Starting Points

Apr 30, 2010

Kemalism Is Dead, Long Live Kemalism

How the AKP Became Ataturk’s Last Defender

Dariush Zahedi and Gokhan Bacik
DARIUSH ZAHEDI is a Research Fellow at the Institute of International Studies at the University of California, Berkeley, and currently teaches at Zirve University, in Turkey. GOKHAN BACIK is Associate Professor of International Relations at Zirve University and a contributor to Zaman and Today’s Zaman.

In both Turkey and the West, Kemalism -- the principle that Turkey should be secular and Western -- has been pronounced dead. The country is drifting away from both, the argument goes, and Islamists, led by the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP), are socially and politically aligning the country with the authoritarian regimes of the Middle East.

Turkey’s domestic and foreign politics are indeed transforming. In the ongoing Ergenekon trial, state prosecutors, encouraged by AKP officials, are indicting a group of alleged Kemalist academics, journalists, officers, and politicians (accusing them of plotting to overthrow the government) in order to purge them from public institutions. Meanwhile, a growing AKP-aligned religious bourgeoisie is starting to dominate various sectors, including energy, finance, manufacturing, and the media. Trade unions and professional associations, such as the Istanbul Chamber of Commerce, are also increasingly under the sway of the AKP. And in terms of foreign policy, Turkey is pursuing ties with Iran and Syria while putting some distance between itself and its old allies in the region, such as Israel.

But in reality, most of the AKP’s policies are not incompatible with Kemalism. Indeed, the irony of Turkey today is that the AKP -- a religiously rooted, conservative political party -- has become the closest thing the country has to a defender of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of Turkey’s original Kemalist vision.s

For the last several decades, military Kemalism has been the organizing principle of Turkish politics, with a small group of military officials (along with a few bureaucratic and judicial representatives) responsible for guarding European values in Turkish society. But the military’s dominance has always been a distortion of Ataturk’s idea of Kemalism. Beginning in the 1920s, a few years before the declaration of the Republic of Turkey, the leaders of the Kemalist movement were adamant that the new state should embrace European social, economic, and political practices. Recognizing that Turkish society was still a long way from achieving secular modernity, they urged a period of tutelage during which the government would lay the socioeconomic and cultural foundations needed for transformation, such as modern infrastructure, better provision of social services, Western legal codes, a cadre of economic technocrats, and a reorganized educational system.

The military was never meant to lead this process. Ataturk, who had been a general in the Ottoman army and a field marshal in the Turkish army, set aside his military fatigues upon assuming the role of head of state in 1923. He removed other military officers from political posts, promoted civilian control of the armed forces, and cautioned the military against intervening in political affairs. He gave responsibility for developing the public’s understanding of liberal, Western values to politicians, civil servants, schoolteachers, journalists, and public intellectuals. Finally, he encouraged the country to adopt modern, liberal economics, though the worldwide depression of the 1930s forced him to resort to state control of the economy.

Elite guardianship over the country’s political and economic systems was to be temporary, lasting only until the bulk of the people had embraced modern norms and institutions. Thereafter, the guardians would relinquish their control over the economy, institute multiparty elections, and extend greater rights to the citizenry.

In 1938, Ataturk died and Ismet Inonu, who had served as prime minister until Ataturk removed him shortly before his death, became president. It was during Inonu’s 12-year, increasingly autocratic rule that civilian Kemalism warped into military Kemalism. Inonu relied on the military (which had supported his bid for the presidency) to implement his policies. Even after he was voted out of office in 1950, the military remained the most powerful actor in the Kemalist establishment. The Cold War only perpetuated this distortion: in exchange for Turkey’s alignment with the Western bloc, the United States gave its support to an increasingly strong military, which, in 1960, carried out the first of three Cold War–era military coups and brought Inonu back to power.

At the end of the Cold War, with communism no longer a threat, Turkish military rulers shifted their sights to creeping Islamization. Beginning in the 1990s, they sought to use the army’s status as the protector of secular Kemalism to justify its continued dominance in Turkish politics. In 1997, they forced the elected government to resign, purportedly because it was pursuing an Islamic agenda. Working with allies in the judiciary and bureaucracy, they banned Islamic political parties, jailed their leaders, and expelled suspected members from government posts. The media, which was supportive of military Kemalism, hailed their actions.

But the military’s claim that it is the protector of Kemalist values is increasingly falling on deaf ears. Many of the AKP’s policies represent an actual fulfillment of Ataturk’s notion of Kemalism. Western values are no longer abstract; they are codified in the Copenhagen criteria for EU accession. The AKP has tried to institutionalize civil liberties, improve minority rights by ending martial law in Kurdish regions, promote civilian control of the military, and further develop the free market.

The emerging industrial, commercial, and financial bourgeoisie, most of which is linked to the AKP, in effect accomplishes Ataturk’s grand historical vision. This rising middle class no longer wants (or needs) to be treated like an adolescent in need of supervision. It willingly embraces democracy, participation in civil society, and the market. It yearns to be a part of the modern world and -- if allowed -- would want to become a member of the European Union.

Rather than being apprehensive about the AKP and its political, economic, and foreign policies, the West should welcome it. A democratic, market-oriented, prosperous, and stable Turkey, at ease with its Islamic identity and at peace with its neighbors, will prove to be a more natural ally than a military Kemalist state. It will also be better positioned to promote Western interests. A Turkey that is respected and trusted by its neighbors can serve as a broker between, for example, Iran and the West, Israel and Palestine, and Israel and Syria.

