Examines the dynamics that drive changes in the religio-political landscape of the Muslim world, the effects of 9/11, the global war on terrorism, and the war in Iraq. The authors present a typology of ideological tendencies; identify the factors that produce religious extremism religious violence; assess key cleavages along sectarian, ethnic, regional, and national lines; and identify possible strategies and military options for the United States to pursue in this critical and volatile part of the world.
The tectonic events of the past three years -- September 11 and Operation Enduring Freedom, the global war on terrorism, and the war in Iraq and its aftermath -- have dramatically affected the Muslim world and attitudes toward the United States. However, some of the dynamics that are influencing the environment in Muslim countries are also the product of trends that have been at work for many decades. The continuation of these trends will make management of the security environment in the Muslim world more difficult in years to come and could increase the demands on U.S. political and military resources. Consequently, it is important to develop a shaping strategy toward the Muslim world that will help to ameliorate the conditions that produce religious and political extremism and anti-U.S. attitudes. This RAND Corporation study has several purposes: (1) to develop a typology of ideological tendencies in the different regions of the Muslim world to identify the sectors with which the United States can find common ground to promote democracy and stability and counter the influence of extremist and violent groups; (2) to identify the factors that produce religious extremism and violence (i.e., the conditions, processes, and catalytic events that have given rise to Islamic radicalism); (3) to identify the key cleavages and fault lines among sectarian, ethnic, regional, and national lines and to assess how these cleavages generate challenges and opportunities for the United States; and (4) to identify possible strategies and sets of political and military options to help the United States meet challenges and exploit opportunities presented by changed conditions in the Muslim world. The regional structure of the report recognizes that while events since September 11 have affected U.S. relations with all parts of the Muslim world, they have done so in different ways in different regions. Abbreviations, glossary, and an extensive bibliography are included.
Islam is Americas fastest growing religion, with more than six million Muslims in the United States, all living in the shadow of 9/11. Who are our Muslim neighbors? What are their beliefs and desires? How are they coping with life under the War on Terror? In Mecca and Main Street, noted author and journalist Geneive Abdo offers illuminating answers to these questions. Gaining unprecedented access to Muslim communities in America, she traveled across the country, visiting schools, mosques, Islamic centers, radio stations, and homes. She reveals a community tired of being judged by American perceptions of Muslims overseas and eager to tell their own stories. Abdo brings these stories vividly to life, allowing us to hear their own voices and inviting us to understand their hopes and their fears. Inspiring, insightful, tough-minded, and even-handed, this book will appeal to those curious (or fearful) about the Muslim presence in America. It will also be warmly welcomed by the Muslim community.
This book examines the United States' foreign policies toward the Muslim world?including actions taken against Islamic countries who attempted to challenge the United States' regional dominance; and alliances with Pakistan, the United Arab Emirates, and Saudi Arabia. It focuses on how the U.S/ has reconfigured its policy towards the radical and the conservative group of Muslim countries and how its new mission against terrorism has affected international relations, particularly U.S.-Indian relations. Islamic revivalism, the emergence of a highly political Islamic population, the rise of terrorism, and other recent socio-political changes are also discussed.
Is the British press prejudiced against Muslims? In what ways can prejudice be explicit or subtle? This book uses a detailed analysis of over 140 million words of newspaper articles on Muslims and Islam, combining corpus linguistics and discourse analysis methods to produce an objective picture of media attitudes. The authors analyse representations around frequently cited topics such as Muslim women who wear the veil and 'hate preachers'. The analysis is self-reflexive and multidisciplinary, incorporating research on journalistic practices, readership patterns and attitude surveys to answer questions which include: what do journalists mean when they use phrases like 'devout Muslim' and how did the 9/11 and 7/7 attacks affect press reporting? This is a stimulating and unique book for those working in fields of discourse analysis and corpus linguistics, while clear explanations of linguistic terminology make it valuable to those in the fields of politics, media studies, journalism and Islamic studies.
The contributors to this volume examine various aspects of the fundamentalist religious response in the Islamic world to encroaching globalization, particularly since 9/11, and how the West has reacted in turn.
