Press Corner

You are cordially invited to participate in an exciting event that brings together Israelis, Palestinians, American Jews and American Arabs to debate solutions to the Palestinian/Israeli conflict.

As you consider the arguments comparing and roughly equating "liberty" and "justice" which are made by this essay, keep in mind the wording of the American Pledge of Allegiance: "I pledge allegiance to the Flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands -- one Nation, under God, with LIBERTY and JUSTICE for all."

Saudi Arabia has detained 701 suspects of different nationalities in recent months for involvement in terrorist activities, an official source at the interior ministry said on Wednesday.

In a recent interview with the English-language Indian daily The Hindu, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad discussed a variety of foreign and domestic issues.

Thousands of Islamic clerics from across India converged in the Indian capital for the Anti-Terrorism and Global Peace Conference, held by the Assembly of Indian Clerics, a countrywide network of Islamic scholars.

The recent re-publication of a cartoon of the Prophet Muhammad by the Danish press and release of Dutch MP Geert Wilders' film "Fitna" have precipitated a wave of Muslim protest, some of it violent, throughout the world.

The recent announcement of peace negotiations between Israel and Syria through Turkey, and the agreement between the Lebanese factions in Qatar – both apparently without meaningful U.S. involvement – should serve as a wake-up call that our policy of nonengagement has isolated us more than the Syrians.

It was the kind of publicity stunt upon which this desert boomtown was built. Dubai's iconic sail-shaped Burj Al Arab hotel recently began offering what it billed as the world's most expensive cocktail. Well-heeled patrons could order a glass of 55-year-old Macallan single-malt Scotch, with custom-made bitters and ice cubes made from water near the Scottish distillery, served in an 18-carat gold Baccarat tumbler. All for just $7,440 a pop.

In recent years, the Salafi movement has seen the emergence of a new conception of, and basis for, religious authority.

On March 25, 2008, Yousuf Raza Gilani of the Pakistan People's Party was sworn in as prime minister of Pakistan. His government is advocating dialogue with the Taliban, as is the secular government of the North West Frontier Province.

In a February 26, 2008 article, Libyan liberal thinker Muhammad Al-Houni wrote that the statements by Archbishop Rowan Williams on implementing shari'a law in Britain constituted dangerous encouragement to fundamentalists in their war against the Enlightenment. He added that such statements could have very grave repercussions for the struggle for freedom in Muslim countries as well.

Following the recent escalation in the Hamas-Israel conflict, Arab officials and columnists have been criticizing Hamas in the Arab and Palestinian press, blaming it for the escalation of violence and for the Gaza residents' suffering.

Dr Walid Phares, is the author of a new policy briefing addressing President Bush's March 27th assessment of the war in Iraq.

Oil is in blow-off territory and a reaction in the price is inevitable, probably quite soon. But that does not mean that we will return to cheap oil in our lifetimes.

Why do people join terrorist groups?

The LIFG was established with the purpose of overthrowing Col. Mu'ammar Gaddafi's regime and recreating Libya as an Islamic state

The Saudi proposal for dialogue between Muslims, Christians and Jews is the first for a country that has no official ties with Israel and bans non-Muslim religious services and symbols.

The launching of an interfaith dialogue by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia is a remarkable development that should be warmly welcomed by the Jewish people.

Pakistan's new Prime Minister, Yusuf Raza Gillani, has told parliament in Islamabad that his top priority will be the fight against terrorism.

"Overall, lifting of the women driving ban in Saudi Arabia is expected to have a major effect on the local economy in three different ways," said Dr. John Sfakianakis, chief economist at the Saudi British Bank (SABB) in Riyadh.

Negotiations are underway to build the first Catholic church in Saudi Arabia with King Abdullah lending his support for its construction.

The interview, at an Al-Qaeda hideout in northern Iraq, was conducted according to Al-Qaeda's stipulations – including no disclosure of the region where it took place and no communications or recording equipment of any kind brought to the site.