This is not to suggest that the AKP is completely benign. Indeed, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s frequent attempts at silencing dissent in the media are worrisome and should be countered.

In time, however, the rise of a middle class will be the most effective guarantee that Turkey will continue its route to secular, Western democracy. Although much of the emerging pious bourgeoisie is closely linked with -- even dependent on -- the AKP, this class will shun extremist policies that endanger its economic interests, even as it continues to embrace moderate Islam. Eventually, the AKP and parties like it may play a role akin to that of the Christian democratic parties of Western Europe.

Finally, those who worry that the AKP’s already lengthy tenure appears set to continue, thereby affording it the opportunity to erode Turkey’s secular foundations further, should recognize that the opposition’s prospects would improve if it embraced some of the more liberal tenets of the AKP’s political platform, such as market reform, civilian control of the military, and the extension of greater cultural rights to the Kurdish minority. But rather than dividing the AKP’s base among its intellectual, religious, entrepreneurial, and Kurdish components by championing progressive causes, the opposition parties have so far opted for reflexive opposition dismissal to its religious platform and bemoaned the end of Kemalism.

Apr 29, 2010

Legitimation Crisis in Afghanistan

NEIL SHAPIRO

In the media celebration of our "victory" over the Taliban in the Helmand Valley, little attention has been given to the nature of insurgency: the proper tactic of guerrillas is to fade away before overwhelming power, leaving behind only enough fighters to force the invaders to harm civilians and damage property. This is exactly what happened in the recent fighting in Marja. Faced with odds of perhaps 20 to 1, helicopters, tanks and bombers, the guerrillas wisely dispersed. Victory may not be quite the right description.

That battle will probably be repeated in Kandahar, which, unlike the agricultural area known as Marja, is a large and densely populated city. Other operations are planned, so the Marja "victory" has set a pattern that accentuates military action. This is not conducive to an exit strategy--it will not lead out of Afghanistan but deeper into the country. Indeed, there is already evidence that this is happening. As the Washington Post reported shortly after the Marja battle ended, not far away "the Marines are constructing a vast base on the outskirts of town that will have two airstrips, an advanced combat hospital, a post office, a large convenience store and rows of housing trailers stretching as far as the eye can see."

Since the Helmand Valley is the focal point of the military strategy, it is important to understand its role in Afghan affairs. The Helmand irrigation project, begun in the Eisenhower administration as a distant echo of the TVA, was supposed to become a prosperous island of democracy and progress. As a member of the Policy Planning Council in the Kennedy administration, I visited it in 1962. What I found was deeply disturbing: no studies had been made of the land to be developed, which proved to have a sheet of impermeable rock just below the surface that caused the soil to turn saline when irrigated; the land was not sufficiently leveled, so irrigation was inefficient; nothing was done to teach the nomad settlers how to farm; plots were too small to foster the social engineering aim of creating a middle class; and since there were no credit facilities to buy seed, settlers were paying 100 percent interest to moneylenders. In short, after the buildup of great expectations, disappointment was palpable.

Was it a portent? It seems likely. At the least, it's striking that precisely where we carried out our first civic action program is where the Taliban became most powerful.

So what should that experience have taught us? That we should learn about the Afghans, their country and their objectives before determining our policy toward them. There is much to be learned, but I will here highlight what I believe are the three crucial issues that will make or break our relationship.

The first issue critical to evaluating US policy is the way the Afghans govern themselves. About four in five Afghans live in the country's 20,000-plus villages. During a 2,000-mile trip around the country by jeep, horseback and plane half a century ago, as well as in later trips, it became clear to me that Afghanistan is really thousands of villages, and each of them, although culturally related to its neighbors, is more or less politically independent and economically autarkic.

This lack of national cohesion thwarted the Russians during their occupation: they won many military victories, and through their civic action programs they actually won over many of the villages, but they could never find or create an organization with which to make peace. Baldly put, no one could surrender the rest. Thus, over the decade of their involvement, the Russians won almost every battle and occupied at one time or another virtually every inch of the country, but they lost about 15,000 soldiers--and the war. When they gave up and left, the Afghans resumed their traditional way of life.

That way of life is embedded in a social code (known in the Pashtun areas as Pashtunwali) that shapes the particular form of Islam they have practiced for centuries and, indeed, that existed long before the coming of Islam. While there are, of course, notable differences in the Pashtun, Hazara, Uzbek and Tajik areas, shared tradition determines how all Afghans govern themselves and react to foreigners.

Among the shared cultural and political forms are town councils (known in the Pashtun areas as jirgas and in the Hazara area as ulus or shuras). The members are not elected but are accorded their status by consensus. These town councils are not, in our sense of the word, institutions; rather, they are "occasions." They come together when pressing issues cannot be resolved by the local headman or respected religious figure. Town councils are the Afghan version of participatory democracy, and when they act they are seen to embody the "way" of their communities.

Pashtunwali demands protection (melmastia) of visitors. Not to protect a guest is so grievous a sin and so blatant a sign of humiliation that a man would rather die than fail. This, of course, has prevented the Afghans from surrendering Osama bin Laden. Inability to reconcile our demands with their customs has been at the heart of our struggle for the past eight years.

