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Rebecca Anne Proctor is an independent journalist, editor, author, and broadcaster based in Dubai and Rome, from where she covers the Middle East and North Africa. She is the former editor-in-chief of Harper’s Bazaar Art and Harper’s Bazaar Interiors.
In thinking about how the crisis between Israel and the Hamas leadership in Gaza might play out, it’s useful to reflect upon the preceding Israeli incursion into Gaza in November 2012.
Observers have struggled to explain ongoing sectarian violence in southern Thailand given that both Thai Buddhists and Malay/Thai Muslims are victims of violence, have historically coexisted peacefully, and share local customs and spiritual traditions. Tim Rackett explores the role of majority and minority ethnic and religious identities in fueling sectarian violence and identifies a way out.
“I will not go to the ballot boxes again,” said a villager from Egypt’s Minya Governorate earlier this year.
The recent wave of violence between Israel and Hamas, which to date has resulted in the death of more than 100 Palestinians and the injury of several Israelis, continues to escalate with no clear sign of when it might end.
One year after the massive June 30 demonstrations against the Muslim Brotherhood (MB) and the July 3 ouster of President Mohammad Morsi by the military, the Egyptian MB is facing grave challenges that will shape the group’s future and that of political Islam.
Religious pluralism has been under threat and sectarianism on the rise during the ten-year (2004-2014) tenure of outgoing president Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono. Carool Kersten explains how local and regional authorities condone (and sometimes even stimulate) intimidation and hate crimes.
This article was first posted on the MEI Editor’s Blog.
Ibrahim al-Badri (also known as Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi) is being presented to the world by his followers as Commander of the Faithful of a new Islamic Caliphate.[1] How much weight can be attached to that move?
Westerners who have joined the ranks of radical groups fighting in Syria have been likened to time bombs—and in May one of them exploded in Brussels. Belgian police released chilling images from surveillance cameras of the lone gunman’s attack on Brussels’ Jewish Museum in Sablon, a neighborhood of genteel antique stores and chocolatiers.
Though it was not at the forefront of the pro-democracy movement, Egyptian labor played a decisive role in bringing down the Mubarak regime in 2011. Labor demonstrations had been increasing since late 2004, which helped to foster the atmosphere of protest in which Egyptians took to the streets in the thousands. The labor protests had emerged outside of the state-run Egyptian Trade Union Federation (ETUF), as workers felt that the institution that was supposedly representing their interests was actually defending the interests of the regime.
The Turks and Europe, by Gaston Gaillard, 1921
Religiously-inspired anti-pluralist actions, vigilante attacks, Islamist extremism, and terrorism—as well as a spectrum of ethnically, regionally, and religiously-based civilian groupings and paramilitary bands—have figured in Indonesian politics since the downfall of Suharto’s New Order dictatorial regime in 1998. However, not all areas of the country have experienced sectarian violence. Not all Indonesian Muslims are fanatics or zealots, nor are Muslim radicals the only agents of conflict. On the contrary, there are many instructive and inspiring examples across contemporary Indonesia of local leaders and communities that have produced and sustained religious harmony.
With the Syrian civil war raging and the ISIS offensive in northern Iraq creating a fresh crisis, Turkey now effectively has two failed states on its southern border and is dealing with new security, political, and economic challenges. Gonul Tol, director of MEI’s Turkish Center, explains how Turkey is responding to this predicament.
