The Foreigner's Gift: The Americans, the Arabs, and the Iraqis in Iraq

Fouad Ajami's text provides deeper insight into the complicated nature of Iraq. The relations between the Shia and the Sunnis often reminds one of the complicated relationship between the Catholics and the early Protestants as the Christian church altered its vision of Christianity. My understanding of the importance of tribalism and the various long-term family backgrounds of the current leaders emerging in Iraq has also been deepened. The value of America's intervention in Iraq is clearly favored by Ajami which is something I knew before I read the book, but reading this perspective has greatly improved my understanding of why we entered Iraq. Also, my understanding of Lebanon, Syria, Egypt, Iran and the entire Middle East has grown. I had no idea how the other nations impacted the machinations of Iraq and each other until I read this book. Now when I read the news, I have a greater understanding of how the various nations impact each other. The beauty of Iraq is also clearly expressed and valued by Ajami - I had no idea about the great poetry of the region and its importance to its people. The descriptions of the Iraq landscape allow one to see positives about the region that are not read in the current media. Also, Ajami's portrayal of leaders who have long-term positive visions for Iraq and work towards those visions despite death threats and deaths of their family and other like-minded leaders, filled me with hope.

This is first of all a beautifully written book whose narrative flows effortlessly over a broad range of political, religious, and cultural issues that together describe the diverse elements that form Iraq. It is a unique book. Fouad Ajami provides the reader with excellent insights on the Muslim minority called Shia, the strange appeal of Saddam Hussein to Sunni Arabs, and the driving political-religious dynamic of the fundamentalist Islamic movements. In the course of doing this he also pays a gracious and sincere tribute to the courage, dedication, and just plain decency of most of the American military forces serving in Iraq. He also manages to clarify the current politics of the Semitic speaking Arab Near East and put into perspective its ambiguous relationship to Indo-European speaking Iran. All in all this is an excellent read and presents what appears to be an accurate description of post Saddam Iraq and the political and religious forces that are shaping its future. Finally he makes clear that Islam suffers from a host of internal contradictions and schisms that often make Muslims appear hypocritical and inconsistent. This book is well worth reading. The reader, however, should be aware that much of the book is based on Ajami's subjective perceptions and is colored by his unique background. Yet, at least to this reviewer, Fouad Ajami is a careful and accurate observer whose knowledge of the Near East and of Arabic clearly qualify him as commentator on Iraq.

This is an elegantly written account of the valiant American effort to bring the Iraqi people the gift of independence and democracy. Fouad Ajami one of the world's most respected commentators on Middle Eastern Affairs made six trips to Iraq, spoke with a wide- range of Iraqis and Americans and argues, against what has become the general view, that the U.S. effort in Iraq is worthwhile and still bears a chance of success. Ajami has for many years been a rare courageous voice, a person of Middle Eastern origin who understood that it is the people of the Middle East themselves who must be held responsible for their situation. Part of what he does in this book is write about the reign of terror imposed upon Iraq by the Zarqawi - led Sunni forces. Ajami who is a Shiite speaks to a variety of Shiite leaders, and suggests that should the United States work properly, a future Shiite - dominated Iraqi regime would not fall into the hand of Iran. One of those he speaks with in this regard is the important somewhat mysterious Shiite leader Ali - al - Sistani. However the ongoing and non- diminishing violence in Iraq, the daily casualties, the persistence of the Sunni insurgency all suggest that Ajami may well be over- optimistic. He in a sense resists the idea that Iraq and the Middle East are not ready for a major motion towards democracy, but from what we have seen in the past years there is no special sign of development towards that democracy anywhere. He too perhaps overestimates the Iranian tentacles , their determination and persistence in working towards an Iranian dominated, American - free Middle East. At this point like many others initially supportive of the American effort to despose Saddam Hussein, I am not wholly convinced that there is a winning way for America in Iraq. More and more there is the sense that the Kurds in the North are going to go their own way, and the Sunnis and the Shiites also split and divide from each other. And that a new order is emerging which will have nothing to do with democracy or values of independence and freedom. Ajami however believes otherwise, and this outstanding book will certainly make its readers better informed about the overall situation in Iraq, whether they wholly agree with his analysis , or not. __________

For many Americans - myself included - the war in Iraq was not entirely about oil, weapons of mass destruction, nor links between al-Qaeda and the regime of Saddam Hussein. Although all of these reasons were given for going to war, it was ultimately about something else. The nineteen young Arabs that attacked America on 9/11 were products of Arab history and culture. They were products of the "anger" of the Arab world were terrorism had taken root. Of all the Arab lands, the most tortured and merciless was Iraq. The Baath regime in Baghdad had poisoned the atmosphere in the Middle East for many years. The American overthrow of the regime was meant to give Iraqis and other peoples of the region the possiblity of liberating themselves and building a decent future, and in the process eliminating the root causes of terrorism. To my knowledge no one has articulated this view better than Fouad Ajami. I have been a fan of his for many years, finding his assessments of the Middle East to be very accurate. He was born of a Shiite family in Lebanon and he is currently professor of Middle Eastern studies at Johns Hopkins. His new book is based on six trips he made to Iraq since the American invasion. He has been granted access to many government officials in Iraq as well as Washington. The overthrow of Saddam Hussein and the ruling Sunni minority in Baghdad caused an upheaval in the Arab world that at first was met with silence. The Sunni Arab elites were reticent about the rise of the Shiite majority and were secretly hoping that the Sunnis would remain in power. They rarely criticized the Jordanian born Sunni al-Zarqawi during his three year reign of terror when he brought death and destruction to Iraqi civilians. Officially it was the fight against American occupation, unofficially it was to stop the rise of the Iraqi Shiites. It was not until al-Zarqawi's brigades bombed three hotels in Jordan that he lost the support of the Jordanians. Ajami is well aware of the difficulty and the heavy burden of the task America has undertaken, the outcome of which looks more dismal by the day. He correctly notes that the mess in Iraq was not entirely of America's making. The Iraqis have been given a chance to build a new government and a new future. He sees Sunni intransigence and sectarian bias as the main source of failure thus far. It remains to be seen whether a political solution can be reached, since a military solution is no longer possible short of civil war. One criticism I would have of this book is that Ajami does not fully recognize the Shia inclination toward Iranian-style theocracy. One of the most powerful and malignant forces waiting in the wings is Moktada al-Sadr and the Mahdi army. Even if they are independent of the Iranians, they still have the potential of creating a society that will be worse than the one that was there before. As the future of Iraq hangs in the balance, Ajami makes a powerful and eloquent plea for sup