All Policy Analysis by Martin Kramer

MARTIN KRAMER Over the past twenty years, U.S. academic "experts" on the Middle East have failed to explain or anticipate change in the region they purport to study. This debacle is the result of their lack of intellectual distance, as well as the field's subversion by ideologically driven or faddish

On September 9, 2002, Martin Kramer and Mouafac Harb addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum with Robert Satloff. Dr. Kramer is the Wexler-Fromer fellow at the Institute, editor of Middle East Quarterly, and author of the Institute's best-selling publication Ivory Towers on Sand: The Failure of Middle Eastern Studies

The Middle East Studies Association of North America convenes Saturday in San Francisco. Its membership includes 2,600 "experts" on the Middle East, most of them based in universities. On Sept. 21, MESA's board issued a statement on the terror attacks against the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. It encapsulates

On October 16, 2001, Martin Kramer addressed The Washington Institute's Special Policy Forum. Dr. Kramer recently became editor of Middle East Quarterly, having finished a six-year term as director of Tel Aviv University's Moshe Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies. At the forum, he presented Ivory Towers on

There is an old adage that the first casualty of war is the truth. If offering up this casualty can spare real casualties in lives, it is worth sacrificing some truth. I heard it said the other day, by a very accomplished analyst of the Middle East, that this is

Are Middle Eastern studies in America in trouble? To judge from the numbers, the answer would appear to be "no." The Middle East Studies Association, known as MESA and founded in 1966, has more than 2,600 members. Across the country, there is an abundance of course offerings on the Middle

The political status of the Temple Mount in Jerusalem is the subject of final status negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians. According to press reports, at one moment in the Camp David negotiations last July, senior Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erakat asked his Israeli counterpart: "How do you know that your

MOUAFAC HARB Israel has no territorial claims over Lebanon, and the two countries agreed to recognize and accept United Nations Security Council Resolution 425, which calls for an unconditional Israeli troop withdrawal. Nevertheless, the Lebanese-Israeli peace track remains challenging, primarily because--after twenty years of civil war--Lebanon lacks a strong central

Two widespread analyses have accompanied this morning's opening of the eighth summit conference of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). The first is that the turnout-the "full house," as one Iranian newspaper put it-demonstrates the failure of the U.S. effort to isolate Iran. The second is that the showing

For nearly a year, Sheikh Rashid Ghanoushi has been seeking an American visa. Ghanoushi, the most prominent Islamist in the West, is the leader of Al-Nahda (The Revival), Tunisia's major Islamist grouping. Al-Nahda is now banned in Tunisia, and Ghanoushi resides in Britain. He would like to visit the United

On February 3, 1994, Asher Susser, director of Tel Aviv University's Dayan Center for Middle Eastern and African Studies, and Martin Kramer, associate director of the Dayan Center, addressed The Washington Institute's Policy Forum on the long-term potential for peace in the Middle East. The following is a rapporteur's summary

The foreign hostages in Lebanon are living reminders of the challenge posed to the West by Hezbollah, the Iranian-backed movement of fundamentalist Lebanese Shi’ites. Hezbollah has conducted its operational campaign with a great measure of strategic and tactical savvy. Yet its ideologues understand and represent its struggle as a war

The recent rioting and deaths in Mecca have shocked Muslims and confused the world. The hostility which led to bloodshed in the sacred city was prompted in part by the political tensions in the Gulf. But the tragedy is primarily one episode in a lengthy history of pilgrimage conflict between