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121. Nonviolent Action Strategy: Lessons from Bahrain's Demonstration Movement

Author:
Loghman Fattahi
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
From February 14 to March 16, 2011, a demonstration movement swept Bahrain employing nonviolent action strategy to effect political and economic change in country. The success of a nonviolent action strategy rests on the ability of organizers to maximize the participation of individual and collective actors in the demonstration process. Participation increases the probability of overcoming the state's pillars of power, chiefly its security forces. Maximizing and managing participation is best achieved by building upon and sustaining the three pillars of a nonviolent action strategy: nonviolent unity, planning, and discipline.
Political Geography:
United States and Europe

122. Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula through the Framework of International Humanitarian Law

Author:
Simon Henderson
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
While Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) has garnered significant media attention, its role in the Middle East raises legal issues that are not currently being explored. With AQAP having presences in Saudi Arabia and Yemen, questions arise as to which legal frameworks can be utilized: international humanitarian law, human rights law, or criminal law. This paper will discuss some of these issues, with a particular focus on international humanitarian law.
Political Geography:
Middle East, Yemen, Arabia, and Saudi Arabia

123. A Regional Arms Race? Testing the Nuclear Domino Theory in the Middle East

Author:
Rizwan Ladha
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
In November 2011, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) released a much-anticipated report on the Iranian nuclear program, highlighting the fact that Iran has made significant progress on research and development toward a possible nuclear weapons program. Nonetheless, the report concluded that Iran's leaders had yet to make the decision to actively pursue the bomb.
Political Geography:
Iran and Middle East

124. Islamic Project Finance: Shari'a Compliant Financing of Large Scale Infrastructure Projects

Author:
Rishad Sadikot
Publication Date:
05-2012
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
Islamic finance has never seen greater appeal. Economically, Islamic finance is experiencing renewed interest due to growing dissatisfaction with the economic status quo and discredit suffered by conventional finance following the financial crisis. Politically, the Arab spring will ensure that Islamic finance plays a more extensive role in the economies of the region due to the fact that long repressed Islamist parties, which will now have a larger influence in the political landscape, have the promotion of Islamic finance as one of their top priorities. Furthermore, he success of post-revolutionary regimes depends on economic recovery.
Topic:
Financial Crisis
Political Geography:
Arabia

125. "Gaza on Their Minds: The Effect of 'Operation Cast Lead' in Mobilizing Palestinian Action"

Author:
Julia Fitzpatrick
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
On December 27, 2008, Israeli armed forces launched air raids on the Gaza Strip. In what Israeli military officials coined, “Operation Cast Lead,” Israeli forces attacked the Gaza Strip with twenty-three days of aerial assaults and ground incursions in an effort to weaken Hamas' power in Gaza and to bring an end to Hamas rockets fired into Israel. “Operation Cast Lead” was not the first Israeli attack in the Gaza Strip since Hamas seized power in 2007, but it was the largest Israeli military campaign since the Second Intifada and was reported to have caused the highest rates of casualties and injuries in a single day since 1948. The Arab press decried Israel's assault and described it as one of the worst attacks against Palestinians since the creation of Israel in 1948, what Palestinians call the “nakba,” or catastrophe. Populations in Arab countries took to the streets to protest Israel's actions and their own governments' complicity in them, with contentious demonstrations occurring in Jordan and Egypt, the only two Arab countries having formal peace agreements with Israel. But for Palestinians citizens of Israel (who are also called Arab Israelis or Arab citizens of Israel), or in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, “Operation Cast Lead” was a reminder of the splintered nature of the Palestinian national community in the face of continued occupation, evident in the increasing political separation of the Gaza Strip from the West Bank.
Political Geography:
Israel, Arabia, and Egypt

126. "Sanctioning Iran: The View from the United Arab Emirates"

Author:
Kosar Johani
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
Since its momentous formation in 1979, the Islamic Republic of Iran has perplexed the United States and its policymakers. Sanctions have been a cornerstone of U.S. policy toward Iran throughout this period, but have proven scarcely effective in changing Iran's behavior on the key issues they target: nuclear proliferation, sponsorship of terrorism, and human rights abuses. Yet, with every successive dispute, the United States has expanded the breadth and depth of its sanctions. U.S. policy recently culminated in the July 2010 Comprehensive Iran Sanctions, Accountability, and Divestment Act (CISADA), by far the most exhaustive measure of its kind. Like any sanctions regime, the effect of CISADA was enhanced by multilateral support: the United Nations Security Council, the European Union, Japan, South Korea, Norway, Canada, and Australia have imposed unilateral sanctions as well.
Political Geography:
Japan, Canada, Norway, South Korea, and Australia

