Fouad A. Ajami (Arabic:فؤاد عجمی; b. September 9, 1945), a Lebanese-born American neoconservative ^[1]university professor and writer on Middle Eastern issues. In recent years, Ajami has been an outspoken supporter of the Iraq War, the nobility of which he believes there "can be no doubt".^[2] This view has drawn some criticism from others in academia. Image File history File links Unbalanced_scales. ... Arabic ( or just ) is the largest living member of the Semitic language family in terms of speakers. ... is the 252nd day of the year (253rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 1945 (MCMXLV) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar). ... Neoconservatism describes several distinct political ideologies which are considered new forms of conservatism. ... The meaning of the word professor (Latin: one who claims publicly to be an expert) varies. ... A map showing countries commonly considered to be part of the Middle East The Middle East is a region comprising the lands around the southern and eastern parts of the Mediterranean Sea, a territory that extends from the eastern Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. ... For other uses, see Iraq war (disambiguation). ...

Personal

Ajami was born on September 19, 1945, in Arnoun, a rocky hamlet in the south of Lebanon. His Shiite family had come to Arnoun from Tabriz, Iran in the 1850s. In Arabic, the word "Ajam" means "non-Arab" or, more specifically, "Persian". Hamlet and Horatio in the cemetery by Eugène Delacroix For other uses, see Hamlet (disambiguation). ... Shi‘as (the adjective in Arabic is شيعى shi‘i; English has traditionally used Shiite) which mean follower in Arabic make up the second largest sect of believers in Islam, constituting about 30%-35% of all Muslim. ... This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Arabic is a Semitic language, closely related to Hebrew and Aramaic. ... Ajami redirects here. ... For other uses of this term see: Persia (disambiguation) The Persian Empire is the name used to refer to a number of historic dynasties that have ruled the country of Persia (Iran). ...

Ajami arrived in the United States in the fall of 1963, just before he turned 18. He did some of his undergraduate work at Eastern Oregon College (now Eastern Oregon University) in La Grande, Oregon. He did his graduate work at the University of Washington, where he wrote his dissertation on international relations and world government. Eastern Oregon University (or EOU) is one of seven state-funded, four-year universities of higher education in the U.S. state of Oregon and belongs to the Oregon University System. ... La Grande redirects here. ... The University of Washington, founded in 1861, is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. ... This article is about the thesis in dialectics and academia. ... The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      International relations (IR), a branch of political science, is the study of foreign affairs and global issues among states within the international system, including the roles of states, inter-governmental organizations (IGOs), non-governmental organizations (NGOs), and multinational corporations (MNCs). ... It has been suggested that World Federation be merged into this article or section. ...

Career

Academia

In 1973 Ajami joined the political science department of Princeton University, making a name for himself there as a vocal supporter of Palestinian self-determination. The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Political Science is the field concerning the theory and practice of politics and the description and analysis of political systems and political behaviour. ... Princeton University is a private coeducational research university located in Princeton, New Jersey. ... The term Palestinian has other usages, for which see definitions of Palestinian. ...

He is today the Majid Khadduri professor in Middle East Studies and Director of the Middle East Studies Program at the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of Johns Hopkins University. Majid Khadduri (1908 — January 25, 2007) was an Iraqi–born founder of the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies Middle East Studies program. ... A map showing countries commonly considered to be part of the Middle East The Middle East is a region comprising the lands around the southern and eastern parts of the Mediterranean Sea, a territory that extends from the eastern Mediterranean Sea to the Persian Gulf. ... The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), based in Washington D.C., is one of the worlds most prestigious graduate schools devoted to the study of international affairs, economics, diplomacy, and policy research and education. ... Look up sais in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... The Johns Hopkins University, founded in 1876, is a private institution of higher learning located in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. ...

