Word: als
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...heart of the Arabic-speaking world" - literally and symbolically. It has direct links with the Middle East's most problematic places: the West Bank (more than half of Jordan's population is of Palestinian origin), Israel, Iraq and Syria. It has also struggled with terrorism; Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, founder of al-Qaeda in Iraq, was Jordanian...
Home to the Al Azhar mosque and university, the great centers of Islamic scholarship, Cairo has long influenced the thinking of Muslims everywhere. It is also, in many ways, the birthplace of radical Islam and of the precepts that underpin terrorist groups like al-Qaeda. (Read TIME's Middle East blog...
...recent months, long-standing hostility between the two communities has escalated, whipped up by resurgent Arab secular nationalism. At the federal level, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has repeatedly said he wants to strengthen Baghdad's hand at the expense of Iraq's 18 provinces, including Kurdistan - the semiautonomous three-province Kurdish region in the north - much to the chagrin of the federalist-minded Kurds. At the provincial level, newly empowered hard-line Sunni groups like al-Hadba in Mosul, Nineveh's capital, are preparing to expand their political clout. (See a TIME photographer's diary of the Iraq conflict...
...Read a TIME cover story on al-Qaeda...
...officials had estimated would be needed to defend the country shortly after the U.S. invaded in late 2001. But the beefed up force is needed to battle surging enemies led by the Taliban - scattered by the U.S. in 2001, but who have since returned with a vengeance - and al-Qaeda. The current Afghan military comprises about 90,000 troops, slated to rise to 134,000, while there are 80,000 men in the national police...