In “The Muslim Conquest of the City of al-Ubulla” (Journal of Islamic Studies 31, no.2 (2020)), Irsan Ramini and Heba Al-Zuraiqi discuss the dating of the Muslim conquest of the southern Iraqi port city of al-Ubulla. They claim that their argument is situated amidst two conflicting accounts of the event, in which one account dates the year as 14AH and the other in the year 16AH, and they reconcile the two accounts through close examination of other aspects of the Ubulla conquest. They conclude that the port city was conquered twice, once in the year 14 AH before the battle of al-Qādisiyya and then again in 16 AH after that battle, arguing that their reconciliation of the two accounts allows them to draw some judgments as to the tribal identity of the Muslim troops who implemented that conquest and established the garrison city of Basra.
Julie Fraser’s chapter “Exploring Legal Compatibilities and Pursuing Cultural Legitimacy: Islamic Law and the International Criminal Court” (Intersections of Law and Culture at the International Criminal Court (London: Edward Elgar, 2020)) advocates for the International Criminal Court’s usage or reference to Islamic law in relevant cases. After discussing Islamic legal perspectives on crime and punishment, she claims the International Criminal Court neglects to recognize, engage with, and understand Islamic law other than a few cases.Fraser concludes that the usage or reference to Islamic law in international criminal law promotes the Court’s cultural legitimacy in Muslim communities and fosters the engagement of Muslim-majority States in the Rome Statute system.
In A Man of Many Flags: Memoirs of a War Crimes Investigator (Oxford:Hart Publishing, 2020), M. Cherif Bassiouni writes about his experience as an international law figure who experienced historical moments of the past century. Beginning with an overview of his childhood and education, Bassiouni goes on to give personal eye-witness account of international events. The book continues with his reflections on his connection to events such as the Suez War, the Camp David Accords, the fall of Muammar el-Qaddafi in Libya, and the establishment of the International Criminal Court.
Mehdi Hakimi interrogates the category of rule of law in Afghanistan in his article“Rule of Law from the Ground Up: Legal Curriculum Reform in Afghanistan” (California Law Review Online 11, (2020)). He explores the nexus between the rule of law and legal education in developing and transitional states, particularly, the role of curriculum reform in bolstering the legal education system. After giving an overview of the Afghanistan Legal Education Project, Hakimi concludes that curriculum initiatives such as this can serve as catalysts for meaningful rule of law reform by tackling foundational deficiencies in the legal education system. He states that byenhancing the capacities of future lawyers to fulfill their legal obligations, such pioneering initiatives can serve as an impetus for concerted efforts in cultivating a rule of law culture from the ground up in Afghanistan and other transitional societies.
