Archives for 2002

Al-Qaida Continues to Recruit The Sunday Times reported on 7/21 that British intelligence now estimates that some 4,000 Muslims with British citizenship passed through al-Qaida training camps, many of them having fought in Afghanistan, Chechnya or the Balkans before returning to the UK. Previous estimates had been 80 or so. If true, this report indicates […]

Turkey and Iraq Although Turkey is rumored to have acquiesced in a US attack on Iraq, assuming it is paid billions of dollars up front for its economic losses on the Iraq front, it is clear that substantial questions remain in the minds of Turkish politicians about this course. Given the instability of the current […]

The Chronicle of Higher Education July 24, 2002 [Online Edn. July 16] Why We Should Not Boycott Israeli Academics By JUAN COLE OPINION: THE CALL for an academic boycott of Israel is misguided, writes Juan Cole, a Middle East specialist at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. Many Israeli academics support the struggling peace […]

History News Network ( http://chnm.gmu.edu/hnn/ )7-08-02: News Abroad——————————————————————————– It’s Time for Sharon to Go Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon has reoccupied the West Bank in response to terrorist attacks from Palestinian radicals, putting the entire population under a grueling curfew. In April, Human Rights Watch accused the Israeli army of extensive violations of international law […]

Afghanistan: Ansari article in Payam-i Mujahid The most recent Payam-i Mujahid, the organ of the Afghan Jami`at-i Islami (a major stream in the “Northern Alliance”) carries an article by Bashir Ahmad Ansari on the history of absolutism in Islam. The article begins with an assertion that consultative (mashvirat) government and voting were normative in very […]

Date: Mon, 8 Jul 2002 08:12:10 -0400 (EDT) To: Gulf2000 More on the split among radical Islamists The Islamic Group leadership in prison recently issued a formal apology for its past acts of terrorism against the Egyptian people, including the assassination of Sadat, and condemned the September 11 attacks as contrary to Islam in a […]

Muntasir al-Zayyat: Zawahiri is alive Al-Sharq al-Awsat for July 5, 2002, has an interview with the prominent Egyptian Muslim fundamentalist lawyer Muntasir al-Zayyat. He was close to al-Jihad al-Islami for many years and knew Ayman al-Zawahiri, its leader and Bin Ladin’s right hand man, intimately. The two fell out over al-Zayyat’s having gravitated to al-Gamaa […]

Date: Wed, 3 Jul 2002 15:29:02 -0400 (EDT) To: gulf2000 list From: Juan Cole Commentary on Hanson, “Our Enemies, the Saudis” in Commentary Re: http://www.commentarymagazine.com/hanson.htm I don’t mind so much that Hanson is a specialist in ancient Rome who knows no Arabic and has never lived in the Middle East, and yet delivers himself of […]

History News Network ( http://chnm.gmu.edu/hnn/ )6-24-02 FOREIGN AFFAIRS——————————————————————————– By Juan R. I. Cole Juan Cole is professor of Modern Middle Eastern and South Asian History at the University of Michigan. The world in 2002 is plunged into war or preparation for it in a number of significant hotspots. During the past decade, we have entered […]