As put forth in both the Bush and Obama administrations, our objective is to prevent Al Qaeda from using Afghanistan as a base for attacks on us. We sharpened this objective to the capturing or killing of bin Laden. That is popular with US voters, but even if we could force the Afghans to surrender him, it would alienate the dominant Pashtun community. Thus it would probably increase the danger to us. But it is unnecessary, since a resolution of this dilemma in our favor has been available for years. While Pashtunwali does not permit a protected guest to be surrendered, it allows the host, with honor, to prevent the guest from engaging in actions that endanger the host. In the past, the Taliban virtually imprisoned bin Laden, and they have repeatedly offered--provided we agree to leave their country--to meet our demand that Al Qaeda not be allowed to use Afghanistan as a base. Although setting a withdrawal date would enable us to meet our objective, we have turned down their offers.

The second crucial issue in evaluating our policy is the way the people react to our civic action programs.

Afghanistan is a barren, landlocked country with few resources, and its people have suffered through virtually continuous war for thirty years. Many are wounded or sick, with some even on the brink of starvation. The statistics are appalling: more than one in three subsists on the equivalent of less than 45 cents a day, almost one in two lives below the poverty line and more than one in two preschool children is stunted because of malnutrition. They are the lucky ones; one in five dies before the age of 5. Obviously, the Afghans need help, so we think they should welcome our efforts to aid them. But independent observers have found that they do not. Based on some 400 interviews, a team of Tufts University researchers found that "Afghan perceptions of aid and aid actors are overwhelmingly negative." We must ask why this is.

The reason, I think, is that the Taliban understand from our pronouncements that civic action is a form of warfare. The Russians taught them about civic action long ago, and Gen. David Petraeus specifically proclaimed in his Iraq days, "Money is my most important ammunition in this war." Thus many ordinary citizens see our programs as Petraeus described them--as a method of control or conquest--and so support or at least tolerate the Taliban when they destroy our projects or prevent our aid distribution.

To get perspective on this, it is useful to look at Vietnam. There too we found that the people resented our efforts and often sided with our enemies, the local equivalent of the Taliban: the Vietminh, or, as we called them, the Vietcong. The Vietminh killed officials, teachers and doctors, and destroyed even beneficial works. Foreigners thought their violence was bound to make the people hate them. It didn't. Like the Kabul government, the South Vietnamese regime was so corrupt and predatory that few supported it even to get aid. When we "inherited" the war in Vietnam, we thought we should sideline the corrupt regime, so we used our own officials to deliver aid directly to the villagers. It got through, but our delivering it further weakened the South Vietnamese government's rapport with its people.

Is this relevant to Afghanistan? Reflect on the term used by Gen. Stanley McChrystal when his troops moved into Helmand: he said he was bringing the inhabitants a "government in a box, ready to roll in." That government is a mix of Americans and American-selected Afghans, neither sent by the nominal national government in Kabul nor sanctioned by local authorities.

How will the Afghans react to McChrystal's government? President Karzai was at least initially opposed, seeing the move as undercutting the authority of his government. We don't yet know what the inhabitants thought. But we do know that when we tried similar counterinsurgency tactics in Vietnam, as the editor of the massive collection of our official reports, the Pentagon Papers, commented, "all failed dismally."

If we aim to create and leave behind a reasonably secure society in Afghanistan, we must abandon this failed policy and set a firm and reasonably prompt date for withdrawal. Only thus can we dissociate humanitarian aid from counterinsurgency warfare. This is because once a timetable is clearly announced, a fundamental transformation will begin in the political psychology of our relationship. The Afghans will have no reason (or progressively less reason, as withdrawal begins to be carried out) to regard our aid as a counterinsurgency tactic. At that point, beneficial projects will become acceptable to the local jirgas, whose members naturally focus on their own and their neighbors' prosperity and health. They will then eagerly seek and protect what they now allow the Taliban to destroy.

If under this different circumstance the Taliban try to destroy what the town councils have come to see as beneficial, the councils will cease to provide the active or passive support, sanctuary and information that make the Taliban effective. Without that cooperation, as Mao Zedong long ago told us, they will be like fish with no water in which to swim. Thus, setting a firm and clear date for withdrawal is essential.

This leaves us with the third issue, the central government. We chose it and we pay for it. But as our ambassador, Gen. Karl Eikenberry, has pointed out in leaked reports, it is so dishonest it cannot be a strategic partner. It is hopelessly corrupt, and its election last year was fraudulent; General Petraeus even told President Obama that it is a "crime syndicate." It is important to understand why it lacks legitimacy in the eyes of its people.

For us, the answer seemed simple: a government must legitimize itself the way we legitimize ours, with a reasonably fair election. But our way is not the Afghan way. Their way is through a process of achieving consensus that ultimately must be approved by the supreme council of state, the loya jirga. The apex of a pyramid of village, tribal and provincial assemblies, the loya jirga, according to the Constitution, is "the highest manifestation of the will of the people of Afghanistan."

Like the Russians, we have opposed moves to allow Afghanistan to bring about a national consensus. In 2002 nearly two-thirds of the delegates to a loya jirga signed a petition to make the exiled king, Zahir Shah, president of an interim government to give time for Afghans to work out their future. But we had already decided that Hamid Karzai was "our man in Kabul." So, as research professor Thomas Johnson and former foreign service officer in Afghanistan Chris Mason wrote last year, "massive US interference behind the scenes in the form of bribes, secret deals, and arm twisting got the US-backed candidate for the job, Hamid Karzai, installed instead.... This was the Afghan equivalent of the 1964 Diem Coup in Vietnam: afterward, there was no possibility of creating a stable secular government." An interim Afghan government certified by the loya jirga would have allowed the traditional way to achieve consensus; but, as Selig Harrison reported, our ambassador at the time, Zalmay Khalilzad, "had a bitter 40-minute showdown with the king, who then withdrew his candidacy." We have suffered with the results ever since.

