"It’s hardly surprising, given the mayhem and misery across the Middle East, that people who know and care about the region are scratching their heads trying to explain, never mind solve, its overarching problems," Ian Black, The Guardian's Middle East editor, wrote in his recent review of Holy Lands: Reviving Pluralism in the Middle East. There… more
When President Obama goes to Riyadh on Thursday, he should meet not just the Al Sauds, but the Saudis the rulers deem politic to hide under a bushel. If he does so, he will discover a country which defies the western stereotype of a bland killjoy state, and away from the religious police preserves as variegated… more
