Qatar Rising
Taking the Lead in Middle Eastern Power Politics
On the Newsstand:Iran
Iraq’s Forgotten Postscript
One of the most remarkable untold stories of American involvement in Iraq is coming to an end.
The Sanctions Fallacy: Iran and Japan
The disadvantages of imposing sanctions too often go unexamined.
U.S.-Turkey-Iran
The United States must reenergize U.S.-Turkey relations; if it does not, it runs the risk of potentially losing one of its greatest Middle Eastern allies.
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The Machiavellian Megillah
Historical literature and the politics of warning, from Machiavelli to Netanyahu.
An Enduring Love and Loyalty
For over thirty years, Farah Pahlavi has been forbidden from setting foot in the country she once ruled. Married in 1959 to Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi, she reigned alongside him until the 1979 Islamic Revolution made pariahs of Iran’s powerful royal family, forcing them into the nightmare of exile. In her 2004 memoir An Enduring Love: My Life with the Shah, Pahlavi chronicles this nightmare and the years leading up to it with a bias only a proud leader could possess.
An Exercise in Non-Fiction
Sherbaz Mazari’s journey to disillusionment begins as early as 1948, after the creation of Pakistan. Hopes were running high and he was eager to serve his country when he took a group of tribesmen to fight for the liberation of Kashmir. Hearing stories of the Maharajah’s unlawful treaty granting the state to India and the oppression of Kashmiri Muslims, he gathered volunteers from the Mazari tribe and rode on horseback to the border of Kashmir to join the rebels.
Smashing Silence: An Iranian Woman’s Quest for Justice
I straddled a historical boundary sitting between my father and my grandmother as I pulled back the first page of Iranian activist-lawyer Shirin Ebadi’s autobiography. I bridged mother and son, linking the experiences of a once-17-year old man who fled and of a woman who stayed and endured the 1979 Iranian Revolution. Ebadi, the first Iranian and the first Muslim woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, makes a parallel connection with her memoir “Iran Awakening."
Secret Cyber Wars Are Here To Stay
A revolutionary computer virus that shut down Iran's nuclear centrifuges opens the door to all sorts of scary possibilities.
The Corruption of Language
Shariar Mandanipour on dissidence, censorship, and the freedom to write in Iran
