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Islam
جدلية صعود أبو الفتوح وإمكانية استنساخ النموذج الأردوجاني
![[AP عبد المنعم أبو الفتوح المرشح للرئاسة في مصر. تصويرخليل حمرا. المصدر]](/content_images/3/sm_Mideast-Egypt_Horo-7-635x357.jpg "[AP عبد المنعم أبو الفتوح المرشح للرئاسة في مصر. تصويرخليل حمرا. المصدر]")
جاء الصعود السريع لحضور ودور أبو الفتوح في سباق الرئاسة المصرية ليعيد إلى الأذهان تجربة الصعود السياسي لأردوجان في تركيا في نهاية التسعينات وبداية القرن الحادي والعشرين. ولعل العودة إلى السنوات الخمس البارزة في تاريخ النظام السياسي التركي، خصوصا بين عامي 1997- 2002، تعين على فهم وتفسير عمليات وسياسات وسياقات صعود القيادات والحركات السياسية من خلال المقارنة بين أبو الفتوح وأردوجان وكشف جوانب التشابه والاختلاف بين النمطين والسياقين. ويلاحظ بداية أن تجربة خروج أبو الفتوح من عباءة الإخوان تشبه من أوجه عدة خروج أردوجان من حزب الرفاه وتحديه لقيادة الحركة الإسلامية التي كان يمثلها نجم الدين أربكان خصوصا بعد الصدام بين أربكان والمؤسسة العسكرية في عام 1997 الذي أدى إلى عزل ...
Keep Reading »Birds of Darkness In The Egyptian Sky
![[Image from Alakhbar English]](/content_images/3/sm_Adel_Imam_MB_pic_1.jpg "[Image from Alakhbar English]")
The Misdemeanor Court in al-Haram, Cairo held up a three-month prison sentence on Tuesday against Adel Imam, one of the most popular comedians in the region. He was accused by Islamists of insulting religion in his films, some dating back 30 years. The Birds of Darkness, from the title of one of Adel Imam’s most famous movies critical of Islamists, have not only set their sights on Imam. They have the potential to lay their dark shadows on freedom of thought in all of Egypt. This realization comes after a legal campaign against the infamous actor which has prompted the first solidarity campaign with Imam in many years, especially since he had sided with Hosni Mubarak ...
Keep Reading »Kuwait's Legislative Absurdity: Kuwaiti MPs Approve Death Penalty for “Cursing God”
![[Emir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah addresses parliament in Kuwait City Feb. 15, 2012, signaling the opening of the new legislative term. Image by Kuwaitelections2012/Flickr.]](/content_images/3/sm_6886746023_db44802e4d_b.jpg "[Emir Sheikh Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah addresses parliament in Kuwait City Feb. 15, 2012, signaling the opening of the new legislative term. Image by Kuwaitelections2012/Flickr.]")
Where to begin? The 1961 Press and Publications Law in Kuwait stipulates that blasphemy is a crime punishable by a prison sentence that ranges from a few months to several years. Following more stringent laws in Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, the Kuwaiti Parliament just approved provisionally--pending a second vote--the death penalty for those who defame God, or the Prophet and his wives. Apparently, ”[t]he move to stiffen penalties for religious crimes came after authorities last month arrested a Shiite tweeter for allegedly cursing the Prophet Mohammed, his wife and some companions.” It also comes in response to increasing incidents of ...
Keep Reading »Reflections on Ideology After the Arab Uprisings
A key conceptual problem for observers of the Arab uprisings–academics and journalists alike–continues to be how to classify and assess the ideological transformations taking place. “The people want the downfall of the regime,” the central slogan of the uprisings, has been interpreted as anything from a return to pan-Arab sentiments to a new Arab liberalism. For some, it signaled the unification of action around a single idea that resisted the atomization of Arab societies under the neoliberal-military-Western nexus of power. Many in the West now regard the revolutionary potential more skeptically, not least due to Islamist parties winning elections. The question is ...
Keep Reading »الإخوان في البرلمان؛ محاولة للفهم
![[عقد جلسة للبرلمان المصري,تصويراسمة وجيه, AP ]](/content_images/3/sm_egypt1j.jpg "[عقد جلسة للبرلمان المصري,تصويراسمة وجيه, AP ]")
حققت جماعة "الإخوان المسلمون" فوزاً كبيراً في الانتخابات التشريعية المصرية الأخيرة، والتى تعد بحق أول انتخابات نزيهة تجري في مصر منذ ثورة يوليو ١٩٥٢. لم تكن النتائج مفاجئة بنظر الكثيرين، فتاريخ الإخوان النضالي وتنظيمهم وقاعدتهم الشعبية كانت عوامل واضحة ومؤشرة إلى فوزهم المحتمل. بدا المشهد يوم الثالث والعشرين من يناير٢٠١٢ وكأن ثورة يناير ٢٠١٢ أفرزت بعد عام أول ثمارها. ورغم تخوفات البعض من سيطرة التيار الإسلامي فقد اعتقد الكثيرون أن كوادر الإخوان مؤهلة بالفعل لتولى دفة الثورة. وسادت اعتقادات أخرى أكثر ثقة وتفاؤلاً بأن المجلس الوليد صاحب الشرعية قادر على إدارة التغيير والتصدي لسياسات المجلس العسكري بل واقترح البعض أن يتسلم البرلمان سلطات المجلس ...
