WHAT could Barack Obama tell the Muslim world tomorrow that we would be happy to hear? He could tell us that he’s going to stay out of our elections.
This person is no longer with the Carnegie Endowment.
Omayma Abdel-Latif was a research and program associate at the Carnegie Middle East Center. Prior to joining Carnegie she was assistant Editor in Chief at Al-Ahram Weekly, the Middle East’s leading English weekly. She has done extensive work on Islamist movements with special emphasis on the Muslim Brotherhood of Egypt. She also covered a wide range of issues including Islamic-Western relations, political reform in Egypt, and political transition in Syria, Lebanon, and Iraq.
WHAT could Barack Obama tell the Muslim world tomorrow that we would be happy to hear? He could tell us that he’s going to stay out of our elections.
The decision made by the Special Tribunal for the Lebanon Court to release four generals held by the Lebanese authorities since August 2005 without trial has increasingly exacerbated political polarisation in the country one month away from parliamentary elections.
The Muslim Brotherhood’s first women’s division, the Muslim Sisters Group, was created in 1932. Since then, women activists have been at the forefront of the social and political struggle of the Muslim Brotherhood movement in Egypt.
Britain's policy change towards Hizbullah is a step in the right direction. Preconditions from Beirut should not be laid down.
Islamist women, increasingly restless with their subordinate status in Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood, are pushing for greater representation and a wider role. Their call for broader participation in decision-making bodies are not signs of a “rebellion of the Sisters,” but part of the normal dynamics of change.
Apart from some posters and banners scattered across the streets of Damascus announcing elections on April 22-23, there are few signs in Syria of the sort of election fever seen in some Arab countries recently.Electoral platforms addressing real issues are conspicuously absent.
In the face of Arab governments' ongoing, heavy-handed efforts to control public debate, the Internet has emerged as a platform for voices—especially those of Islamists—denied a place in the mainstream, state-owned media.