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This book examines the rise of Hizbullah and the marginalization and repression of Shi'ites that made them susceptible to exploitation by their sectarian leaders. It also explores how Hizbullah's abiding commitment to Iran's foreign adventures injured Lebanese Shi'ites and jeopardized their status beyond the boundaries of home.

In his review of my book Arabs at the Crossroads: Political Identity and Nationalism, the neophyte political scientist Bassel F. Salloukh attempts to instruct me on the fundamentals of research methodology. Sadly, however, his review amounts to nothing more than a brazen barrage of protestations and disapprovals. I counted about two dozen complaints and unsubstantiated criticisms in the one-and-a-half-page review, in which he summarily condemns the book for its purported "sweeping indictment of Arab failures." Salloukh unleashes a fiery litany of pseudoacademic indignation because I found the political-culture approach and crises of identity and legitimacy relevant to the study of failed Arab political systems. The reviewer is certainly free to disagree with my approach, but professional integrity necessitates that he adopt a method more academic than screeching sophomoric objections. Rather than develop an analytical case against me, the reviewer instead opts to swing from the hip, falsely attributing to me things that I never said, such as my alleged identification of a "basic foundational dislocation that has doomed everything Arab."

The objective of this article was to identify the political values of Lebanese Maronite college students. The data come from a nationwide survey that covered the entire university system in Lebanon during winter 1988. The examination focused on five exploratory variables related to the pursuit of long-term career opportunities, distinct group consciousness, intergroup relations, nationalistic tendencies, and democratic orientation. The findings point to overwhelming preference for pursuit of work and residence outside Lebanon, positive intragroup solidarity and cohesion, and strong attachment to Maronite leaders and political symbols along with a feeling of distinction from all other Lebanese groups. Respondents manifested negative attitudes toward most Lebanese religious groups, particularly the Muslim. Most expressed a strong sense of Lebanese nationalism and were eager to identify themselves with the Phoenician and Greco-Roman heritage. Finally, the responses yielded low marks for the democraticness scale.

Lebanese Muslim reactions to the September 11 attacks are assessed using the hypotheses that receptiveness to dogmas of militant Islam and young age would predict approval of the attacks, and education and income, although important in explaining the domestic component of political Islam, would have no bearing on support for the September 11 terrorist attacks. In view of the recent surge of Sunni Muslim militancy, it is proposed that Sunni respondents would show greater support for the attacks than Shi'is. The data were obtained from a stratified random sample consisting of 337 Sunni and Shi'i male and female respondents to an opinion poll conducted in the Greater Beirut area during October and November 2001. The findings verify the proposition that proneness to militant Islam and age predicted approval of the attacks but do not verify the hypothesis that Sunni respondents exceeded Shi'is in approval for the attacks.