Epstein Secrets

aria (Islamic law) and too one-sided in favor of Israel. He's on record calling for "the permanent withdrawal of United States military forces from the Middle East and the Gulf." EFTA00712946 Feel better now? To its credit, the Times does not repeat the Journal's sleight of hand. Rather than being obscured,

xclusive and need not be in competition." Believing it was his role to repudiate neoconservatism, Obama completely missed the revolutionary wave of Middle Eastern democracy—precisely the wave the neocons had hoped to trigger with the overthrow of Saddam Hussein in Iraq. When revolution broke out—first in Iran

nter threats from Iran. But there is something dreadfully wrong with tying America's future position in the region to the birthplace and bastion of Salafism and its warped vision of a new order. Robin Wright the author of "Rock the Casbah: Rage and Rebellion Across the Islamic World," is a fellow at th

76195 survive war with Iran. In 2012, Mr Obama strikes a much flintier leader on the world stage. If he can build "strategic trust" with China in the Middle East, the habit could take hold elsewhere. One might say that the road to Xanadu goes through Tehran and Jerusalem. If he cannot, then he faces a tough

sar Allah, a Salafi group that had openly challenged Hamas' authority, and a number of its members. But short of using extreme violence to suppress Salafism in Gaza, which would have been too costly for Hamas, Hamas could not eliminate the Salafi challenge. It watched with worry as new Salafi groups em

ibility" to forge that peace. Writing in the Financial Times, former U.S. National Security Adviser Brent Scowcroft intoned: "The nature of the new Middle East cannot be known until the festering sore of the occupied territories is removed." Read: The fate of democracy hinges on Palestine. So do "Iran's h

only forces set free by the downfall of President Hosni Mubarak. One leading liberal politician told me last week that he had been barely aware of Salafism until after the revolution. Suddenly, Salafi spokesmen are all over the media and are organising politically. By some reckonings they could get 5 p

egional primacy - even, perhaps, of hegemony - to be attained through fanning rising Sunni militancy [1] and Salafist acculturation. At least seven Middle Eastern states are now beset by bitter, and increasingly violent, power struggles; states such as Lebanon, Egypt, Libya, Bahrain and Yemen are dismantling.

rms the vanguard of this new "Cultural Revolution": It aims however not to contain, but simply to displace traditional Sunnism with the culture of Salafism. Unlike the Brotherhood, this element, whose influence is growing exponentially - thanks to a flood of Gulf dollars - has no political ambitions wi

mpressive command of leading high-tech industries. The second, its up-to-date infrastructure, including high-speed Internet, far ahead of any other Middle Eastern country and even in some respects the United States. The third, its gift for entrepreneurial flair. The fourth is now oil and gas. When asked whet

me then under the paracolonial aegis of Great Britain. The kingdom was organized in religious terms by a version of Sunni Islam called Wahabism (or Salafism). Wahabism is a very strict puritanical doctrine that was notably intolerant not only of religions other than Islam but of other versions of Islam