A searing portrait of Muslim life in the West, this “profound and intimate” memoir captures one man’s struggle to forge an American Muslim identity (Washington Post) Haroon Moghul was thrust into the spotlight after 9/11, becoming an undergraduate leader at New York University’s Islamic Center forced into appearances everywhere: on TV, before interfaith audiences, in print. Moghul was becoming a prominent voice for American Muslims even as he struggled with his relationship to Islam. In high school he was barely a believer and entirely convinced he was going to hell. He sometimes drank. He didn’t pray regularly. All he wanted was a girlfriend. But as he discovered, it wasn’t so easy to leave religion behind. To be true to himself, he needed to forge a unique American Muslim identity that reflected his beliefs and personality. How to Be a Muslim reveals a young man coping with the crushing pressure of a world that fears Muslims, struggling with his faith and searching for intellectual forebears, and suffering the onset of bipolar disorder. This is the story of the second-generation immigrant, of what it’s like to lose yourself between cultures and how to pick up the pieces.
Research Paper (postgraduate) from the year 2007 in the subject Politics - Region: Near East, Near Orient, , language: English, abstract: The alleged Al Qaeda attacks of November 9, 2001, have dramatically distorted the political environment between the Muslim and the Western world. Muslims live in a vast and diverse region that stretches from West Africa to the southern Philippines, as well as Muslim communities and Diaspora, scattered throughout the world. In the Muslim world, religion, politics, and culture are intertwined in complicated ways. This chapter is dedicated to dig-out and examine the dynamics that are driving changes in the political-religious landscape of the Muslim world, and to provide the global policymakers, the broader academic and security circle, with a general outline of events and recent trends, in the Islamic militia, that are most likely to affect U.S. interests and global security. In thus chapter, we can have an insight which ideological zeal Muslims in the Middle East and somewhere else seem to follow. They differ significantly not only in their religious views but also in their political and social orientation, in particular, women’s rights and the content of education and their tendency for violence. Based on such political and religious analysis an exploration will be undertaken within the two main streams of Islam, first and foremost those between the Sunni and Shiia branches and between the Arab and the non-Arab Muslims straight ait down to sub-national communities, tribes, and clans However, after 9/11, the Bush Administration along with a bundle of strategies came out and advocated to democratize the Arab world. The main strategy and rationale behind the US government security interest in promoting freedom and democracy is to reduce anti-American terrorism. According to their calculus, the more democracy promoted in the Middle East the less terrorist attack on the US targets take place. Policy designers of the US government might like the idea and would like to think from the American point of view that democracy in Arabia works as in the United States. Unfortunately, there’s no evidence for it and therefore, such a kind of decision making is basically wrong. In contrast, it is highly advisable to stop encouraging (and exporting) American democracy in Arabia and the Middle East.
After 9/11, there was an increase in both the incidence of hate crimes and government policies that targeted Arabs and Muslims and the proliferation of sympathetic portrayals of Arabs and Muslims in the U.S. media. Arabs and Muslims in the Media examines this paradox and investigates the increase of sympathetic images of “the enemy” during the War on Terror. Evelyn Alsultany explains that a new standard in racial and cultural representations emerged out of the multicultural movement of the 1990s that involves balancing a negative representation with a positive one, what she refers to as “simplified complex representations.” This has meant that if the storyline of a TV drama or film represents an Arab or Muslim as a terrorist, then the storyline also includes a “positive” representation of an Arab, Muslim, Arab American, or Muslim American to offset the potential stereotype. Analyzing how TV dramas such as The Practice, 24, Law and Order, NYPD Blue, and Sleeper Cell, news-reporting, and non-profit advertising have represented Arabs, Muslims, Arab Americans, and Muslim Americans during the War on Terror, this book demonstrates how more diverse representations do not in themselves solve the problem of racial stereotyping and how even seemingly positive images can produce meanings that can justify exclusion and inequality.
The volume, comprised of fourteen contributions from specialists in the field, is a serious attempt to address and analyze key factors affecting US interests. It suggests measures for the US policy makers and provides a policy framework for enabling the US to face challenges and opportunities in the Muslim world.
