The United States & Iran: An Alliance of Convenience

Surprised? Friday night (June 13) on the Charlie Rose television program, Richard Haass, the president of the Council on Foreign Relations, laid out a case for the United States and Iran to work together to fight back ISIS (the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria) in Iraq. Saturday, Iranian president Hassan Rouhani publicly announced that […]

US Military Intervention in Syria is Wrong

US military intervention in Syria is wrong, but President Obama has a rare moment to become an historic statesman. It’s now or never. Here’s why. Read the article here.

The Kindness of Strangers

The story of my days as a guest of Canada, which began the morning of 9/11, when I was flying from London to Atlanta. It was originally published in the U.S. and the U.K. on the first anniversary of the attack.

Remembering Benazir Bhutto

Today, August 20, 2013, nearly six years after the murder of Benazir Bhutto (twice Pakistan’s Prime Minister), General Pervez Musharraf (Pakistan’s military dictator at the time of Mrs. Bhutto’s death), has been indicted for her murder. If like me you feel her life is worth remembering…,

The Middle East Now, and Its Not Pretty Near Future

The Middle East Now, and its Not Pretty Near Future For this post, I’m breaking a rule never to post anyone else’s thoughts without commenting on them myself. So I’ve got to hand it to Hussein Agha and Robert Malley, who co-authored an article on the Middle East in the current New York Review of […]

A Roomful of Very Damaged People

A Roomful of Very Damaged People: More of Us Should Say We’re Sorry Wow! I just experienced the most moving story of forgiveness I think I’ve ever heard (apart from that of Calvary). It takes place in a small roomful of very damaged people. If these people can say they are sorry, can’t we forgive […]

American Evangelicals

Many prominent Evangelicals have begun to decry publicly the rigid, sectarian fundamentalism of the religious right and to call for profoundly increased interfaith dialogue and wiser approaches to U.S.-Mideast relations.

First published in the Turkish Daily News, July 7, 2008.

Ten Years After 9/11

What Are We Remembering? by Charles Strohmer The 10th anniversary of 9/11 is upon us. But what will we be remembering? Will it be humble remembering of our days of personal and collective grief, suffering, tears, and loss? Or will it be faux remembering? Read this short opinion piece here