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Mideast Leaders Need to Take Ownership of Countering Violent Islamism
December 19, 2014
Some Mideast security experts are making a convincing case that the sustainable rollback of Islamic State-style violent Islamism in the region requires a policy re-set, away from Western-led strategies and toward regional ownership of the political and military responses to Islamist radicalization and violent extremism.
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Pakistani Taliban Assault on School Underscores Capacity of Radical Extremists
December 17, 2014
The high number of civilian casualties resulting from the Pakistani Taliban's (“TTP”) siege at the Army Public School and Degree College in the Pakistan-Afghan border city of Peshawar has put on display the Pakistani military's failure to degrade the capacity of the militant Islamist group committed to building sharia states across South Asia.
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Hong Kong Stays Committed to Becoming Islamic Finance Hub
December 17, 2014
Despite tepid growth in Hong Kong's sharia finance sector since the one-billion-dollar, sovereign sharia bond offering in September, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority (“HKMA”) continues to amend the territory's legal, regulatory, and taxation structures to make Hong Kong a global sharia-finance hub linking investors from the Mideast and China.
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Sharia Compliance Beginning to Shape Online Internet Consumer Ventures
December 17, 2014
Internet consumer portals are demonstrating a trend toward the development of sharia-compliant products designed to capture market share among the world's 1.6-billion Muslim consumers, with MasterCard's new sharia-compliant debit card an indicator of the expansion of sharia-customized consumer options in travel, food, and lifestyle goods.
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Mideast Dictators Exploit Islamic Sectarianism to Hold Power
December 17, 2014
Critics of the current sectarian-communal model for analyzing violence in Mideast argue that one of the most pernicious factors in explaining social violence and political cleavages in the region is the longstanding policy of state dictators, monarchs and clan leaders alike, who exploit and manipulate sectarian differences within Islam in order to maintain authoritarian power.