127. "Let's Talk About Sex and Gender: The Case of Iran" A Book Review

Author:
Hafsa Kanjwal
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
During a widely reported and controversial lecture at Columbia University in New York, the Iranian President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, boldly declared: "In Iran we don't have homosexuals like in your country.” His statement, which caused ripples internationally, especially in the United States, underscores prolonged tensions on the subject of gender and sexuality in modern Iran, a nation experiencing what many have called “a sexual revolution.” How do we come to understand the history behind these tensions? How does this history relate to the broader historiography of gender and sexuality in the Islamicate? This review will look at two recent works, both published in the past decade, that have attempted to address these questions. The first book, entitled Women with Mustaches and Men Without Beards: Gender and Sexual Anxieties of Iranian Modernity, by Afsaneh Najmabadi draws upon visual and literary material from nineteenth century Iran during the Qajar period to demonstrate the centrality of gender and sexuality to the shaping of modern culture and politics in Iran.
Political Geography:
Iran

128. "Ahmad Urabi, Delegate of the People: Social Mobilization in Egypt on the Eve of Colonial Rule"

Author:
Sean Lyngaas
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
On June 11, 1882, the port of Alexandria lay smoldering in rubble. At the urging of the Egyptian viceroy, Tawfiq (r. 1879-1892), the British had bombarded the city in an effort to extinguish an insurrectionist government headed by Ahmad Urabi. Beneath the billows of smoke were the charred remains of a once-proud city. Alexandria had embodied much of what brought Egypt to the fore in the nineteenth century: openness to foreigners and commerce against the backdrop of a modernizing infrastructure. Now this noble concept was in flames, and with it went the vision of participatory government that had coalesced in the years prior to Alexandria's immolation. The Urabi Revolt (1881-1882) saw the Egyptian military capitalize on societal discontent, which had been brewing for decades, to usurp the Ottoman khedive. State repression of political freedoms, crippling taxes, discrimination in the Turco-Circassian bureaucracy, and a khedive, Tawfiq, who ultimately sided with Europeans over Egyptians, were all part of the brew that came to boil in the opening months of 1881.
Political Geography:
Europe and Egypt

129. From Coexistence to Cleansing: The Rise of Sectarian Violence in Baghdad, 2003-2007

Author:
Ches Thurber
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
Following the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the nature of violent conflict in Iraq evolved from an insurgency against the interim U.S.-supported government into a sectarian civil war, pitting the country's minority Sunni population against the majority Shia. By the summer of 2006, Iraqi on Iraqi violence had reached epic proportions. On most mornings, dozens of bodies could be found floating along the Tigris River. Iraqi men were executed for no reason other than having the name “Omar,” and militias set up checkpoints to verify the identity of all those out in the streets. According to Iraq Body Count, 3,182 civilians were killed in July 2006 and over 2,000 civilian casualties were reported each month through August 2007. 1 Over this same period of time, the city of Baghdad was separated into distinct homogeneous neighborhoods based on sectarian identity.
Political Geography:
United States

130. "Development and the Battle for Swat"

Author:
Rabia Zafar
Publication Date:
05-2011
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
al Nakhlah
Institution:
The Fletcher School, Tufts University
Abstract:
In the early summer of 2009, world attention focused on Pakistan as Taliban militants gained a foothold just 70 miles outside of the nation's capital, Islamabad, challenging the country's nascent civilian government. The government responded with a strong show of military force, pummeling the Swat Valley and surrounding areas with tanks, heavy artillery, and helicopter gunships. In the process, some 2 million people were internally displaced leaving Pakistan on the brink of a large-scale humanitarian crisis. By late June however, the military operation had started yielding results and the government claimed that the Malakand Division, including Swat, had been cleared of the Taliban. Most of the displaced civilians began returning to the area and international observers seemed satisfied that this story had come to an end. Yet, this battle, with its seemingly existential consequences and high-level human drama, was only one episode in a long chronicle of insurgency, extremism, and frustration in Swat.
Political Geography:
Taliban and Islamabad