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Dr. Andreas Eppink The Old Men in the Mountains Muslim culture and the psychological side of terrorism |
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Ali Baba! Ali Baba! “Is your house locked safely Rashid?” the youths ask tauntingly of the man as he carefully locks his front door before leaving for his day’s work. “Thieves are everywhere, Rashid, especially the one who steals women’s underwear!” The young men laugh uproariously at this, but Rashid ignores them, making a show of putting the large key into the folds of his robe and walking up the street in the most dignified manner he can manage. An hour or so later shouts of “Ali Baba! Ali Baba!” are heard as the youths laugh hysterically. A passerby, hearing the shouts, looks upward where the young men are pointing and sees the outline of someone running along the rooftops of the row of houses where Rashid lives. Being a stranger, the passerby does not understand the humor in a thief escaping via the rooftop, and asks someone standing nearby what on earth is going on. The cryptic reply: “A thief of women’s underwear” - that being the colloquial term for the paramour of a married woman. Rashid’s honor is what is really at stake here. The mocking laughter burned his ears and inside he seethed with rage and hurt pride at the taunting, but nonetheless, Rashid’s honor had remained intact - for, after all, hadn’t everyone on the entire street seen him lock his door tightly and shake it brusquely to assure it was firmly affixed before he left? He had shown all those within view that his home was securely locked and therefore his women - and his honor - were safe. (The fact that the “thief” easily circumvented the locked front door and entered via the roof was, to Rashid, quite secondary to the primary matter of honor.) Although Rashid’s values and priorities may seem very strange to Westerners, this story offers a revealing look into the concept of honor in the Muslim world. One could imagine that the moral of this story is that one can get away with a great deal if one simply devises a way in which the other party can save face. Perhaps. This may be an effective ploy indeed. But in the Muslim world things are rarely as simple as they may first appear … Contents Introduction - September 11, 2001 and The Eppink Model of Cultural Psychological Analysis Chapter 1 - A short anecdotal look at Muslim values Chapter 2 - The Eppink Model and the psychological Analysis of a culture Chapter 3 - The dangerous mix Part One: The Creation of the 'Dangerous Islam' : Honor and inviolability combined with restricted communication and restricted knowledge Chapter 4 - The first Bin Ladens Chapter 5 - The other Bin Ladens: The old men in the mountains training assassins Chapter 6 - The political plan of a fanatic: the Ayatollah Khomeiny Chapter 7 - The outcome of the theocratic Muslim state Part Two: Clashing Cultures Chapter 8 - The tribes versus the settlers Chapter 9 - Culture clash 1: The nomads versus the townspeople Chapter 10 - Culture clash 2: A theocratic state or democracy? Part Three: Terror and those who create it: The psychosis of the Muslim Terrorist Chapter 11 - The power complex Chapter 12 - From orthodoxy to extremism and Holy War: what creates a terrorist? Chapter 13 - Moderates & puritans in the Mislim world combinations of the supporting HG information/knowledge Chapter 14 - Is there hope for peace and Western democracy in Iraq and Muslim world? Appendices Appendix A - A historical overview of Mesopotamia/Iraq Appendix B - A list of scholars under the Caliphate of Baghdad Appendix C - References Appendix D - Glossary About the author Dr. Andreas Eppink has served as an expert consultant for the United Nations, the World Health Organization, the Dutch Minister of the Interior and a wide range of large corporations and goverment agencies. The developer of the Eppink Model of Psychocultural Analysis, he currently works as a management consultant. Also an expert in Middle Eastern culture, religion and history, he wrote his Ph.D. dissertation on family relations in North Africa. Dr. Eppink began his career as a corporate consultant and conducted studies in organizational psychology and anthropology. Dr. Eppink received his doctorate degree in social sciences in 1977 from the University of Amsterdam, and went on to study clinical psychology and psychotherapy, culminating in his official registration as a psychotherapist. He also worked as a forensic psychologist and anthropologist specializing in the study of culture, and was a pioneer in the field of migration study, particularly relating to mental health and occupation. In addition to these posts, he has also served as an intergovernmental expert for the European Committee for Migration in Geneva and as an expert for various European committees in Strasbourg and Brussels. Dr. Eppink speaks five languages and reads several more. With an introduction by John Pellam Bestel/Order |
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