Arabs "are living in a world of the supernatural," not today's world of "logic," and that the "so-called religious awakening" had turned everything upside down – while "the prevalent culture is backward, yet the political regime uses this culture to glorify itself, without realizing that it is destroying the future... We move forward with our eyes looking backward."

Wednesday's conviction of Hassan Abujihaad should serve as a warning sign to the lethality and danger to our security from political Islam (Islamism).

Mortimer B. Zuckerman, Editor of US News & World Report and a supporter of Israel stated that he did not yet know who among the three leading presidential candidates, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain, is best for Israel.

The world's tallest building, biggest mall, largest airport, largest arch bridge - the projects in the $1-trillion building boom in the Gulf are all about scale, about extreme engineering and about architecture.

No country in the world, except maybe India, is more concerned with the outcome of the political crisis that is gripping Pakistan than Saudi Arabia.

As Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice heads back to the Middle East this week, three months after Bush hosted a peace conference bringing together Israelis and Arabs in Annapolis, prospects for peace have shifted dramatically.

In recent years, Saudi Arabia has been making intense efforts to fight both terrorism and its religious and ideological underpinnings.

New population data have some Palestinians contemplating an unorthodox formula for Middle East peace - a single democratic nation of Arabs and Jews, in which Palestinians would be the majority.

Irked by the slow rate of progress in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks, major Arab players are threatening to withdraw their offer to normalize ties with Israel once a Palestinian state is established.

The construction of a church in this tiny, oil-rich, conservative, Islamic state has been a historical landmark for the country's diverse Christian population

Our religious laws should be enacted by choice and choice alone in their whole and in their parts – not as a system one chooses to enter or buck against.

Support is growing for time-limits on the residency of the millions of expatriates living in the Gulf, seen by some of the region's governments and nationals as posing a demographic threat

The European continent, the core of Western civilization is collapsing. European birth rates have fallen below replacement rates, populations are dwindling and slowly being displaced by large foreign Muslim populations. Wedded to socialism Europe faces a generation in which the elderly and their social services will vastly outnumber a far smaller population of youth leading to economic collapse.

Seven years have passed since I first stood before you at this rostrum. In that time, our country has been tested in ways none of us could have imagined. We have faced hard decisions about peace and war, rising competition in the world economy, and the health and welfare of our citizens.

Al-Sharq Al-Awsat Editor: Hamas Fails to Understand that the Role of a Leadership Is to Protect the People and Guarantee Their Security and Livelihood

He was a Greek Orthodox Christian, who sang in his church choir as a boy back in the Palestinian town of Lydda. Habash's life tells us a lot about the long Israeli-Palestinian conflict, which seems as intractable as ever, and prompts reflection on the Middle East's seemingly unstoppable whirlwind of violence.

"When we hijack a plane it has more effect than if we kill a hundred Israelis in battle," "For decades, world public opinion has been neither for nor against the Palestinians. It simply ignored us. At least the world is talking about us now."

Dr. Habash, founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, which carried out numerous attacks against Israeli targets as well as civil aircraft hijackings, received me in his apartment, attractively decorated with mementos of Palestine.

George Habash, founder of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) died in the Jordanian capital at the age of 82.

Saudi Arabia is to lift its ban on women drivers in an attempt to stem a rising suffragette-style movement in the deeply conservative state.

Crowds of Gazans streamed into Egypt after the border fence was breached. It was part of a Hamas pressure campaign to open the Rafah Crossing in contravention of agreements Egypt is a party to.

Following reports on Israel's January 17, 2008 test of the Jericho III missile, which has a range of 4,500 km, the Iranian website Tabnak wrote that the missile's addition to Israel's arsenal does not change the balance of power between Israel and Iran.

On January 9, 2008, the editor of the Arab liberal website Aafaq, Omran Salman, published an article analyzing recent developments in the Middle East through the prism of the U.S.-Iran conflict and arguing that Iranian hegemony over the region was becoming a reality.