Keep Reading »Building the New Egypt: Islamic Televangelists, Revolutionary Ethics, and 'Productive' Citizenship
![[A Salafi activist holds up a copy of the Quran in Tahrir square. Image by Paul Kohlbry.]](/content_images/3/sm_SalafiActivistTahrir.png "[A Salafi activist holds up a copy of the Quran in Tahrir square. Image by Paul Kohlbry.]")
Appearing on state television after the fall of Mubarak for the first time in his career, the famous Egyptian Islamic televangelist Amr Khaled told the program host that he had seen God in Tahrir. “I saw God in Tahrir,” he said. “When you entered Tahrir Square you immediately noticed a different spirit. It is as if God was with all the people there
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Al-Zahawi's Revolt in Hell (Part I)
![[ Jamil Sidqi al-Zahawi (1863-1936). Image from ar.wikipedia.org]](/content_images/3/sm_Zahawi.jpg "[ Jamil Sidqi al-Zahawi (1863-1936). Image from ar.wikipedia.org]")
The thawra of Jamil Sidqi al-Zahawi Jamil Sidqi al-Zahawi (1863-1936) was an Iraqi poet, critical figure in the development of Arabic literary modernism, and a scholarly and outspoken contributor to political and social debates during the early part of the twentieth century. Zahawi envisaged a revolutionary role for poetry, transforming the purpose of verse into a utility by which contemporary social critiques could be posed. This is evident in his staunch support for women’s rights, his involvement in the politics of the Ottoman Empire until the constitution of 1908, his affiliation with the Young Turks, as well as his avid observation of the political currents in ...
Keep Reading »Flowering of the Arab Spring: Understanding Tunisia’s Elections Results
![[Tunisian election workers count ballots at the end of voting for the election in Tunis. Image by Louafi Larbi of Reuters.]](/content_images/3/sm_tunisia_elections_ballot_vote_count.jpg "[Tunisian election workers count ballots at the end of voting for the election in Tunis. Image by Louafi Larbi of Reuters.]")
In early 1994 a small Islamic think tank affiliated with the University of South Florida (USF) planned an academic forum to host Rachid Ghannouchi, the leader of the main opposition party in Tunisia, Ennahdha. The objective of this annual event was to give Western academics and intellectuals a rare opportunity to engage an Islamically-oriented intellectual or political leader at a time when the political discourse was dominated by Samuel Huntington’s much hyped clash of civilizations thesis. Shortly after the public announcement of the event, pro-Israeli groups and advocates led by Martin Kramer, Daniel Pipes, Steven Emerson, the head of the local B’nai B’rith, and a ...
Keep Reading »New Texts Out Now: Saadia Toor, "The State of Islam: Culture and Cold War Politics in Pakistan"
Saadia Toor, The State of Islam: Culture and Cold War Politics in Pakistan. London and New York: Pluto Press, 2011. Jadaliyya: What made you write this book? Saadia Toor: I felt compelled to write this book because of the increasingly disturbing discourse on Pakistan in the West, both within the media and within academia. There is a mixture of incomprehension and hawkishness in this discourse when it comes to Pakistan, which is extremely dangerous given the increasing extension of the US/NATO war in Afghanistan into Pakistan. I believe that the ease with which even anti-war liberals (and sometimes Leftists) support, explicitly or implicitly, the covert war in Pakistan ...
Keep Reading »Religious Liberty, Minorities, and Islam: An Interview with Saba Mahmood
![[Saba Mahmood. Image from Barnard.edu]](/content_images/3/sm_sabamahmoodssrc.jpg "[Saba Mahmood. Image from Barnard.edu]")
Saba Mahmood is an anthropologist who teaches at the University of California, Berkeley, and whose work raises challenging questions about the relationship between religion and secularism, ethics and politics, agency and freedom. Her book Politics of Piety, a study of a grassroots women’s piety movement in Cairo, questions the analytical and political claims of feminism as well as the secular liberal assumptions on the basis of which such movements are often judged. In the volume Is Critique Secular?she joins Talal Asad, Judith Butler, and Wendy Brown in rethinking the Danish cartoon controversy as a conflict between blasphemy and free speech, between ...
Keep Reading »New Texts Out Now: Mohammad Salama and Rachel Friedman, Locating the Secular in Sayyid Qutb
Mohammad Salama and Rachel Friedman, “Locating the Secular in Sayyid Qutb.” Arab Studies Journal Vol. XX No. 1 (Spring 2012). Jadaliyya (J): What led you to write this article? Mohammad Salama and Rachel Friedman (MS and RF): The post-revolutionary political scene in Egypt, with at least fourteen Islamist parties vying for power, is a timely historical moment to take a close look at the dynamics of religious authority versus the so-called secular. As the Egyptian people succeeded in overthrowing ...
