7 Quotes by Fouad Ajami

a phoenix. His faith in Iraq and in himself has been incredible.

There must have been great yearning and repression in Mohamed Atta's life; it is the torment of Atta's generation. They were placed perilously close to modernity, but they could not partake of it.

The end of despots is always odd?exhilarating to those who suffered their tyrannies, and to those who hold despotism in contempt, and anti-climatic at the same time, the discovery that these tyrants were petty, frightened men after all.

These others -- the overwhelming majority of Iraq's people -- have repeatedly given every indication of valuing their newfound freedom: voting in two elections at the risk of their lives, preparing for a third, writing and ratifying a constitution granting more freedoms than exist in any country in the entire Arab Middle East. The secret is out, There is something decent unfolding in Iraq. It's unfolding in the shadow of a terrible insurgency, but a society is finding its way to constitutional politics.

The driving motivation of a new American endeavor in Iraq and in neighboring Arab lands should be modernizing the Arab world.

I don't think the constitution will make or break Iraq. What will make or break Iraq is the coalition of this national will.

I don't think countries in the region are ruled by constitutions.