The role of Iran’s Supreme Leader, based on a claim to embody the same infallible, divine authority as the Prophet Muhammad, contradicts centuries of Islamic doctrine. It is a wholly made-up office, and its legitimacy has never been more in doubt. Read More Here
The amazing point is that religion can serve as a unifier—bringing people of different backgrounds together—not a divider. Read More Here
Saudi Arabia and India are approaching their relationship keeping in mind the larger global context, Dr. S. Jaishankar told Arab News in an exclusive interview during his first official visit to the Kingdom as the external affairs minister of India. Read More Here
Like Khomeini and Khamenei, Sadr seeks to impose that which he cannot gain by consensus. Read More Here
Almost inevitably, violent non-state revolutionary groups tend to be founded by charismatic figures. Osama bin Laden and Abu Musab al-Zarqawi epitomise this trend. Both men, in their own ways, presented themselves as the embodiment of their group’s values and purpose. Read More Here
Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar recently won plaudits, particularly in Muslim countries, for his confident assertion of the country’s strategic autonomy concerning the Ukraine war. But then the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party unleashed more Hindu-chauvinist rhetoric, severely damaging India’s standing in the Islamic world. Read More Here
From War and Anti-war: Making Sense of Today’s Global Chaos by Alvin and Heidi Toffler (Warner Books 1993) Each of these mind wrenches is designed to exploit the mass media to sway emotions in mass societies. Atrocity accusation Hyperbolic inflation of the stakes involved in a battle or war (soldiers and civilians told everything they […]
Jihadist ideology and the radical Islamism the blasphemy law has spawned is unlikely to be uprooted altogether—for it is the sole source of domestic and regional leverage for Pakistan’s rulers. Read More Here
The struggle for geopolitical primacy between Iran’s Shiite theocracy and the countries led by Sunni Arabs and, more recently, Sunni Turkey is stoking conflict across the region—eroding social compacts, worsening state dysfunction, and catalyzing extremist movements. Read More Here
Reminiscent of their previous harsh rule in the 1990s, the Taliban have already begun to wipe out some of Afghanistan’s gains of 20 years. They’ve denied women a seat at the Cabinet, beaten journalists into silence and enforced their severe interpretation of Islam, on occasion violently. Read More Here
looking beyond borders 