Could we reverse this downward trend? If we remove our opposition to a loya jirga, will the Kabul government respond? Probably not so long as America is willing to pay its officials and protect them. But if we set a clear timetable for withdrawal, members of the government will have a strong self-interest in espousing what they will see as the national cause, and they will call for a loya jirga. Indeed, President Karzai already has.

Would such a move turn Afghanistan over to the Taliban? Realistically, we must anticipate that many, perhaps even a majority, of the delegates, particularly in the Pashtun area, will be at least passive supporters of the Taliban. I do not see any way this can be avoided. Our attempts to win over the "moderates" while fighting the "hardliners" is an echo of what we tried in Vietnam. It did not work there and did not work for the Russians in Afghanistan. It shows no sign of working for us now. As a 2009 Carnegie Endowment study of our occupation and the Taliban reaction to it laid out, even after their bloody defeat in 2001, "there have been no splinter groups since its emergence, except locally with no strategic consequences."

Nor, as I have shown in my history of two centuries of insurgencies, Violent Politics, are we likely to defeat the insurgents. Natives eventually wear down foreigners. The Obama administration apparently accepts this prediction. As the Washington Post reported this past fall, it admits that "the Taliban cannot be eliminated as a political or military movement, regardless of how many combat forces are sent into battle."

A loya jirga held soon is the best hope to create a reasonably balanced national government. This is partly because in the run-up to the national loya jirga, local groups will struggle to enhance or protect local interests. Their action will constitute a brake on the Taliban, who will be impelled to compromise. Today the Taliban enjoy the aura of national defenders against us; once we are no longer a target, that aura will fade.

If we are smart enough to allow the Afghans to solve their problems in their own way rather than try to force them to adopt ours, we can begin a sustainable move toward peace and security. Withdrawal is the essential first step. Further fighting will only multiply the cost to us and lead to failure.

About William R. Polk

William R. Polk (williampolk.com) is the senior director of the W.P. Carey Foundation. He is the author, most recently, of Understanding Iran, and is working on a new book on Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir, tentatively titled The Cockpit of Asia

Apr 19, 2010

Entertainment Trumps Politics on Chinese Web Sites - NYTimes.com

Image via CrunchBase

By DAVID BARBOZA

SHANGHAI — The daily Web habits of a typical 18-year-old college student named Li Yufei show why American Internet companies, one after another, have had trouble penetrating what is now the world’s most wired nation.

He writes a blog, downloads Korean television shows, manages two Web sites devoted to music and plays an online game called Rongguang Hospital, at Baidu.com.

“I started doing a lot of this when I was about 11 years old,” says Mr. Li, a freshman at the Shanghai Maritime University. “Now, I spend most of my leisure time on the Internet,” he says. “There’s nowhere else to go.”

Google’s decision last month to remove some of its operations from China has overshadowed a startling dynamic at work in this country, a place where young people complain that there is not a lot to do: the Internet, already a potent social force here, has become the country’s prime entertainment service.

Image via CrunchBase

Frustrated with media censorship, bland programming on state-run television and limits on the number of foreign films allowed to be shown in China each year, young people are logging onto the Web and downloading alternatives. Homegrown Web sites like Baidu, Tencent and Sina.com have captured millions of Chinese youths obsessed with online games, pirated movies and music, the raising of virtual vegetables, microblogging and instant messaging.

Even though Facebook, Twitter and YouTube are blocked by censors here, Chinese social networking sites like QQ Zone, Tianya.cn and Kaixin001.com are flourishing in surprisingly inventive ways.

A study conducted by the Boston Consulting Group found that people in China (which now has nearly 400 million Internet users) are far more connected than Americans, and that globally only the Japanese spend more time on the Web.

Analysts say Google struggled to gain market share in China partly because the company had failed to build a big enough online community around its search engine, unlike its chief rival here, Baidu.com.

The surprising power of online communities in China has Communist Party leaders worried about the ability of online social networks to spread viral messages that could ignite social movements, and pose a challenge to the party and its leaders. They saw what happened to Han Feng, a midlevel party official in southern China, when his private diary was recently posted online.

In the diary, Mr. Han catalogued not just the hefty bribes he was taking, but detailed his sexual escapades with co-workers and mistresses. The ensuing online uproar led to his sacking and a criminal investigation.

“For the government, the scary part of the Internet is the unpredictable power of its organization,” said Yang Guobin, an associate professor at Barnard College and author of “The Power of the Internet in China” (Columbia University Press, 2009).

“Although people are there socializing, it can provide a platform for lots of other activities, and even turn political,” he said.

But young people in China say they are excited about the Web not because it offers a means to rebellion, but because it gives them a wide variety of social and entertainment options.

One of the more remarkable developments in the Internet in recent years has been the informal network of young people who volunteer to produce Chinese subtitles for popular American television series like “Prison Break” and “Gossip Girl.”

The Chinese subtitles are often translated within hours of the program’s showing in the United States, and then attached to the video and made freely available on Chinese file-sharing sites.

Chinese Internet companies have gleaned a lesson from this: entertainment trumps politics on the Web in China.

“The Web is really a reflection of real life,” says Gary Wang, founder and chief executive of Tudou, one of China’s biggest video-sharing sites. “What people do in real life is they go to karaoke rooms, they go to bars, they get together with friends and they shop. And that’s what they do online.”

Baidu is one of the companies that recognized the link. Founded in 1999, Baidu — which got an early investment from Google — quickly established itself as China’s largest search engine.

By the time Google sold its stake in Baidu and set up its own Chinese-language search engine in 2006, Baidu was already expanding its site in the hopes of building a community that would stick around longer on the site.

