Bernard Lewis supplied the clash of civilizations thesis to American foreign policy

Evidence

Said’s nemesis did not fade from the scene as a result of Orientalism. If anything, Lewis became increasingly influential in certain political spheres. His ability to popularize and repackage Orientalist ideas in the last decades of the twentieth century gained him solid credentials in American foreign policy circles in light of the challenges posed by the Arab world to US political and economic interests. By making the case that Islam and the West are involved in a “clash of civilizations,” Lewis not only inspired Samuel P. Huntington, a professor of government at Harvard University, to develop the clash of civilizations thesis on a larger scale but also helped American and Western politicians shift their focus to a “new” enemy, Islam, as an old enemy, the Soviet Union, was disintegrating. — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 213

Categorization

• XREF: Directly relevant to the reader’s throughline tracing the fear from medieval polemics into the modern West — Lewis is a node where Orientalist discourse becomes explicit policy. — connects to: Bernard Lewis justified the essentialist category of Islamic terrorism — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 398; Huntington popularized a clash-of-civilizations thesis built on Lewis’s earlier Orientalist work. — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 234; Bernard Lewis mentored the neoconservatives who planned the Iraq War — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 264 (+8 more)
• SEED: Angle: the genealogy of the clash thesis shows it was built on repackaged Orientalist binaries and filled the post-Soviet enemy vacuum.

Broader Connections

• Huntington popularized a clash-of-civilizations thesis built on Lewis’s earlier Orientalist work. #expands (0.85) — Khaled A. Beydoun, American Islamophobia_ Understanding…, 234
• Bernard Lewis justified the essentialist category of Islamic terrorism #expands (0.80) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 398
• Bernard Lewis mentored the neoconservatives who planned the Iraq War #expands (0.75) — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 264
• Lewis attributed Muslim animosity to jealousy over Western dominance #expands (0.75) — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 218
• Lewis located Muslim hostility in Islam rather than Western conduct #expands (0.75) — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 217
• The War on Terror was ideologically framed as a civilizational clash #exemplifies (0.70)
• Clash-of-civilizations rhetoric ideologically legitimized both foreign wars and domestic attacks #expands (0.70) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 421
• Bernard Lewis reduced fourteen centuries of East-West to unchanging conflict. #expands (0.70) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 27
• Clash-of-civilizations ideology animated the Trump administration’s core policies #expands (0.60) — Arsalan Iftikhar, Fear of a Muslim Planet_ Global…, 685
• The clash-of-civilizations paradigm serves to prolong dominance #expands (0.60) — Green, Todd H, The Fear of Islam_ An Introduction to…, 233
• Bernard Lewis argued Arabs are unready for Western-style elections #expands (0.55) — Deepa Kumar, Islamophobia and the Politics of Empire, 211