Middle East Forum

Dhimmitude Project

Ruins of Tilla Jogian, an ancient Hindu monastery in Jhelum District that served Nath Jogi ascetics for nearly 2,000 years before being abandoned during Partition in 1947. Today it stands in disrepair, a symbol of Pakistan's fading Hindu heritage.
Dhimmitude Project
Citizens in Name Only: Pakistan’s Vanishing Hindu Minority
Neo-Dhimmitude Prompts Eight Decades of Erasure
September 18, 2026
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Imran Khurshid
Anti-Israel hostility stoked by the Islamic Republic of Iran has rendered Jews, who play a significant role in Persian and Iranian history, vulnerable to oppression and violence.
Dhimmitude Project
Recognized, Yet Suspected: Iranian Jews and the Paradox of Citizenship under the Islamic Republic
From Dhimmitude and Pahlavi-Era Citizenship to the Politics of Loyalty after 1979
September 10, 2026
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Erfan Fard
Turkish soldiers stationed in Northern Cyprus celebrate Armed Forces Day, a Turkish holiday. Ankara has used religious institutions to alter the cultural identity and practices of the secularized Muslim community that inhabited Cypruse prior to Turkey's 1974 invasion of the island. The methods used by Turkey to impose its will on secularized Muslims on Cyprus are similar to the methods Islamic rulers have used to control and transform non-Muslim communities in the Middle East and elsewhere throughout the world.
Dhimmitude Project
The Transformation of Turkish Cypriot Identity: State-Sponsored Islam, Human Rights, and Dhimmitude
As Ankara Expands the Role of Islam in Northern Cyprus, Turkish Cypriots Fight to Preserve a Secular Identity Forged over Generations.
August 28, 2026
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Nicoletta Kouroushi
The Islamic Republic of Iran, established by Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979, imposes different systems of oppression on adherents of the Baha’i and Zoroastrian faiths. Under the 1979 constitution, Zoroastrians are a recognized minority granted limited ritual freedoms and a reserved parliamentary seat, while Baha’is—the country’s largest unrecognized religious community—are denied legal existence and subjected to systematic exclusion from education, employment, and property.
Dhimmitude Project
Neo-Dhimmitude in Iran: Religious Hierarchy and Minority Life Under the Islamic Republic
A Comparative Study of the Baha’i and Zoroastrian Communities
August 22, 2026
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Erfan Fard
Christians from the United States admire anti-Israel propaganda displayed at the Walled Off Hotel in Bethlehem as part of a "peacemaking" conference organized by Bethlehem Bible College in 2018. The Kairos II document is targeted at Christians like these and the churches to which they belong.
Dhimmitude Project
The Captured Testimony of Kairos Palestine II
“Peacemaking” Document Invites Western Churches to Abet the Restoration of Dhimmitude in the Levant.
August 14, 2026
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Mark Durie
The Dome of the Rock stands at the center of a modern system of intimidation and religious subordination rooted in the classical Islamic institution of the dhimmah.
Dhimmitude Project
Neo-Dhimmitude on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount—A Case Study
The Paradox of a Secular Jewish State as the De Facto Enforcer of Islamic Supremacism
July 29, 2026
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Tom Nisani
For thirteen centuries, the jizya stood as a religiously mandated instrument of subjugation—rooted in explicit Qur’anic command and elaborated across classical jurisprudence—not a reciprocal protection fee. Its graduated payments, humiliating collection rituals, and surrounding architecture of legal disabilities extracted wealth while enforcing abasement, driving the demographic collapse of once-thriving Christian and Jewish communities across the Levant, North Africa, and beyond. The jizya's enduring legacy of humiliation and contempt requires honest reckoning today: formal acknowledgment, restitution where possible, and reparative justice for the descendant communities who paid for the right to remain what they already were.
Dhimmitude Project
Confronting the Legacy of Jizya as an Instrument of Subjugation
Modern Muslim States Must Abandon the Mythology Surrounding the Jizya and Confront its Damage to Religious Minorities
July 15, 2026
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Jalal Tagreeb
Protesters gathered outside Pakistan's Supreme Court in 2018 to demand the execution of Asia Bibi, a Christian farmworker accused of insulting Islam. Bibi's status as a Christian, coupled with Pakistan's blasphemy laws, rendered her vulnerable to the “hanging sword” of neo-dhimmitude in Pakistan, where mere allegations can lead to prolonged detention, social ostracism, and in some instances, violence. After the Pakistani Supreme Court overturned her conviction, Bibi fled the country in 2019.
Dhimmitude Project
Neo-Dhimmitude in the Land of the Pure: Pakistan’s Native Christians and the Betrayal of Jinnah’s Pluralism
April 20, 2026
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Craig Considine
More from MEF
When a local pastor condemned officials for naming a busy intersection after Hezbollah-supporter Osama Siblani in September 2025, Dearborn Mayor Abdullah Hammoud (above in 2024) called the pastor “an Islamophobe,” declaring: “I want you to know as mayor, you are not welcome here. And the day you move out of the city will be the day that I launch a parade celebrating the fact that you moved out of the city because you are not somebody who believes in coexistence.”
FWI News
Journalist Sues Dearborn and Its Mayor for Anti-Christian, Anti-Jewish Discrimination
Local Pastor Supports Lawsuit
September 18, 2026
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Dexter Van Zile
Protesters at a January 20, 2025 rally in London demonize Israel, adding fervor and strength to the Islamist cause in the United Kingdom.
FWI Opinion & Interview
Baroness Warsi: Unable—or Unwilling—to Defend Civil Society in U.K.
Labour’s Likely Islamophobia Czar Says Only ‘Six Freaks’ Back Hamas
September 18, 2026
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Hannah Baldock
Israel and the Kingdom of Morocco formally agreed to upgrade their respective diplomatic liaison offices to full embassies and appoint official ambassadors. Accompanied by mutually agreed steps to expand direct commercial aviation routes and finalize key bilateral agreements on investment protection and double-taxation prevention by the end of 2026, the decision represented a further step in the evolution of their 2020 normalization framework.
Middle East Forum Online
Israel and Morocco Are Redrawing the Strategic Map of North Africa
Behind the Formal Diplomatic Language Lies a Vastly Broader, Far More Complex, and Highly Consequential Regional Narrative
September 18, 2026
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Amine Ayoub