The Muslim world has been plagued by imperial interests, cultural ravaging and plundering, unequal partnership with the West. However, since the September 11, 2001 (9/11) attacks, the Arab world has moved to the center of political and cultural debates and attracted the major number of representations in American writings. These writings form a new phenomenon called neo-orientalism and revolve around a major theme: Muslim Arabs as victims of fundamentalist dogma. This study explores the ways in which neo-orientalism developed and was communicated to the reader in the United States after 9/11. The literature on this phenomenon is limited; therefore, there exists a need for the study of neo-orientalism through contemporary fictions that deal directly with Arab-American relationship. This study also investigates the assumption implicit in the conception that contemporary American novel is in solidarity with the state ignoring its imperial ambitions and its saturation with hegemonic practices. In response to the terrorist attacks, novel has been one of the most effective genres to represent the feelings of the nation and the concern of the country. This part of the study will refer to different attitudes and political orientations of novelists, which allow novel to follow the mainstream politics and do not grapple with the hegemonic interests.

The article is an attempt to highlight the suffering of the Yemenite Jews as depicted in Ali Al-Muqri’s The Handsome Jew. It argues that Ali Al-Muqri has been able to articulate the suffering experienced by Yemenite Jews for thousands of years and that the novel presents a fair and realistic picture of the Jewish society during a crucial period in the history of Yemenite Jews. In addition, the article examines how and why Yemenite Jews actively took on diasporic consciousness. It argues that this feeling of unbelonging and longing needs to be contextualized according to their specific living conditions in Yemen. It also argues that Jewish excitement during the messianic activity, their longing for Zion, and their dream of return are the outcomes of persecution and discrimination that they received at the hands Zaydi rulers of Yemen.

The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is one of the long-standing and most enduring political conflicts in modern history. It primarily revolves around competing national aspirations and territorial cla...

The present article traces the origins and developments of Saudi novel from its inception in the 1930s to the contemporary period. It aims to provide a comprehensive overview of the historical trajectory, artistic progress and thematic transformations of the novel in Saudi Arabia, while drawing attention to the noteworthy achievements of Saudi novelists. The article argues that the Saudi novel, despite its modest beginnings, has evolved into a sophisticated and powerful literary form that reflects the social, cultural and intellectual transformations of Saudi society. The article asserts that, despite its relatively late emergence, the Saudi novel has been remarkably successful in establishing its own identity by addressing the complexities of local realities while engaging with universal human concerns. By mapping its evolution and underlining its challenges, the article contends that understanding the history and the major characteristics of Saudi novel is crucial to appreciating its role in articulating collective and individual experiences within the rapidly changing society.

The article examines Ihsan Abdel Quddous’s literary texts that deal with Egyptian Jewish women to explore how Egyptian Jewesses figure in these texts to disrupt, disturb, or offset prevailing historical and fictional discourses and explore his attitude toward Egyptian Jews in general and Jewish women in particular. Deploying post-colonial feminist theory, the article argues that in Quddous’ works, Jewish women represent a highly-educated and liberal community with fluid, transnational identities that serve to foil exclusionary discourses, and that Quddous increasingly has given Egyptian Jewish women, more than any other Arab writer of the period, a voice and an active role in his works. As a result, he has articulated their hopes, fears, and needs in a period dominated by political and social instability. The article aims at identifying and categorizing major tropes and characteristics pertaining to the portrayal of Jewish women in Ihsan Abdel Quddous’ fiction, and how these portrayals adhere to or play on the universal stereotypes of Jews.

The Palestinian-Israeli conflict is one of the thorniest conflicts in the world. The life of the Palestinians in refugee camps under occupation is very difficult. Curfews, checkpoints, detention, and violence permeate all aspects of their daily life. Striving against poverty, their vicious enemy, and the constant struggle to survive are daily nightmares. However, they are often perceived as terrorists and war criminals. Dixiane Hallaj’s Refugee without Refuge: A Novel of One Palestinian Family is an attempt to highlight the problems Palestinians face in the refugee camps in occupied Palestine. The novel engages in establishing the relationship between the horrendous living conditions of the Palestinians and the aggression of the Israeli occupation forces on one hand and the violent reaction of the Palestinians on the other. It demonstrates that suicide bombing committed by the Palestinians is a rebounding of the Israeli violence and atrocities exercised against the Palestinians and that such lethal acts have no relation to religion or politics. They are personal decisions and acts taken after a long tragic suffering under the yoke of occupation. This article argues that Hallaj’s novel challenges the familiar notions and preconceptions of Palestinians as violence agitators, suicide bombers, and terrorists, which are propagated by western media and literature. The article focuses on Hallaj’s depiction of the Palestinian suffering and their final determination to get rid of their persecutors using violence after all nonviolent means become impossible. Psychoanalysis theory is applied to the novel to criticize the protagonist’s motives to attempt suicide bombing.