Religion Dispatches
…r participant ever since. “Christian Zionist leaders have, for decades at least, been making coded and covert anti-Semitic statements and some of them have been pushing conspiracy theories that derive historically from such works as the Protocols of The Elders of Zion,” according to Wilson. “If one thing is clear, it’s that from now on there’s going to be a somewhat heightened level of scrutiny of public speech from Christian Zionist leaders.” “Th…
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…reject Moscow’s annexation of Crimea and its interference in the country’s east, “At the same time, the ensuing daily chaos and uncertainty, as well as the rising levels of nationalism and militarization in Ukraine, have drawn many to the emotional safety of the traditional family and religious values of the Orthodox Church — an institution that has been often guilty of bigotry and open hostility to sexual difference. Old Ukrainian folk narratives…
Read MoreOctavia Nasr, CNN’s senior Middle East editor, is no longer with CNN. Her departure from CNN shows a continued lack of consistency when it comes to issues of Arabs and Muslims in the mainstream media. She left for a tweet that said nothing except that she was human. Nasr is of Lebanese descent and proud of her birth land. Because of her professional and personal knowledge of the country, she expressed a sentiment over the death of Marja’ at-Taqli…
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…e statues were less about honoring the Civil War dead than they were about promoting 20th century white supremacy). In some ways, it’s not all that different from the ideas that sold people on the first Crusade back in the 11th century. And it’s not all that different from the story we tell ourselves today, every time we enter another country for their “own good.” Sure, we went into Iraq on the basis of false information about WMDs. But in the rhe…
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…new book, Interfaith Leadership: A Primer, came out in July, which was at least four months too early. In the heat of a bitter national election, a book calling for toned-down domestic diplomacy seemed out-of-sync with the political mood. Why talk with other people when you can vote them into submission? Interfaith Leadership: A Primer Eboo Patel Beacon Press September 2016 Now, after an election that has left many Americans feeling baffled, infur…
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…he very religion-state engagement the State Department initiative seeks to promote. Let me illustrate in relation to Europe. Europe’s historical entanglement with religion is deep and ancient. In fact, the very idea of “Europe” is a product of Christianity’s attempt to bring unity to this region under the auspices of the Holy Roman Empire. Moreover, the rise of European nation states in the early modern period is bound up with the contemporaneous…
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…Blind Spot is not half bad. The book includes a dazzling chapter by Middle East scholar Michael Rubin on the value of knowing a thing or two about post-1970s Iraqi and Iranian Sh’ia Islam (“Three Decades of Misreporting Iran and Iraq”), which should make any reader wonder how things have not gone exponentially worse for the United States in Iraq. There is also a valuable insider look at human rights initiatives launched by Christian groups during…
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…asting him as a lightning rod for conflict with America’s most feared and least understood enemies. While there is insufficient evidence to assume that this is an organized campaign, aspects of it give pause to the critical observer. Luttwak is about hawkish as they come (see his 1999 Foreign Affairs piece,“Give War a Chance”), scornfully dismissive of American involvement in Mideast dialogue or peace making, preferring instead that the various pa…
Read More…to defend Germany and all Europe against the Judeo-Bolshevik menace in the East, was widely popular, both in Germany and abroad—at least, as long as the Germans seemed to be winning the war. After World War II, as Communism spread across Eastern Europe, it carried the widespread fear that Jews were intent, not just on implementing Communism, but on taking revenge against their enemies. To what degree did this fear drive post-war anti-Semitism? I t…
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…uld identify on television, with the added bonus that he was also a fellow East Indian. However, I was puzzled as to how a child could have made the pilgrimage to Mecca and earned the title of “Hajji,” and as someone who spoke Urdu/Hindi and Punjabi, I had no idea what his magic words “sim sim salabim” meant. There was an Arab character (Cpl. Max Klinger), played by Jamie Farr on M*A*S*H, but he was a Lebanese Christian, not a Muslim. He also spen…
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