Ali al-Muqri’s novels have inflamed the Arab literary scene for 30 years.

Most of us don’t know what we would be like if forced to flee our homes in the face of death threats, but all of us would like to imagine we’d be like Ali al-Muqri. The mustachioed Yemeni author, now exiled with his family in Paris, has a quick grin and a stylish jacket, and while he says his French isn’t good enough to answer questions about his work — he spoke to OZY through a translator — it’s more than good enough to order a glass of wine.

Al-Muqri, 52, has only had one of his books translated into English. But the rest of his oeuvre — which tackles war, sex and religion — has long ruffled feathers and inspired accolades across the Arab world. He’s twice been longlisted for the International Prize for Arabic Fiction and was the runner-up for France’s Arab Literature Prize in 2015.

Insisting that none of his subjects are shocking or that he’s breaking taboos, he has returned time and again to explore the lives of marginalized people in Yemeni society, humanizing those who are often dismissed while charging headlong into cultural minefields.

The U.S. must ensure this country does not become another haven for Iran-backed terrorists.

As the war in strategically located Yemen grinds on into its third year, there is no end in sight for a conflict that the U.N. is calling the worst humanitarian disaster in the world. Citizens of this small impoverished Gulf country pay an enormous price for the proxy war being fought on their soil between two regional giants, Saudi Arabia and Iran: The U.N. puts civilian casualties so far at 17,000, including at least 6,660 deaths.

The military situation is a swirl of competing causes, groups and alliances — sufficient to make any strategist’s head hurt.

On one side is the Iran-supported Shiite tribal movement — the Houthis, avowedly anti-U.S. and anti-Israel. Adding to the complexity are the differing objectives of the Saudis and their major coalition partner, the United Arab Emirates.

Nixon nominee G. Harrold Carswell looked likely to be confirmed to a U.S. Supreme Court seat in 1970 … until some very persuasive women made their case.

By the time Richard Nixon nominated George Harrold Carswell for the Supreme Court in January 1970, the seat vacated by Abe Fortas had been open for nine months, and the president was getting frustrated. Two months earlier, the Senate had rejected Nixon’s first nominee for the seat, South Carolina Judge Clement F. Haynsworth (a little too pro-segregation for comfort), but Nixon had gone back once more to the well of conservative Southern judges to pluck out Carswell, 50, a judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit.

Carswell had been a federal judge for more than a decade — at age 38, he had become the youngest one in the country — and his nomination looked promising. But sometimes, as has recently been proved again with the rocky nomination of Brett Kavanaugh, things can go unexpectedly sideways during the Supreme Court confirmation process. For Carswell, that was thanks in no small part to some outspoken female activists willing to call him out for his behavior toward women.