'The Sahel states are facing starvation, as well as the obliteration of the delicate religious eco-system that enabled Sufism to survive'

The President has eviscerated the US defence budget, and so threatens to deprive America of the means to use decisive force

‘However successful the US is in capturing terrorists, the war on terror can never be over; fighting terrorism cannot be a “war”’

Ten years since the war in Afghanistan was started, neither the Taliban nor the West seems to be winning, nor 'not losing'

Osama Bin Laden's death gives credence to the Bush administration and American conservatives who fought against al-Qaeda

‘If the law books say it’s never lawful to kill tyrants, it’s the books that need changing, not Western policy’

‘I do not care whether Osama bin Laden was cowering behind his wife or whether he had a gun. I’m just glad he’s dead’

‘I only discovered both how much I was missing New York and what was irritating me about Berlin when I visited Manhattan in the week after bin Laden’s killing’

‘Why is Britain pledging £650 million without ensuring that Islamabad does more to inhibit jihadists of Pakistani origin in our own country?’

Spinoza was the first major modern thinker to defend both democracy and liberty. His Tractatus Theologico-Politicus is still the classic defence of the idea that 'in a free state, every man may think what he likes and say what he thinks.'