Government

Ajami has been an advisor to United States Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice as well as a friend and colleague of Deputy United States Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz. Seal of the United States Department of State. ... Condoleezza Rice (born November 14, 1954) is the 66th United States Secretary of State, and the second in the administration of President George W. Bush to hold the office. ... The United States Secretary of Defense is the head of the United States Department of Defense (DoD), concerned with the armed services and The role of the Secretary of Defense is to be the principal defense policy advisor to the President and is responsible for the formulation of general defense... Paul Dundes Wolfowitz (born December 22, 1943) is a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, working on issues of international economic development, Africa and public-private partnerships. ...

Journalism

Ajami is a frequent contributor on Middle Eastern issues and contemporary international history to The New York Times Book Review, Foreign Affairs, The New Republic, The Wall Street Journal, and other journals and periodicals, as well. The New York Times is a daily newspaper published in New York City and distributed internationally. ... This article is about a journal. ... For other uses, see New Republic. ... The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) is an international daily newspaper published by Dow Jones & Company in New York City, New York, USA, with Asian and European editions, and a worldwide daily circulation of more than 2 million as of 2006, with 931,000 paying online subscribers. ...

Television

Ajami frequently appears on PBS and CBS News.

Books

In "The Fate of Nonalignment," an essay in the Winter 1980/81 issue of the journal Foreign Affairs, Ajami outlines how the Third world has fared in a context of nonalignment in post Cold war politics. In 1980, he accepted an offer from Johns Hopkins University to become director of Middle East Studies at their international relations graduate program in Washington, D.C.: the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS). He holds an endowed chair as the Majid Khadduri professor. This article is about a journal. ... For the Jamaican reggae band, see Third World (band). ... The Johns Hopkins University, founded in 1876, is a private institution of higher learning located in Baltimore, Maryland, United States. ... For other uses, see Washington, D.C. (disambiguation). ... The Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), based in Washington D.C., is one of the worlds most prestigious graduate schools devoted to the study of international affairs, economics, diplomacy, and policy research and education. ... Look up sais in Wiktionary, the free dictionary. ... Endowment may refer to many things: Finance Financial endowment; relating to funds or property donated to institutions or individuals. ... Majid Khadduri (1908 — January 25, 2007) was an Iraqi–born founder of the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies Middle East Studies program. ...

A year after arriving at SAIS, Ajami published his first book, The Arab Predicament, which analyzed what Ajami described as an intellectual and political crisis that swept the Arab world following its defeat by Israel in the 1967 Six Day War. Year 1967 (MCMLXVII) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will display full calendar) of the 1967 Gregorian calendar. ... The 1967 Arab-Israeli War, also known as the Six-Day War or June War, was fought between Israel and its Arab neighbors Egypt, Jordan, and Syria. ...

Subsequently, Ajami has written several other books: The Dream Palace of the Arabs: A Generation’s Odyssey (1998), Beirut: City of Regrets (1988), and The Vanished Imam: Musa Al-Sadr and the Shia of Lebanon (1986).

In The Dream Palace of the Arabs: A Generation’s Odyssey, Ajami surveyed the intellectual landscape in the Arab world and Iran, in what was in some ways an autobiography as well as a sequel to "The Arab Predicament." On Middle Eastern politics, he wrote of "a world where triumph rarely comes with mercy or moderation." On Pan-Arabism, he described the ideology as "Sunni dominion dressed in secular garb." Pan-Arabism is a movement for unification among the Arab peoples and nations of the Middle East. ... Sunni Islam (Arabic سنّة) is the largest denomination of Islam. ...

Ajami's most recent book: The Foreigner's Gift: The Americans, The Arabs and The Iraqis in Iraq (2006), offers a portrait of the struggle for Iraq.

Philosophy

View of Huntington's "Clash of Civilizations"

One notable contribution Ajami made in the September October 1993 issue of Foreign Affairs was a rebuttal to Samuel Huntington’s "The Clash of Civilizations?", regarding the state and future of international relations after the Cold War. Ajami's critiques of Huntington had a resounding effect on views of the East-West dichotomy, offering an important alternative assessment of future relations.^{[citation needed]} This article does not adequately cite its references or sources. ... The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order cover The clash of civilizations is a controversial theory in international relations. ... For other uses, see Cold War (disambiguation). ...

