Muslims and Liberals

Myriad East-West interactions renewing religious and secular values

Can Israel digest 30% of West Bank?

WASN’T BENJAMIN NETANYAHU going to extend “Israeli sovereignty” to 30 percent of the West Bank, beginning July 1? Well, July 1 came and slipped quietly away, but the Israeli prime minister didn’t annex an inch of the Palestinian territory. What has happened to his plan? Rabbi Sharon Brous tells us what has. An influential leader...

Bhutto is hosting visiting Kissinger to dinner at his home in October 1974.

India’s empty threat to Pakistan

Pakistan was protesting, vociferously, India’s decision to wipe out the “special status” of the part of the Jammu and Kashmir state under its occupation. Rajnath Singh, the Indian defense minister, told Islamabad to hush up. He said New Delhi may be changing its “no-first-use” policy on firing nukes. India adopted the policy of not using...

Struggle for Bangladesh’s cultural soul

SYLHET, Bangladesh: Is modernity finally putting brakes on the Islamization campaign in Bangladesh? Is it eroding the nation’s ethnic culture? These questions keep haunting me during trips to Bangladesh. A visit yesterday to  Shahjalal University of Science and Technology in Sylhet lent the two questions special poignancy. The population of what is now Bangladesh is...

Bangladesh: Pot calling kettle black

SYLHET, Bangladesh – Khaleda Zia, the leader of the opposition Bangladesh Nationalist Party, her son and some of her political associates go on trial April 21 to face charges of corruption during her two terms as Bangladeshi prime minister. On the face of it, it’s a good thing. Investigation by media and a previous government...