The recent visit by U.S. President Bush to the Gulf evoked harsh reactions from Qatari columnists, who maligned Bush personally and castigated him over his policy.

Few Europeans or Latin Americans believe that Barack Obama, if elected president, would chart a new direction in domestic policy, the way Franklin Delano Roosevelt did with the New Deal and Lyndon Baines Johnson did with the Great Society.

The project is Saudi Arabia's boldest bet yet that this oil-rich kingdom can transform itself into an industrial powerhouse. The plant is part of a $500 billion investment program to build new cities, create millions of jobs and diversify the economy away from petroleum exports over the next two decades.

The Joint Direct Attack Munition is a kit that, when added to the back end of a 500- or 2,000-pound "dumb" bomb, turns it into a lethal, all-weather "smart" weapon.

Each month, 25,000 people from around the globe arrive in the United Arab Emirates, seeking jobs, contracts, and political stability.

Two testimonies by young men who went to Iraq to wage jihad were published recently.

An in-depth survey of Pakistani public opinion reveals majority support for a moderate and democratic Islamic state, though a small but significant minority shows sympathy for Islamist militant groups.

In an article published recently on the Arab liberal websites, Egyptian liberal Hisham Al-Tukhi adapted Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous "I Have a Dream" speech, urging full civil rights and equality for Egyptian minorities.

Against the backdrop of President Bush's Middle East visit high-ranking Syrian government officials called on Arab countries to deepen relations and cooperation with Iran.

US President George W. Bush prayed at the traditional birthplace of Jesus on Thursday, in a Bethlehem swamped by security forces, his first stop on a pilgrimage to some of Christianity's holiest sites.

The spiritual leader of Iraq's Chaldean Christian community has called on US forces to release Saddam Hussein's ex-deputy Prime Minister Tariq Aziz.

A United States federal appeals court on Friday overturned a $156 million award against US-based Muslim activists for their involvement in the

Bhutto was an outspoken critic of Al Qaeda and other extremist Islamist groups. Consequently, Al Qaeda and other Islamist groups hated her for her

Upon ending eight years of self-imposed exile Benzair Bhutto described herself as "emotionally overwhelmed" as hundreds of thousands of supporters

Pakistan opposition leader Benazir Bhutto was assassinated Thursday in a suicide attack that also killed at least 20 others at a campaign rally

Russia is to supply Iran with new S-300 air defense systems, Defense Minister Mostafa Mohammad Najjar said Wednesday, a sign of growing military

Abraham is also the patriarch of Christianity and Judaism which makes this holiday season especially important for Muslims as it provides them

Barred by the Soviets for decades from carrying out Islam's most sacred rite, such pilgrims were among the tens of thousands of Russian Muslims

Bin Laden asked, "Why do your governments ally themselves to the criminal gang in the White House against the Muslims? Why did your governments ally

Speaking at Lisbon University on his first ever official visit to Portugal, Gaddafi also criticised the fact that only a few select countries in the

Mr. Speaker, I regret that I was unavoidably out of town on October 23, 2007, when a vote was taken on HR 1955

Britain unveiled plans on Thursday for controversial new powers to extend the time police can hold terrorism suspects without charge

A federal jury reported Thursday that it was deadlocked over whether to convict seven South Florida men accused of plotting terrorist attacks

Officials said there were plans to attack oil industry targets and preparations were being made to smuggle missiles into the country.

Federal prosecution is exposing the hidden agenda of some mainstream Muslim groups

Iraqi forces' inability to takeover security operations may be the only leverage the United States has to facilitate reconciliation and a political solution between the parties in Iraq.

Bear in mind that the number of Muslims who don't know that a fatwa isn't binding is matched by the number who think bin Laden is a religious scholar.

FMC President Kamal Nawash represented the U.S. before the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe in the session on combating intolerance against Muslims.