ΚΕΝΤΡΟ ΜΕΣΟΓΕΙΑΚΩΝ, ΜΕΣΑΝΑΤΟΛΙΚΩΝ & ΙΣΛΑΜΙΚΩΝ ΣΠΟΥΔΩΝ

The Iranian leadership remains trapped in a revolutionary ideology that is sustained by a nationalist narrative, especially in times of hardship. Appealing to the patriotic sentiment of the people has worked in the past, but in the current circumstances the public, especially the millennial generation who have no memory of the Revolution or the Iran-Iraq war, have lost faith in this narrative. Faced with a stifling economic and employment crisis, excruciating sanctions and mounting international pressure, the Iranian political, military and clerical establishment is more than ever challenged to adapt to the changes that have driven the society in 40 years, or face protests that could get out of the control of Tehran. Although the regime is aware of the crucial momentum, any promises for reform remain unfulfilled, as a wide array of unelected bodies is still capable of blocking any initiative of the elected government. The US stance boosts the narrative and the anti-US sentiment, thus making an implosion or a regime change à la US unlikely to materialize anytime soon.

As the battle for Bani Walid continues unabated, major questions remain about what the next day of the L ibyan war will look like, not only in the Maghreb but also in a wider regional and international level. As the rebels are still sweeping the country for the last supporters of the regime and the Qadh?fi family, the Sahel is boiling, the Syrian regime staunchly refuses any concession to the protesters and in Yemen a new wave of manifestations has been met with more repression. At the other side of the Mediterranean, the E U has got the hands full into the debt crisis of its poorest members, while China and the US are coping with their own controversies and internal issues respectively.

A series of French and foreign scholars and researchers have embarked on an effort to approach a phenomenon that has increased in ìpopularityî since 9/11 in western media, academic communities and thinkñtanks; however, it still remains widely ambiguous. Analyses which focus on extremist movements in the Muslim world quite often use the term ìSalafismî along with ìJihadismî, ìWahhabismî and ìextremist Islamî. This kind of mixing of theological, militant and political terms obscures more than it reveals while confusing the reader and intensifying his or hers already troubled perception of the phenomenon under discussion. This work - the first one to approach the Salafist phenomenon under a global prism - sheds light on the course of salafism from its cradle in the Arabian Peninsula to its apparition in the Parisian suburbs, passing by the Middle Eastern world and particularly Morocco.