Keep Reading »الأزهر يريد تحرير أفغانستان
قصة لابد منها: منذ عقد أو يزيد كانت المواقف السياسية للأزهر الشريف تتسم بكونها بطيئة وهادئة مهما كانت جسامة الحدث وخطورته، وقتها كان يروج للجماهير عبر وسائل الإعلام أن تلك هي وسطية الإسلام وأن عليهم آلا ينصرفوا إلى الآخرين المتعصبين، كما أن الأزهر كمؤسسة دينية لا دخل لها بالشؤون السياسية التي يتولاها أهلها من ذوى الخبرة والحكمة. وحينما تولى شيخ الأزهر الحالي الدكتور/ أحمد الطيب منصبه، صُدمت الجماهير، ذلك أن رجل الدين هو نفسه عضو لجنة السياسات التابعة للحزب الوطني والتي كان يرأسها آنذاك نجل الرئيس ...
Keep Reading »Covering Iran's Ninjas
On the evening of 29 March, a line in my twitter feed read, “You don’t want to mess with Iran’s lady ninjas.” Cara Park’s snarky comment had been retweeted by someone I follow in Cairo. I clicked her link to find she’s a deputy managing editor of Foreign Policy, blogging on the suspensions of Reuters’ accreditation in Iran over their reporting on women training in ninjutsu: In case it wasn’t obvious, you don’t want to offend a highly-trained cadre of Iranian ninjas. Anger these black-belted beauties ...
Keep Reading »Syria's Islamic Movement and the Current Uprising: Political Acquiescence, Quietism, and Dissent
In one of his recent papers, Steven Heydemann writes that the attempts of forces behind the Syrian uprising and the Syrian National Council (SNC) to define themselves as the pre-eminent nationalist force in the country risk backfiring. This is because they face a regime that has successfully justified its rule by constantly emphasizing its own pan-Arab and nationalist credentials. Effectively, therefore, these self-identifications stir up precisely the old political sympathies and fears that have ...
Keep Reading »New Texts Out Now: Pascale Ghazaleh, Held in Trust: Waqf in the Islamic World
Pascale Ghazaleh, editor, Held in Trust: Waqf in the Islamic World. Cairo and New York: American University of Cairo Press, 2011. Jadaliyya (J): What made you put together this book? Pascale Ghazaleh (PG): This book brings together articles written by scholars from different countries, working on different aspects of waqf during different periods. These articles were originally papers submitted to the annual seminar organized by Dr. Nelly Hanna of the American University in Cairo's Arab and ...
Keep Reading »Ayaan Hirsi Ali's War
For a couple of centuries now, we have had to make due with Samuel Johnson’s famous phrase: “Patriotism is the last refuge of a scoundrel.” Thanks to Ayaan Hirsi Ali, we can now revise this phrase for the twenty-first century. Tthe last last refuge of a scoundrel, it appears, lies in taking up the battle against something called “Christophobia.” Hirsi Ali coins this term as part of her alarmist and deeply hateful cover story for Newsweek. “The War on Christians” is splashed across the cover, but the ...
Keep Reading »New Texts Out Now: Nile Green, Bombay Islam: The Religious Economy of the West Indian Ocean, 1840-1915
Nile Green, Bombay Islam: The Religious Economy of the West Indian Ocean, 1840-1915. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press, 2011. [Co-winner of the 2011 Albert Hourani Book Award] Jadaliyya: What made you write this book? Nile Green: It took me some time to realize the importance of Bombay to Muslims from all around the Indian Ocean, but after so many textual trails led me there, I realized I had to write a book about Bombay and its steam-spun web of connections. The documentation was ...
Keep Reading »New Texts Out Now: Amal Ghazal, "Islamic Reform and Arab Nationalism"
Amal N. Ghazal, Islamic Reform and Arab Nationalism: Expanding the Crescent from the Mediterranean to the Indian Ocean (1880s-1930s). New York: Routledge, 2010. Jadaliyya: What made you write this book? Amal Ghazal: I wanted to find a topic that bridged my two fields of study, Middle East Studies and African Studies. I thought Omani rule in East Africa would be interesting, especially in that I was initially able to trace correspondence between Arabs in East Africa and newspapers in the Middle East. A ...
Keep Reading »Fear, Inc.: The Roots of the Islamaphobia Network
[Below is the latest from the Center for American Progress on Islamaphobia in the United States.] Fast Facts on the Islamophobia Network This in-depth investigation conducted by the Center for American Progress Action Fund reveals not a vast right-wing conspiracy behind the rise of Islamophobia in our nation but rather a small, tightly net- worked group of misinformation experts guiding an effort that reach- es millions of Americans through effective advocates, media partners, and grassroots ...
Keep Reading »New Texts Out Now: Mohammad R. Salama, "Islam, Orientalism, and Intellectual History"
Mohammad R. Salama, Islam, Orientalism, and Intellectual History: Modernity and the Politics of Exclusion since Ibn Khaldun. London and New York: I. B Tauris, 2011. Jadaliyya: What made you write this book? Mohammad Salama: There were a few reasons that compelled me to write this book. First, I am a Muslim who has been living in the US since the September 11 attacks, and I have witnessed the dire consequences of those events on personal and public levels. After so much misinformation about ...
Keep Reading »Infomous
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