"Since the end of the Second World War, a dispute has continued amongst Muslims and Arabs regarding the character of Orientalism. The period during the Cold War played a principal role in the shaping of disparate views when some of the key Arab states leaned towards the former Soviet Union, while others aligned themselves with the United States and its allies. Such alignments resulted in distinctive orientations towards cultural studies that found expression in a ‘soft’ confrontation led by Islamists on one side and leftwing leaders on the other. In exploring these differences, it is important to begin by defining what is meant by Orientalism. To do this, one needs to examine the three main areas of scholarly focus in the last two hundred years: the editing of Arabic manuscripts, historical scholarship on Islam, and Islamic religious studies and its associated branches."(...)