One of the company’s most popular offerings is the Baidu Post Bar, an online bulletin board of hot topics that now accounts for nearly 15 percent of the site’s traffic. (Among the most popular topics in recent weeks was a television anchorwoman’s ties to a corrupt official).

There is also Baidu Knows, Baidu Space (for blogs) and Baidu Baike, a Chinese version of Wikipedia.

Now, the company is working on an online video site that would work much like Hulu.com, the site in the United States where several broadcast TV networks present their shows.

Every Chinese Internet company seems to be building its own online conglomerate to offer online games, shopping, blogs and bulletin boards. Few companies want to specialize.

Just like American TV networks, state-run networks in China are worried that entertainment is migrating to the Web and that young people are souring on television. So they are trying to jazz up their offerings with reality shows or programs modeled on “American Idol.”

Sometimes, though, network news divisions get even by investigating the follies of their Web competitors.

In 2008, for instance, China Central Television — the biggest state-run network — ran an exposé on how Baidu accepted money to bolster the search results of unlicensed medical companies.

Baidu reviewed its policies, but also cleverly managed its way through the scandal by paying more than $5 million to be a sponsor of the state network and by courting the Chinese press.

Several Chinese journalists say that soon after Baidu suffered bad publicity, the company offered to fly a group of journalists to Hong Kong for a leisurely weekend at a luxury hotel.

A spokeswoman for Baidu declined to comment on the Hong Kong press outing, but media coverage of Baidu improved.

Google’s late start in China made it difficult to keep pace with Chinese competitors, who were constantly rolling out new things to appeal to young Web users.

Analysts say Microsoft’s new search engine, Bing, also has little chance of succeeding. Although Microsoft has spent years building a presence in China and working with the Chinese government, the company’s online offerings have fared poorly.

“I don’t think Bing will come even close to Baidu,” said Lu Bowang, president of China IntelliConsulting in Beijing. A Microsoft spokesman declined to comment on Bing’s China strategy.

Mr. Li, the Shanghai Maritime University student, says he surfs the Web to find or build his own community. A shy person with no siblings, he now has 300 online buddies, and says he turns to the Web to find what he cannot find anywhere else, particularly on state-run TV, which banned some Korean shows years ago.

“The State Administration shut down a lot of the popular Japanese and Korean series a long time ago,” he says. “So I have to go online to find things like this.”

Chen Xiaoduan contributed research.

White House Quietly Courts Muslims in U.S. - NYTimes.com

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

By ANDREA ELLIOTT

When President Obama took the stage in Cairo last June, promising a new relationship with the Islamic world, Muslims in America wondered only half-jokingly whether the overture included them. After all, Mr. Obama had kept his distance during the campaign, never visiting an American mosque and describing the false claim that he was Muslim as a “smear” on his Web site.

Nearly a year later, Mr. Obama has yet to set foot in an American mosque. And he still has not met with Muslim and Arab-American leaders. But less publicly, his administration has reached out to this politically isolated constituency in a sustained and widening effort that has left even skeptics surprised.

Muslim and Arab-American advocates have participated in policy discussions and received briefings from top White House aides and other officials on health care legislation, foreign policy, the economy, immigration and national security. They have met privately with a senior White House adviser, Valerie Jarrett, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. to discuss civil liberties concerns and counterterrorism strategy.

Image by Getty Images via Daylife

The impact of this continuing dialogue is difficult to measure, but White House officials cited several recent government actions that were influenced, in part, by the discussions. The meeting with Ms. Napolitano was among many factors that contributed to the government’s decision this month to end a policy subjecting passengers from 14 countries, most of them Muslim, to additional scrutiny at airports, the officials said.

That emergency directive, enacted after a failed Dec. 25 bombing plot, has been replaced with a new set of intelligence-based protocols that law enforcement officials consider more effective.

Also this month, Tariq Ramadan, a prominent Muslim academic, visited the United States for the first time in six years after Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton reversed a decision by the Bush administration, which had barred Mr. Ramadan from entering the country, initially citing the U.S.A. Patriot Act. Mrs. Clinton also cleared the way for another well-known Muslim professor, Adam Habib, who had been denied entry under similar circumstances.

Arab-American and Muslim leaders said they had yet to see substantive changes on a variety of issues, including what they describe as excessive airport screening, policies that have chilled Muslim charitable giving and invasive F.B.I. surveillance guidelines. But they are encouraged by the extent of their consultation by the White House and governmental agencies.

“For the first time in eight years, we have the opportunity to meet, engage, discuss, disagree, but have an impact on policy,” said James Zogby, president of the Arab American Institute in Washington. “We’re being made to feel a part of that process and that there is somebody listening.”

Image by IIOC via Flickr

In the post-9/11 era, Muslims and Arab-Americans have posed something of a conundrum for the government: they are seen as a political liability but also, increasingly, as an important partner in countering the threat of homegrown terrorism. Under President George W. Bush, leaders of these groups met with government representatives from time to time, but said they had limited interaction with senior officials. While Mr. Obama has yet to hold the kind of high-profile meeting that Muslims and Arab-Americans seek, there is a consensus among his policymakers that engagement is no longer optional.

The administration’s approach has been understated. Many meetings have been private; others were publicized only after the fact. A visit to New York University in February by John O. Brennan, Mr. Obama’s chief counterterrorism adviser, drew little news coverage, but caused a stir among Muslims around the country. Speaking to Muslim students, activists and others, Mr. Brennan acknowledged many of their grievances, including “surveillance that has been excessive,” “overinclusive no-fly lists” and “an unhelpful atmosphere around many Muslim charities.”

