The Foreign Service Journal, April 2008

16 F O R E I G N S E R V I C E J O U R N A L / A P R I L 2 0 0 8 hatever the results of the presidential campaign, new policymakers will take their places in Washington in January. There is no doubt that the Middle East will loom large on the horizon as the new adminis- tration seeks to implement its ideas about countering terrorism, promoting democracy and developing an international consensus to support U.S. policies. All this will require a more sophisticated understanding of political Islam than the heat of campaign debates allows. F O C U S O N P O L I T I C A L I S L A M P OLITICAL I SLAM : A P RIMER FOR THE P ERPLEXED W ASHINGTON POLICYMAKERS SHOULD ALWAYS BEAR IN MIND THAT POLITICAL I SLAM MAY BE OUR ENEMY OR OUR FRIEND , DEPENDING ON THE CONTEXT . B Y A LLEN K EISWETTER W Illustration by Ben Fishman. Images courtesy of iStockphoto.com.