Dexter Van Zile

Boston

Managing Editor at Middle East Forum

Violin Family Research Fellow, Middle East Forum (MEF). Managing Editor, Focus on Western Islamism (FWI).

Articles

NIAC Has Lost Its Mojo

1 week ago | meforum.org | Dexter Van Zile

The National Iranian-American Council (NIAC), which has masqueraded as a cross between a respectable think tank and a voice for the Iranian diaspora in the United States since its founding in 2002, has had a rough time since Israel started destroying Tehran’s nuclear program on June 12,2025.
Pro-Iran Islamists Running Summer Camp Outside of London

2 weeks ago | meforum.org | Potkin Azarmehr |Dexter Van Zile

During the third week of August, dozens of Muslim children aged eight to thirteen will spend a long weekend at Phasels Wood Activity Center—a venue typically used for Scout camps and youth retreats—located a short drive from London.
Staten Island Mosque Enlists Felon, Antisemite, and Pro-Jihadist to Teach Children Qur’an

1 month ago | meforum.org | Dexter Van Zile

A mosque has taken a divisive approach to promoting the Muslim faith in New York City. The Muslim Community Center (MCC) of Staten Island has enlisted the teaching skills of Tarek Mehanna, a prominent extremist who was convicted in 2011 of conspiring to kill his fellow U.S. citizens and sentenced to seventeen years in federal prison for his crimes.
How the United Church of Christ Betrayed Its Flock

2 months ago | dextervanzile.substack.com | Dexter Van Zile

In 2022, I interviewed Umar Lee, a prominent Muslim activist from St. Louis, for the publication I edit, Focus on Western Islamism (FWI). One of the electrifying moments of the interview came when Lee said that he discourages young white men from converting to Islam. Muslims born into the faith regard white male converts with suspicion that will likely never go away, he warned.
Trump Needs to Listen to the Far Left on the Peace Corps

Mar 23, 2025 | dextervanzile.substack.com | Dexter Van Zile

The author near Lake Kivu, Bukavu, Zaire, 1987. As strange as it sounds, President Donald Trump needs to pay close attention to a group of leftists who started a movement called, “Decolonize the Peace Corps” a few years back. The organization has a bracing message: the only people who are really helped by the Peace Corps are its volunteers and that it’s time to shut the organization down.
Trump Needs to Listen to the Far Left on the Peace Corps

Mar 23, 2025 | dextervanzile.substack.com | Dexter Van Zile

The author near Lake Kivu, Bukavu, Zaire, 1987. As strange as it sounds, President Donald Trump needs to pay close attention to a group of leftists who started a movement called, “Decolonize the Peace Corps” a few years back. The organization has a bracing message: the only people who are really helped by the Peace Corps are its volunteers and that it’s time to shut the organization down.
Catastrophes Happen but God Abides (If We Let Him)

Mar 12, 2025 | dextervanzile.substack.com | Dexter Van Zile

Anglican scholar Gerald McDermott (above) has written a restorative and kerygmatic text that is of interest to scholars and lay Christians struggling to withstand the turmoil of the current age. (Photo by Dexter Van Zile). In his penultimate book, The Passenger, Cormac McCarthy posits the widely held belief that the end is near for Western civilization. He offers this message through his aptly named protagonist, Bobby Western—whose father, a nuclear physicist, worked on the Manhattan Project.
Jew-Jitsu

Feb 26, 2025 | dextervanzile.substack.com | Dexter Van Zile

I was in my third or fourth month at the David Project, an organization founded in 2002 to counter anti-Zionism on college campuses, when one of my co-workers at the desk next to me told me the news. It was a mid-morning in early 2005 and I had just gotten off a long phone conversation with another Christian defender of Israel. “Dexter, it’s OK,” she said. “You can say it.”Dexter’s Substack is a reader-supported publication.
Hard to Kill: A Letter to a Young Jew

Feb 16, 2025 | dextervanzile.substack.com | Dexter Van Zile

Dear Son of Abraham:This is the first of several letters I will be writing to young Jewish men in the United States over the next several months.
Jewish Nonprofit in Boston Rebukes Islamist Agitators It Once Funded

Dec 31, 2024 | meforum.org | Dexter Van Zile

(Photo by Dexter Van Zile) A Massachusetts nonprofit recently announced that it has ceased providing financial support to the Muslim Justice League (MJL), a charity that conflates Islamism and leftism while promoting anti-Israel and anti-American propaganda in the Boston area. The Lenny Zakim Fund also rebuked the MJL for stoking hate and bigotry at a vigil it held in September.