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Dr. Zogby — Washington Watch
Monday July 16, 2012
A few weeks back, the sensation-seeking Representative Michele Bachmann did her best imitation of the late Senator Joseph McCarthy. She and four of her Congressional colleagues released letters they had collectively sent to the Inspectors General of the Departments of State, Justice, Defense, and Homeland Security, and the Office of the Directorate of National Intelligence calling on them to investigate whether "influence operations conducted by individuals and organizations associated with the Muslim Brotherhood" have "had an impact on the federal government's national security policies.” Read More »
Monday July 09, 2012
With neighboring Syria imploding, tensions with Iran mounting, and Israel ever threatening, Lebanon appears to be on the brink of conflict. But then that has been the story of Lebanon for decades now. This remarkably beautiful country filled with extraordinary people has long been a victim of its history, its own leaders and the machinations of outsiders. This may be Lebanon's past and present, but if we listen to the Lebanese people, it need not be the country's future. Read More »
Sunday July 01, 2012
Supreme Constitutional Court (SCC) Chair Farouk Sultan's nearly interminable announcement of the outcome of Egypt's presidential election tested his nation's patience. Twitter commentary on his speech's almost mind-numbing detail, while hilarious, masked an underlying nervousness that this was but an effort to wear everyone down preparing the ground for the announcement that the winner was, in fact, General Ahmed Shafik. Read More »
Monday June 25, 2012
Ralph Nader is without a doubt one of the truly transformational figures in contemporary American history. We drink cleaner water, breathe purer air, drive safer cars, and are better protected at work and at play, because of the movement he led. Read More »
Monday June 18, 2012
A few weeks ago a Palestinian-American woman, Sandra Tamari, traveling to the West Bank to visit her family was stopped by Israeli airport officials and ordered to log on to her email account and provide her password so that the Israelis could read her private communications. They insisted this be done before they would allow her to enter the country. From reports we are receiving, this practice has become routine. Read More »
Monday June 11, 2012
For Arab Americans, the big election news of the past week didn't come out of just Wisconsin or Egypt. As important as these contests was Congressman Bill Pascrell's stunning victory over Congressman Steve Rothman in northern New Jersey's 9th District. Read More »
Monday June 04, 2012
One year ago, on the second anniversary of President Obama's historic Cairo University address to the Muslim World, we released the results of our 2011 Arab World polling . The findings were devastating, though not wholly unexpected. What we found was that America's overall favorable ratings across the Arab World were lower in 2011 than they had been in the last year of the Bush Administration. Read More »
Tuesday May 29, 2012
Republican presidential challenger, Mitt Romney was given credit last week for refusing to endorse a proposed ad campaign that sought to link President Barack Obama with the controversial sermons delivered by his former pastor Jeremiah Wright. In doing so, Romney appeared to be demonstrating the same streak of decency that wouldn't allow him to join in with the silly "birther" cabal, or the "Islamophobic" hysteria when these tendencies were all in vogue. Read More »
Monday May 21, 2012
Never before have we seen such a competitive contest in Egypt or, for that matter, in any Arab country. And never before have we had a presidential contest, anywhere in the world that I can recall, where we have no idea what the winner will actually win when the election is over. Read More »
Saturday May 12, 2012
Benjamin Netanyahu, ever the master maneuverer, has done it again. Just moments before the Israeli Parliament was to ratify the call for new elections, the Kadima Party announced that it had completed negotiations with the Prime Minister and would join the government producing Israel's largest governing coalition in history (including 94 of 120 Members of the Knesset). The announcement sent shockwaves throughout the region and here in the US. Speculation was rife about what this sudden move might mean. Read More »
Monday May 07, 2012
When a senior White House national security official traveled to New York City recently to praise that city's police department, he stoked the embers of a controversy between the Administration and the Arab American and American Muslim communities. The official's words, quoted by the Associated Press (AP), "I have full confidence that the New York Police Department is doing things consistent with the law" and his terming the department's work a "success" were especially troubling... Read More »
Monday April 30, 2012
It was rough going, but Mitt Romney, having run the gamut of the U.S. presidential primary process, has survived. He can now be considered the Republican Party's presumptive nominee. From the beginning, Romney had distinct advantages over his opponents. He had run before—and had, in fact, not stopped running since losing to John McCain in 2008. Read More »
Saturday April 21, 2012
With all of the dramatic and sometimes discouraging developments currently taking place across the Arab World, the challenges faced by the small but vibrant Arab American community are often given short shrift. This week we took time to acknowledge the threats to the community's security and well-being and the efforts being made to address these challenges. Read More »
Monday April 16, 2012
For the past three decades, democracy promotion has been a staple, though oftentimes understated arm, of overall US foreign policy. President Jimmy Carter advocated this agenda. Ronald Reagan advanced it as a weapon in the Cold War. And Presidents since then have embraced democracy promotion initiatives, though none with the ideological fervor of George W. Bush. Read More »
Friday April 06, 2012
It may still be possible to imagine a just political resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. But, in the real world, politics is not the work of our imagination. Rather it is about power, those who have it and how they use it. Politics, at the end of the day, is not about what we hope for or what we believe is just. Instead, politics is about what we can get with the power we have and are willing and able to use. Read More »
Saturday March 31, 2012
There are times when I see a really hideous looking building and I think "that monstrosity didn't just happen. Someone designed it. Someone approved it. It went before a board that signed off on funding it. And a construction company was then hired to build it.” In other words, many people, not just one architect, are to blame. Read More »
Saturday March 24, 2012
It has been 10 years since the Arab League endorsed the Arab Peace Initiative (API), in which the leaders of the Arab World asserted that they would recognize and normalize relations with Israel if Israel were to withdraw from the territories occupied in the 1967 war and negotiate with the Palestinians a resolution of their decades-old conflict. Read More »
Friday March 16, 2012
The massive surveillance program implemented by the New York City Police Department (NYPD) in coordination with CIA officials is shredding the Constitution, putting at risk the rights and freedoms of Arab Americans and American Muslims. If left unchecked, their behavior will weaken the foundations of our democracy and seriously compromise our values as an open and inclusive society. Read More »
Monday March 12, 2012
Syria continues its long, slow descent into hell, with violence and tragedy showing no let up. By now, one year into this horror, it has become clear that neither side can win an easy victory, reaffirming the adage that there can be "no victor and no vanquished.” Read More »
Monday March 05, 2012
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu hopes he is coming to a very different Washington this week. From his perspective, past visits have all been marred by that "pesky" Palestinian issue. On one occasion he was pressed to recognize the need for a "two-state” solution. Then he was chided about his settlement expansion program. And just one year ago, he was reminded that the 1967 borders were the basis for a peace agreement with the Palestinians. Read More »
Looking at Iran by James Zogby
Kahlil Gibran Awards Gala - April 16, 2013
