MER Article Villages of No Return During the bitter war with the guerrillas of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in the 1990s, the Turkish army and paramilitary “village guards” depopulated and burned villages in southeastern Turkey on a systematic scale. Clearance of the countryside and resettlement of the rural population, from which the PKK drew membership, Joost Jongerden • 11 min read
MER Article Editor's Picks (Summer 2005) Anderson, Betty. Nationalist Voices in Jordan: The Street and the State (Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 2005). Anderson, Irvine. Biblical Interpretation and Middle East Policy: The Promised Land, America and Israel, 1917-2002 (Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida, 2005). Arat, Yeşi The Editors • 1 min read
MER Article Europe and the Political Economy of Arab Cinema TEXTS REVIEWED: Roy Armes, Postcolonial Images: Studies in North African Film (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2005). Kevin Dwyer, Beyond Casablanca: M. A. Tazi and the Adventure of Moroccan Cinema (Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2004). Garay Menicucci • 4 min read
MER Article Europe, the US and the Strategic Triangle Oil is by its very nature a finite commodity. The question has always been not whether it would run out, but when it would. The doomsday scenarios that some predict --mass blackouts and the imminent demise of suburbia -- may be far-fetched, but the era of “peak oil” is here. Saad Rahim • 13 min read
MER Article A Dangerous Trend in Cyprus One year after a failed referendum on reunification, divisions on the island of Cyprus are widening. In both the Turkish north and the majority-Greek south, ethnic nationalism is on the rise. Rebecca Bryant • 16 min read
MER Article Reluctant Partners Turkey passed a milestone in its long and arduous journey toward acceptance into the exclusive club of the European Union when the EU gave Turkey a date for the start of accession talks. But major obstacles remain -- chiefly resurgent anti-Muslim feeling in Europe and resurgent ethnic nationalism in Hilal Elver • 14 min read
MER Article The Republic's "Second Religion" The 2004 law banning "conspicuous" religious symbols (read, headscarves) in French public schools cast France as an intolerant and radically secular state hostile to the manifestation of difference, especially Muslim difference, in the public sphere. During debates about the new law, a clear distinc Mayanthi Fernando • 16 min read
MER Article Lions of Tawhid in the Polder The murder of the controversial filmmaker Theo van Gogh by a radical Islamist youth induced a deep national trauma in the Netherlands. Very quickly, debate about the murder and the subsequent outbreak of anti-Muslim violence led to a larger and disturbing debate about the place of Muslims and Islam Fadi Hirzalla, Paul Aarts • 15 min read
MER Article The Targeted and the Untargeted of Nablus On April 14, 2005, Ibrahim Isneiri, a member of the al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, was shot dead by Israeli forces in the Balata refugee camp on the outskirts of Nablus, a town located between two mountains in the northern West Bank. Palestinian eyewitnesses said Israeli forces opened fire first, while t Amahl Bishara • 10 min read
MER Article Rhetorical Acrobatics and Reputations The inaugural report of Egypt's state-sponsored National Council for Human Rights raised eyebrows when it was released in April 2005. The 358-page document acknowledged claims of torture in the country's police stations and called for an end to the emergency laws that have effectively suspended the Joshua Stacher • 17 min read
MER Article From the Editors (Summer 2005) There is one cliché about the killing field that is US-occupied Iraq that rings true. There is no “good option,” no magic wand that will make the violence bedeviling the country disappear. The question ought to be which of the bad options offers the best hope for achieving a sovereign Iraq with a mi The Editors • 3 min read
