The Damascus med-school dropout has also had somewhat of a sartorial makeover in recent years, swapping the Osama bin Laden-look for a neatly trimmed beard and green fatigues à la Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, or corporate blazers and chinos. “A person in their twenties will have a different personality than someone in their thirties or forties, and certainly someone in their fifties. This is human nature,” he assured CNN on the eve of Assad’s fall.
But withholding his hand suggests something about where exactly Shar’a might be on the spectrum of radical political Islam, as well as the limits of his recent modernization. It may also indicate the restrictions he has to observe in order to keep his Islamist fighters on board.
Baerbock, for her part, has sought to make light of the incident, telling broadcasters: “As I traveled here, it was clear to me that there would obviously be no ordinary handshakes.”
But reporting on political Islam over the years, observing how radical Islamists (or jihadists) interact with women when claiming to have become more moderate has been somewhat of a litmus test for this columnist. And a refusal to engage, to look a woman squarely in the eyes or shake their hand tends to be ominous when it comes to inclusivity.
Aside from indicating how truly moderate they’ve become, a handshake — or lack thereof — speaks volumes about how pragmatic a leader is prepared to be.
Of course, many conservative Muslims believe unrelated men and women should never touch, and yet exceptions have been made. For example, when conducting diplomacy, a handshake — the modern standard greeting for global politicians and businessmen — is something traditional Saudi and Emirati rulers have been ready to entertain. In 1987, Saudi’s King Fahd had no problems shaking then-British Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher’s hand, understanding that the gesture conveys trust, or at least a readiness to engage.