Huntington presents a world divided at the highest level into eight civilizations, and includes a number of countries that are “torn” between two civilizations, arguing that these civilizational divides are far more fundamental than economic interests, ideology, and regimes, and that the world is becoming a smaller place with increasingly close interactions. He further claims that the pre-eminence of a so-called "kin-country" syndrome will provide a civilizational rallying point that will replace political ideology and traditional "balance of power" considerations for relations between states and nations, resulting in a division between the West and "the rest" creating a backlash against Western values (which supposedly "differ fundamentally" from those prevalent in other civilizations). The term Western world, the West or the Occident (Latin occidens -sunset, -west, as distinct from the Orient) [1] can have multiple meanings dependent on its context (e. ...

In his article “The Summoning”, Ajami criticises Huntington for ignoring the empirical complexities and state interests which drive conflicts in and between civilizations. Ajami believes that states will remain the dominant factor influencing the global framework and interaction. He also argues that civilizational ties are only utilized by states and groups when it is in their best interest to do so and that modernity and secularism are here to stay, especially in places with considerable struggles to obtain them, and he cites the example of the Indian Middle class. Ajami also believes that civilizations do not control states; rather, states control civilizations. The middle class (or middle classes) comprises a social group once defined by exception as an intermediate social class between the nobility and the peasantry. ...

Political influence

Ajami is arguably one of the most politically influential Arab-American intellectuals of his generation. Condoleezza Rice has been known to summon him to the White House for advice, and Deputy Secretary of Defense Paul Wolfowitz, a friend and former colleague at SAIS, has paid tribute to him in speeches on Iraq. Condoleezza Rice (born November 14, 1954) is the 66th United States Secretary of State, and the second in the administration of President George W. Bush to hold the office. ... Paul Dundes Wolfowitz (born December 22, 1943) is a visiting scholar at the American Enterprise Institute, working on issues of international economic development, Africa and public-private partnerships. ...

Awards

Ajami was a 1982 winner of a five-year MacArthur Prize Fellowship in the arts and sciences. The John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation is a private, independent grantmaking institution. ...

Memberships

Ajami is a member of the Board of Directors of the Council on Foreign Relations, and the Board of Advisors of the journal Foreign Affairs. Ajami also sits on the editorial board of Middle East Quarterly, a publication of the Middle East Forum think tank. The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an influential and independent, nonpartisan foreign policy membership organization founded in 1921 and based at 58 East 68th Street (corner Park Avenue) in New York City, with an additional office in Washington, D.C. Through its membership, meetings, and studies, it has been... This article is about a journal. ... The Middle East Quarterly is a quarterly journal devoted to Middle Eastern affairs. ... The Middle East Forum, a think tank, works to define and promote the interests of the United States in the Middle East. ...

Controversies

Support for Iraq War

Ajami has been an outspoken supporter of the Iraq War, which he believes "issued out of a deep American frustration... with the culture of terrorism that had put down roots in Arab lands."

In an August 2002 speech before the Veterans of Foreign Wars, US Vice President Dick Cheney sought to assuage concerns about the anticipated US invasion of Iraq, stating: "As for the reaction of the Arab 'street,' the Middle East expert Professor Fouad Ajami predicts that after liberation, the streets in Basra and Baghdad are 'sure to erupt in joy in the same way the throngs in Kabul greeted the Americans.'" ^[3] The Veterans of Foreign Wars, or VFW, is an American organization whose members are current or former members of the U.S. armed forces. ... Seal of the office of the Vice-President of the United States The Vice President of the United States is the first in the presidential line of succession, becoming the new President of the United States upon the death, resignation, or removal of the President. ... Richard Bruce Dick Cheney (born January 30, 1941), is the 46th and current Vice President of the United States, serving under President George W. Bush. ...

Ajami cautioned the United States about the likely negative consequences of the Iraq War. In a 2003 essay in Foreign Affairs, "Iraq and the Arabs' Future," Ajami wrote, This article is about a journal. ...