“These are challenges we face together as Americans,” said Mr. Brennan, who momentarily showed off his Arabic to hearty applause. He and other officials have made a point of disassociating Islam from terrorism in public comments, using the phrase “violent extremism” in place of words like “jihad” and “Islamic terrorism.”

Image by IIOC via Flickr

While the administration’s solicitation of Muslims and Arab-Americans has drawn little fanfare, it has not escaped criticism. A small but vocal group of research analysts, bloggers and others complain that the government is reaching out to Muslim leaders and organizations with an Islamist agenda or ties to extremist groups abroad.

They point out that Ms. Jarrett gave the keynote address at the annual convention for the Islamic Society of North America. The group was listed as an unindicted co-conspirator in a federal case against the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, a Texas-based charity whose leaders were convicted in 2008 of funneling money to Hamas. The society denies any links to terrorism.

“I think dialogue is good, but it has to be with genuine moderates,” said Steven Emerson, a terrorism analyst who advises government officials. “These are the wrong groups to legitimize.” Mr. Emerson and others have also objected to the political appointments of several American Muslims, including Rashad Hussain.

In February, the president chose Mr. Hussain, a 31-year-old White House lawyer, to become the United States’ special envoy to the Organization of the Islamic Conference. The position, a kind of ambassador at large to Muslim countries, was created by Mr. Bush. In a video address, Mr. Obama highlighted Mr. Hussain’s status as a “close and trusted member of my White House staff” and “a hafiz,” a person who has memorized the Koran.

Within days of the announcement, news reports surfaced about comments Mr. Hussain had made on a panel in 2004, while he was a student at Yale Law School, in which he referred to several domestic terrorism prosecutions as “politically motivated.” Among the cases he criticized was that of Sami Al-Arian, a former computer-science professor in Florida who pleaded guilty to aiding members of a Palestinian terrorist group.

At first, the White House said Mr. Hussain did not recall making the comments, which had been removed from the Web version of a 2004 article published by a small Washington magazine. When Politico obtained a recording of the panel, Mr. Hussain acknowledged criticizing the prosecutions but said he believed the magazine quoted him inaccurately, prompting him to ask its editor to remove the comments. On Feb. 22, The Washington Examiner ran an editorial with the headline “Obama Selects a Voice of Radical Islam.”

Muslim leaders watched carefully as the story migrated to Fox News. They had grown accustomed to close scrutiny, many said in interviews, but were nonetheless surprised. In 2008, Mr. Hussain had co-authored a paper for the Brookings Institution arguing that the government should use the peaceful teachings of Islam to fight terrorism.

“Rashad Hussain is about as squeaky clean as you get,” said Representative Keith Ellison, a Minnesota Democrat who is Muslim. Mr. Ellison and others wondered whether the administration would buckle under the pressure and were relieved when the White House press secretary, Robert Gibbs, defended Mr. Hussain.

“The fact that the president and the administration have appointed Muslims to positions and have stood by them when they’ve been attacked is the best we can hope for,” said Ingrid Mattson, president of the Islamic Society of North America.

It was notably different during Mr. Obama’s run for office. In June 2008, volunteers of his campaign barred two Muslim women in headscarves from appearing behind Mr. Obama at a rally in Detroit, eliciting widespread criticism. The campaign promptly recruited Mazen Asbahi, a 36-year-old corporate lawyer and popular Muslim activist from Chicago, to become its liaison to Muslims and Arab-Americans.

Bloggers began researching Mr. Asbahi’s background. For a brief time in 2000, he had sat on the board of an Islamic investment fund, along with Sheikh Jamal Said, a Chicago imam who was later named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land case. Mr. Asbahi said in an interview that he had left the board after three weeks because he wanted no association with the imam.

Shortly after his appointment to the Obama campaign, Mr. Asbahi said, a Wall Street Journal reporter began asking questions about his connection to the imam. Campaign officials became concerned that news coverage would give critics ammunition to link the imam to Mr. Obama, Mr. Asbahi recalled. On their recommendation, Mr. Asbahi agreed to resign from the campaign, he said.

He is still unsettled by the power of his detractors. “To be in the midst of this campaign of change and hope and to have it stripped away over nothing,” he said. “It hurts.”

From the moment Mr. Obama took office, he seemed eager to change the tenor of America’s relationship with Muslims worldwide. He gave his first interview to Al Arabiya, the Arabic-language television station based in Dubai. Muslims cautiously welcomed his ban on torture and his pledge to close Guantánamo within a year.

In his Cairo address, he laid out his vision for “a new beginning” with Muslims: while America would continue to fight terrorism, he said, terrorism would no longer define America’s approach to Muslims.

Back at home, Muslim and Arab-American leaders remained skeptical. But they took note when, a few weeks later, Mohamed Magid, a prominent imam from Sterling, Va., and Rami Nashashibi, a Muslim activist from Chicago, joined the president at a White-House meeting about fatherhood. Also that month, Dr. Faisal Qazi, a board member of American Muslim Health Professionals, began meeting with administration officials to discuss health care reform.

The invitations were aimed at expanding the government’s relationship with Muslims and Arab-Americans to areas beyond security, said Mr. Hussain, the White House’s special envoy. Mr. Hussain began advising the president on issues related to Islam after joining the White House counsel’s office in January 2009. He helped draft Mr. Obama’s Cairo speech and accompanied him on the trip. “The president realizes that you cannot engage one-fourth of the world’s population based on the erroneous beliefs of a fringe few,” Mr. Hussain said.

