For more than a decade now, religious fundamentalism has been the driving force behind global events. If you see it as the underlying cause of 9/11, then our response to that event has not, alas,
And yet when you look at Iraq, you cannot but see the lethal power of Shiite fundamentalism. Watching the videos of Moqtada al-Sadr's return, one sees close-up what cultic theocracy can be. There is some kind of intense reverence for a man qualified solely by nepotism to be a demi-god. In Pakistan, the response to the appalling assassination of Salman Taseer has been a chilling demonstration of the power of Islam against core liberal values such as freedom of speech. The stain of blasphemy still seems to be a critical value of not just the Islamist but increasingly the Muslim world. In Egypt, everything the neocons warned about Arab autocracy is being proven true: it can incubate and propel Islamism rather than stifle it. But democracy's impact in Iraq, where it is now associated with both chaos and Shiite radicalism, and in Gaza, where it empowered Hamas, hardly shows a promising way forward. In Israel, the politics cannot be understood any more without a deep understanding of the increasingly powerful religious parties and their expansionist goals. In every cycle, fundamentalist religion is winning and secular moderation appears to be waning.