A picture of Baghdad

Writing about the People of Iraq

by Catherine Cobham and Fabio Caiani 23 March 2023 marked the twentieth anniversary of the attack on Iraq. Predictably, western mainstream media made little or no reference to contemporary Iraqi culture. Recently, however, there has been a growing interest in…

Introducing From Rumi to the Whirling Dervishes

by Walter Feldman Love is the Way and the Path of our Prophet. We are Love’s children, and Love is our Mother. Rumi These words echo down through the ages from when Mevlana (”Our Master”) Jalaluddin Rumi (d. 1273), first…

What are Tribes? Do They Still Matter?

by Scott Weiner What is a tribe? Social scientists have long been interested in tribes, but political science has struggled to talk about them. Tribes exist on every inhabited continent and are as foundational to many states as political parties,…

How ISIS Fights: New Books in National Security

In this great interview from New Books in National Security, Omar Ashour, author of How ISIS Fights: Military Tactics in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Egypt, talks to host Jeffrey Bristol about his work. They discuss the origin of Ashour’s study…