Other government offices followed the lead of the White House. In October, Commerce Secretary Gary Locke met with Arab-Americans and Muslims in Dearborn, Mich., to discuss challenges facing small-business owners. Also last fall, Farah Pandith was sworn in as the State Department’s first special representative to Muslim communities. While Ms. Pandith works mostly with Muslims abroad, she said she had also consulted with American Muslims because Mrs. Clinton believes “they can add value overseas.”

Despite this, American actions abroad — including civilian deaths from drone strikes in Pakistan and the failure to close Guantánamo — have drawn the anger of Muslims and Arab-Americans.

Even though their involvement with the administration has broadened, they remain most concerned about security-related policies. In January, when the Department of Homeland Security hosted a two-day meeting with Muslim, Arab-American, South Asian and Sikh leaders, the group expressed concern about the emergency directive subjecting passengers from a group of Muslim countries to additional screening.

Farhana Khera, executive director of Muslim Advocates, pointed out that the policy would never have caught the attempted shoe bomber Richard Reid, who is British. “It almost sends the signal that the government is going to treat nationals of powerless countries differently from countries that are powerful,” Ms. Khera recalled saying as community leaders around the table nodded their heads.

Ms. Napolitano, who sat with the group for more than an hour, committed to meeting with them more frequently. Ms. Khera said she left feeling somewhat hopeful.

“I think our message is finally starting to get through,” she said.

CQ - Behind the Lines for Monday, April 19, 2010

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By David C. Morrison, Special to Congressional Quarterly

Special orders do upset us: One of three Detroit men arrested for a series of fast food restaurant robberies turns out to be TSA screener . . . Order in the court: Citing the high volume of threats it receives, Supreme Court seeks more federal security funds . . . Don't tread on me: California woman standing trial today for allegedly hitting the TSA agent who tried to seize her mother's applesauce. These and other stories lead today's homeland security coverage.

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“The Obama administration is for the first time drafting classified guidelines to help the government determine whether newly captured terrorism suspects will be prosecuted or held indefinitely without trial,” the Los Angeles Times’ David S. Cloud and Julian E. Barnes lead. Even as “vexing detainee decisions” loom, this fall’s midterm elections “will lead to further politicization of detention issues and make the administration’s efforts more difficult,” John B. Bellinger III safely predicts in a CFR Expert Brief — while The Boston Globe’s Bella English spotlights a group of 9/11 families fighting for a civil trial rather than a military tribunal for the attacks’ plotters.

Feds: Facing a Senate subpoena threat, Defense will not share info that could compromise prosecution of the suspected gunman in last year’s Fort Hood shooting, Reuters’ Phil Stewart hears Secretary Robert M. Gates vowing. Taking a leaf from the Fort Hood shootings in November, the Pentagon last week announced steps to expand the dissemination of info on terrorist threats to the military, Killeen (Texas)’s KWTX 10 News notes — as NBC News’s Jim Miklaszewski cites an internal Pentagon report’s judgment that existing safeguards were “unclear” or “inadequate.” The Supreme Court is asking for more federal security funds, citing as one reason the “volume” of threats it receives, The Hill’s Russell Berman reports.

Homies: “There’s almost nothing I’ve done [in my career] that doesn’t touch upon DHS. This department crosses so many things,” Janet Napolitano says in a Washington Post Magazine “First Person Singular” squib — while The Boston Globe’s Brian R. Ballou covers the homeland chief’s frantic Friday rounds in Beantown. His new blog “is all national security and terrorism stuff related to some of the threats we face,” soon-to-be imprisoned would-be DHS chief and ex-NYPD commish Bernard Kerik touts to TPM’s Justin Elliott. Senate homeland overseers plan to introduce a bill later this month to overhaul and modernize DHS’s edifice-encircling Federal Protective Service, Government Executive’s Robert Brodsky updates.

State and local: Wyoming authorities have refused to turn over detailed records showing how DHS grants have been used there since 2001, The Cowboy State Free Press relays. The court security division of the Seneca County (N.Y.) sheriff’s department has received its official accreditation, The Finger Lakes Times tells — as The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel sees the supervisor for the private firm hired last month to secure the Milwaukee County Courthouse being removed in view of newly revealed convictions. “Researchers continue waiting to move into the new Homeland Security lab at Fort Detrick . . . after an endurance test uncovered flaws in the building,” The Frederick (Md.) News-Post reports.

Know nukes: “Almost from the invention of the atomic bomb, government officials were alarmed by the threat that compact nukes would be smuggled into the United States by Soviet agents and detonated,” The New York Times surveys. “Obama’s proclamation of unilateral nuclear disarmament [has] nullified America’s willingness and ability to defend itself . . . when worldwide nuclear proliferation abounds,” an American Thinker contributor condemns — as Al Jazeera sees Iran’s supreme leader telling a nuclear disarmament conference in Tehran on Saturday that the United States’ atomic weapons “are a tool of terror and intimidation.” The Christian Science Monitor spotlights a Pentagon memo fretting that the United States lacks a long-term plan to deal with Iran — while Defense’s Gates tells the Post: “The memo was not intended as a ‘wake-up call.’”

