Fouad Ajami

What's really important is the emergence of a political class that would agree on the rules of the game.

What's really important is the emergence of a political class that would agree on the rules of the game.

The remarkable thing about the terror in Iraq,

The remarkable thing about the terror in Iraq,

There must have been great yearning and repression in Mohamed Atta's life; it is the torment of Atta's generation. They read more

There must have been great yearning and repression in Mohamed Atta's life; it is the torment of Atta's generation. They were placed perilously close to modernity, but they could not partake of it.

Even [Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani] does not want a quote-unquote Islamic State, ... He wants a state that respects the place read more

Even [Grand Ayatollah al-Sistani] does not want a quote-unquote Islamic State, ... He wants a state that respects the place of Islam in public life.

[These others -- the overwhelming majority of Iraq's people -- have repeatedly given every indication of valuing their newfound freedom: read more

[These others -- the overwhelming majority of Iraq's people -- have repeatedly given every indication of valuing their newfound freedom: voting in two elections at the risk of their lives, preparing for a third, writing and ratifying a constitution granting more freedoms than exist in any country in the entire Arab Middle East.] The secret is out, ... There is something decent unfolding in Iraq. It's unfolding in the shadow of a terrible insurgency, but a society is finding its way to constitutional politics.