The Revenge of the Truth

in
The ‘facts on the ground' do not always have a direct bearing on the policies that emerge in response to what is really happening. This is no more true than in today's Iraq - and in the policy responses that are the fallout for the Middle East of what is taking place in Iraq. Policy - in the form of the arguments emerging from Washington as well as from among some of those states to which it remains allied in the region - is not driven by the reality of a ‘Sunni-Shia' split in Iraq; instead, writes Joshua Craze, the policy of seeking the existence of a Sunni-Shia split is now creating the circumstances in which such a split might become a reality. The US Vice President Dick Cheney's assertion that a ‘cold war' between Sunni and Shia is in the offing, was not based on the view that there is a cold war - but on the need to create the impression that such a war exists. And to what end is all this taking place? Contending with Iran is clearly at its heart - with the focus being on holding Iran responsible for the situation in Iraq - despite the violence in Baghdad being committed by Sunni insurgents, and there being no definitive evidence that this ‘cold war' - or a ‘hot' equivalent - is really taking place.
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Capital's War

in
Later this month George Bush, stumbling into the last year of his presidency, with his allies deserting him in droves, will make a grand tour of the Middle East. Along the way, he will make his first visit to a country that has remained steadfastly loyal to the American government, muted criticisms of American actions in Iraq and Israeli actions in Lebanon aside: Saudi Arabia.
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Saudi Arabia: A state for rent?

in
Another month, another series of proposals on how to bring democracy to Saudi Arabia. Recent efforts include the Centre for Contemporary Conflict, which recommends developing private enterprise, and the Washington Quarterly, which argues for engaging with the autocrats. Many such proposals import a model of the state based on the Western experience, and lack an appreciation of just how different other states can be.
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The desert and the city. Two stories.

in
This year sees two notable anniversaries. It is the fifth anniversary of the 9/11 attack, and the newspapers are full of commentators(1) trying to work out the relationship between Wahhabism, Al Qaeda and the House of Saud. Meanwhile, in July of this year, a conference(2) of Arab writers gathered in Yemen’s capital Sana’a to mark a little noticed event – the 600th anniversary of Ibn Khaldun’s (1332-1406) death.
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Miniature

in

You cannot see them. Small figures entwined in the metal that stretches to the sun come morning. They are concealed in a minature which is itself a concealment: the dreams of giants concealed in the reverie of infants.

To minaturise. To make useless. To remove from any claim or cause until the object stands in grotesque rememberance of its power. To minaturise is to liberate. Liberated from meaning into the fragility of existence. As breakable and fleeting as steel and stone.

Its to make whole what was once myriad – it is to make fragments out of meanings and render them mobile.

Minature.

A traveller’s portable God.