Bugs ‘n bombs: “While the United States cannot defend its citizens against a nuclear weapons blast, we do have the capability against bioterrorism,” the WMD Commission chairmen stress in a St. Louis Post-Dispatch op-ed. The author of “Willful Neglect: The Dangerous Illusion of Homeland Security” (Lyons Press) decries to Pro Publica the United States’ “weak, outmoded defenses and poorly trained personnel more apt at discouraging burglars than stopping suicide terror teams.” The soon-to-depart Northern Command/NORAD chief warns that wind farms pose problems for the radar that scans for air and space threats, The Colorado Springs Independent informs — while The Boston Herald hears that officer’s pending successor warning that small, hard-to-detect terror plots are a mounting concern.

Exercised: Florida’s Department of Environmental Protection joined state and local agencies last week for a chemical threat response training exercise at the Banner Center for Homeland Security & Defense, Tallahassee’s WCTV News relays. California local response officials, meanwhile, are gearing up for a June exercise simulating the detonation of a 10-kiloton nuke in Los Angeles, the L.A. Daily News notes. Access and fishing areas near the dam at Old Hickory Lake was closed Friday and Saturday while the Army Corps of Engineers ran homeland security exercises, The Tennessean tells — as The Arizona Republic reports responders and health officials staging a mock bioterror attack at the Peoria Sports Complex last week.

Close air support: One of three Motor City men arrested for a series of fast food restaurant robberies turns out to be a TSA screener at Detroit Metro Airport, the Free Press reports — while ABC 15 News uncovers hundreds of internal e-mails, audits and other documents revealing a pattern of failures involving security contractors at Phoenix’s air hub. A California woman is slated to stand trial today for allegedly hitting a TSA agent who tried to seize her mother’s applesauce at a Bob Hope Airport checkpoint, The Burbank Leader relates. “The lesson of the Jihad Janes is that our safety requires vigilance that exempts few groups, if any,” a Post reader writes. Logan airport, meantime, is in line for 60 more explosive trace detectors, The Boston Globe, again, has DHS’s Napolitano announcing during Friday’s junket.

Border wars: Arizona’s two senators have asked CBP reduce the long vehicular and pedestrian lines at Nogales’ border crossings, stressing the backups’ harm to the local economy, The Nogales International informs. Ultra-tough legislation passed in Arizona last week is heightening debate on how far is too far to go to curb illegal immigration, and prompting renewed calls for a federal immigration overhaul, The Christian Science Monitor surveys — while The High Plains Journal hears the Independent Cattlemen’s Association of Texas urging DHS to increase security along the Mexico border, and The San Diego Union-Tribune has CBP officers shooting a man Saturday morning after he came through the San Ysidro border crossing.

Courts and rights: FBI agents are in Guyana seeking evidence in the case against four men accused of plotting to blow up New York’s JFK airport, CaribWorldNews.com recounts. With less than six months until the terror trial of seven North Carolina men begins, defense attorneys say they are trying to work through the massive amount of evidence, Raleigh’s WRAL TV-5 News notes — while ABC 11 News has the seven back in court Friday for a hearing on the same. The feds are probing whether an Oregon peace activist knowingly helped fund Muslim terrorists in Russia when he allegedly laundered donations through his charity in 2000, The Medford Mail Tribune tells.Decrying “judicial interference,” lawyers for New York City want a judge to stop talking about his objections to a $657 million settlement of some 10,000 9/11 respiratory cases, The New York Law Journal notes.

Qaeda Qorner: The destruction of nearly 100 videotapes showing the harsh interrogation of two al Qaeda detainees in 2005 triggered concerns within the CIA over whether it was adequately cleared, CNN notes. Osama Bin Laden requested a satellite TV dish be installed in his Afghanistan hideaway so he could watch the 9/11 attacks unfurl, but the signal was blocked by the mountainous terrain, The Daily Mail mentions — while FOX News notes Facebook moving to shut down a social-networking page purportedly put up by the chatty terrorist mastermind. A new video by the al Qaeda-linked Al Shabaab shows the Somali militant group indoctrinating children, some of whom appear to be toddlers, The National Post notes — while the Times has the group outlawing school bells in a southern town after deciding that they conflicted with Islam.

Over there: Pakistani authorities beat confessions out of some of the five northern Virginia men accused of planning terrorist acts there, the mother of one defendant tells The Associated Press — and check the Times, again, for a broader profile of that family. Former Pakistani P.M. Benazir Bhutto’s 2007 assassination might have been prevented had security forces taken adequate steps after death threats were made against her, Bloomberg has a U.N. probe finding. India is further tightening security before the October Commonwealth Games after State issued a warning to American citizens about possible militant attacks on hotels and markets in India, Reuters reports — as France 24 has at least 10 people hurt Saturday when two bombs exploded at a cricket stadium in Bangalore.

Ashes to asses: “A gigantic ash cloud from an Icelandic volcano that blanketed Northern Europe and paralyzed air travel across the continent has turned out to be part of the finale of the television series ‘ Lost,’” The Borowitz Report has network officials confirming. “Bracing themselves for the public uproar over a special-effects spectacle gone awry, ABC officials attempted to explain how the producers’ desire for a fitting ending to the increasingly convoluted series led to an aviation nightmare,” Andy Borowitz writes. “’The producers of ‘Lost’ set off a small explosive charge underneath the Eyjafjallajokull glacier in Iceland, hoping to create a cloud of black smoke,’ said ABC spokesperson Carol Foyler.‘That was pretty much the only way they could think of to end the series.’ But longtime ‘Lost’ fanatics doubt the network’s story. Tracy Klugian, 27, a web designer from Evanston, Illinois who has seen every episode of the confusing series at least eight times doesn’t believe that the gigantic ash cloud could possibly be the end of the series: ‘For one thing, it makes too much sense.’,”

Source: CQ Homeland Security