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Background Silent cerebral small-vessel disease (CSVD) is defined as white matter hyperintensities, silent brain infarction, or microbleeds. CSVD is responsible for future vascular events, cognitive impairment, frailty, and shorter survival. CSVD prevalence among middle-aged people living with well-controlled human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) infection (PLHIV) is unknown. Methods The French National Agency for Research on AIDS and Viral Hepatitis (ANRS) EP51 Microvascular Brain Retina and Kidney Study (MicroBREAK; NCT02082574) is a cross-sectional study with prospective enrollment of treated PLHIV, ≥50 years old with viral load controlled for ≥12 months, and frequency age- and sex-matched HIV-uninfected controls (HUCs). It was designed to estimate CSVD prevalence on 3T magnetic resonance imaging (3D fluid-attenuated inversion recovery, transversal T2-weighted gradient-echo imaging and diffusion-weighted imaging), as diagnosed by 2 blinded neuroradiologists. A logistic regression model was used to assess the impact of HIV on CSVD after adjustment for traditional risk factors. Results Between June 2013 and May 2016, 456 PLHIV and 154 HUCs were recruited. Median age was 56 and 58 years, respectively (P = .001), among whom 84.9% and 77.3%, respectively (P = .030), were men. CSVD was detected in 51.5% of PLHIV and 36.4% of HUCs with an adjusted odds ratio (aOR) of 2.3. The HIV impact differed according to age, with aOR values of 5.3, 3.7, and 1.0 for age groups 60 years, respectively (P = .022). Older age, hypertension, and lower CD4 cell count nadir were independently associated with a higher risk of CSVD among PLHIV. Conclusions HIV is an independent risk factor for CSVD. Despite sustained immunovirological control, the CSVD prevalence was twice as high among middle-aged PLHIV than HUCs. Clinical Trials Registration NCT02082574.

This article deals with the impact on the political forces in the Arab World in general and in Syria in particular of the free, democratic and peaceful accession to power of the Justice and Development Party in Turkey. It further examines how Syrian political movements, especially political Islam, are trying to make sense out of these recent “revolutionary” political developments in Turkey and how they can be applied to the Syrian case.

This article deals with the impact of the free, democratic and peaceful accession to power of the Islamic Justice and Development Party (JDP) in Turkey on the Arab world in general and on the Islamic currents active in Arab societies in particular. A main point is looking into how Arab political formations and especially political Islam are trying to make sense out of such recent developments in Turkey as: (1) the fact that traditionally reviled Turkish secularism, Kemalism and westernism could produce a democratic form of political Islam capable of winning free elections and ruling Turkey without a catastrophe befalling the whole polity; and (2) the fact that an Islamic JDP is the most eager proponent of Turkey’s membership in the secular EU, while the traditional staunch military guardian of Turkish secularism is now the main obstructor of the drive for EU membership.

The phenomena of orientalism, occidentalism, and Islamism are at play in a variety of contexts today. This intervention, while not a systematic essay on the subject, presents a kind of collage of analyses, observations, criticisms, and commentaries dealing with several conventional and unconventional themes substantively related to these issues. Occidentalism, it is argued here, has taken various forms over the past few decades: the “Orientalism in Reverse” of Hasan Hanafi and his call for the establishment of a science of istighrab (occidentalism) in the Arab world; the retaliatory occidentalism of Adonis's “Manifesto of Modernity (or Modernism)” of 1980; the Talibanish occidentalism found in a work like The Spirit of Terrorism by Jean Baudrillard; and the benign and popular variety of occidentalism, which helps in some cases to reinforce shaken identities. Such discourses are examined in light of the recent publication of Ian Buruma and Avishai Margalit's Occidentalism and by way of a reassessment of the political intentions of Edward Said's Orientalism. The concluding section of the article is devoted to answering the question, what is Islamism? It is suggested that Islamism as ideology and practice since the mid-1970s can be said to have six defining characteristics: fundamentalism, revivalism, integralism, theocraticism, theonomism, and terrorism.

Abu Fakhr: You have stated that one of the errors of the Left was that it neglected the importance of civil society, democracy, human rights, secularism, and so on. At present, many are giving up the mantle of Marxism and enlisting in the ranks of the secularists as though they believed secularism could serve as a shield against religious fundamentalism [salafiyyaj. Where do you believe we are headed in the near future?