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Blaming the imperialists nowadays is obviously absurd, as is blaming the Americans, who obviously don’t have the slightest desire to control anything in the Middle East.

Bernard Lewis

Refugees of all kinds were constantly fleeing from Christendom to the Islamic lands. Jews of course and Muslims of course, but even some Christians and the movement of refugees went overwhelmingly that way.
BERNARD LEWIS

Christian Community Country Course Movement People Refugees Religious
The Cold War philosophy of Mutual Assured Destruction (MAD), which prevented the former Soviet Union and the United States from using the nuclear weapons they had targeted at each other, would not apply to President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s Iran.
BERNARD LEWIS

Country Dignity Human Important Philosophy Prevented War
My position on that has been misrepresented again and again and again in the media.
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Action Again Country Independent Media War
The United States is showing minimal and diminishing interest in the Muslim world. They now have to confront their own problems. The old excuses are gone. The old justifications are gone and therefore the anger of people is turning increasingly against their own rulers.
BERNARD LEWIS

Confront Diminishing Excuse Justification Own Problem
What is happening now in Israel is that you have a coming together of Jews from the Christian world and Jews from the Muslim world with different cultures.
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Christian Communities Cultures Different Happening Jews People Together
If the conflict is about the size of Israel, then long and difficult negotiations can eventually resolve the problem. But if the conflict is about the existence of Israel, then serious negotiation is impossible.
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Country Long Negotiation Problem Size
In the West nowadays, it’s very common to talk about the Judeo- Christian tradition. It’s a common term. The term is relatively modern but the reality is an old one.
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Christian Common Nowadays Reality Term Thinking
Christianity had the great religious wars of the 17th century. Islam, fortunately for the Muslims, did not have that. Christianity worked out a system of toleration. Islam was always more tolerant of Christendom.
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Always Century Great Muslim People Religious Tolerant Toleration
Moses led his people through the wilderness and he wasn’t permitted to enter the Promised Land. Jesus was crucified.
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Enter Jesus Moses People Strong Wilderness
When we talk about the Judeo-Christian or the Judeo-Muslim tradition, it’s important to remember that we are speaking of a Jewish component of civilization, but not in itself a civilization.
BERNARD LEWIS

Christian Human Important Religious Together Tradition
Islam and Islamic values now have a level of immunity from comment and criticism in the Western world that Christianity has lost and Judaism has never had.
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Criticism Immunity Islamic Level World
In the one sense, it denotes a religion, as system of beliefs and worship; in the other, the civilization that grew up and flourished under the aegis of that religion.
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Aegis Belief Civilization Religion Worship
I think the important point which I’ve been trying to get across is that Islam, from the very beginning, is strongly, clearly opposed to autocratic dictatorial government.
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Dignity Human Important Oppose Strongly Thinking
Muslims have their own tradition on limited government. Now in Islam, there is a very strong political tradition. Because the different circumstances, Islam is political from the very beginning.
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Community Government Political Religious Tradition
The golden age of equal rights in Spain was a myth, and belief in it was a result, more than a cause, of Jewish sympathy for Islam.
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Age Christian Dignity Golden Human Important Rights Sympathy
In the past, foreign intervention was obviously a major problem. Foreign domination, or if not domination, interference. But that has ended. There is no foreign domination; there is minimal foreign interference. The Cold War has ended. The Soviet Union no longer exists.
BERNARD LEWIS

Dignity Domination Human Important Past People War

Blaming the imperialists nowadays is obviously absurd, as is blaming the Americans, who obviously don’t have the slightest desire to control anything in the Middle East.

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Blaming the imperialists nowadays is obviously absurd, as is blaming the Americans, who obviously don’t have the slightest desire to control anything in the Middle East.

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