAZPROM
Last week’s official visit to Bulgaria granted Russian President Vladimir Putin an opportunity to show that his power-transfer scheme worked impeccably, as the person standing next to him was Dmitry Medvedev, who had no business in Sofia in his official capacity as first deputy prime... MORE
VAN DER LINDEN’S FAREWELL DEAL WITH PUTIN
On January 17 Parliamentary Assembly of Council of Europe (PACE) President Rene van der Linden paid a farewell visit to Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin. With van der Linden’s term as PACE president expiring today (January 21), Putin invited him as a token... MORE