Attempts to cast Said as the consummate New York intellectual miss the point that his milieu was one of global, and specifically Palestinian, anticolonial struggle.
The Syrian intellectual Sadiq al-Azm proposed Self-Criticism after the Defeat to the Arabs in 1968, and in the following year a Critique of Religious Thought. He sees a third way for the Muslim faith between radicalism and state Islam
Tolerance doesn't augment our knowledge of another's values, says Hans Joas, dean of the Max Weber Centre for Cultural and Social Sciences, Germany. Volker Maria Neuman spoke to Joas about the logic of the communication of values, the Middle East conflict, and the Clash of Civilizations
Governments and organizations around the world condemned the recent execution of Saddam Hussein as incompatible with democratic values. Yet his hanging was actually the result of failed policies on Iraq, argues Tomas Avenarius in his commentary
Though Damascene born and bred, al-Azm is a true cosmopolitan - with no nostalgia for his mother′s baking, no tears shed over the good old days, and no longing for the fresh scent of jasmine so reminiscent of Damascus. He has always preferred personal freedom with all its associated risks to the comfort of a familiar environment. By Yassin al-Haj Saleh