"There should be no illusions about the sort of Arab landscape that America is destined to find if, or when, it embarks on a war against the Iraqi regime. There would be no "hearts and minds" to be won in the Arab world, no public diplomacy that would convince the overwhelming majority of Arabs that this war would be a just war. An American expedition in the wake of thwarted UN inspections would be seen by the vast majority of Arabs as an imperial reach into their world, a favor to Israel, or a way for the United States to secure control over Iraq's oil. No hearing would be given to the great foreign power."^[4] Hearts and Minds refers to two separate Vietnam War related subjects. ... The doctrine of the just war has its foundations in ancient Greek society and was first developed in the Christian tradition by Augustine in Civitas Dei, The City of God, in reaction to the absolutist pacifist strain of Christian ethics based on the doctrine of Turn the other cheek espoused...

But he also goes on to say:

America ought to be able to live with this distrust and discount a good deal of this anti-Americanism as the "road rage" of a thwarted Arab world -- the congenital condition of a culture yet to take full responsibility for its self-inflicted wounds. There is no need to pay excessive deference to the political pieties and givens of the region. Indeed, this is one of those settings where a reforming foreign power's simpler guidelines offer a better way than the region's age-old prohibitions and defects.

Ajami retains a positive view of the war three years later. In a 2006 book on the invasion and its aftermath, he described it as a noble effort, and argues that despite many unhappy consequences, it is too soon to write it off as a failure.^[5]

Characterization by liberal sources

Ajami has been accused of being a self-hating propagandist who tells those in power what they want to hear, thus helping justify their policies. This highly critical assessment of Fouad Ajami as a "Native Informant" comes most recently through an essay authored by Adam Shatz of The Nation.[2] Soviet Propaganda Poster during the World War II. The text reads Red Army Fighter, SAVE US! Chinese propaganda poster from during the Cultural Revolution. ... The Nation (ISSN 0027-8378) is a weekly [1] U.S. periodical devoted to politics and culture, self-described as the flagship of the left. [2] Founded on July 6, 1865 as an Abolitionist publication, it is the oldest continuously published weekly magazine in the United States. ...

Throughout his career, Ajami has variously been alleged to espouse Nasserism, Shia sectarianism, the Palestinian cause, the Israeli government cause, and the US invasion of Iraq.^[6] President Gamal Abdel Nasser Nasserism is an Arab nationalist political ideology based on the thinking of the former Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser. ... Shiʻa Islam (Arabic شيعى follower; English has traditionally used Shiite) makes up the second largest sect of believers in Islam, constituting about 30%–35% of all Muslim. ...

Scooter Libby compared to a fallen soldier

In a June 2007 Wall Street Journal editorial, he described Scooter Libby as a "fallen soldier" for his role in covering up the Bush administrations public disclosure of Valerie Wilson's classified CIA status The Wall Street Journal is an influential international daily newspaper published in New York City, New York with an average daily circulation of 1,800,607 (2002). ... I. Lewis Libby I. Lewis Scooter Libby Jr. ...

References

This page is about the official residence of the President of the USA. For other White Houses see White House (disambiguation). ... The White House Press Secretary is a senior White House official with a rank one step below Presidential Cabinet level. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 111th day of the year (112th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 111th day of the year (112th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ... Year 2006 (MMVI) was a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ... is the 111th day of the year (112th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. ...

Links

• Johns Hopkins SAIS Page for Fouad Ajami
• Rude Arab Awakening, assessment of Ajami by Martin Kramer
• Iraq and the Arabs' Future
• Heart of Darkness: From Zarqawi to the man on the street, Sunni Arabs fear Shiite emancipation.
• Iraq in the Balance WSJ op-ed by Ajami, April 11, 2007
• Fouad Ajami speaks at the Council on Foreign Relations on July 11, 2006 about his book, The Foreigner's Gift: The Americans, The Arabs and The Iraqis in Iraq.