Tobin and others also worry about who is funding Islamic and Middle Eastern studies.
"Essentially, no, the court is not neutral, " said Steven Cook, a senior fellow for Middle Eastern Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
Jamsheed K. Choksy is professor of Iranian, Islamic, and International Studies at Indiana University where he served as director of Middle Eastern Studies.
FORBES: Is Baghdad Becoming Tehran's Military Weapons Pipeline?
One critic has been US Professor of History and Middle Eastern Studies, Denise Spellberg, who said the book was a disrespectful mis-representation of history.
In the wake of the September 11 attacks, interest in Islamic and Middle Eastern studies has surged and universities are scrambling to meet that demand.
"It depends on what your definition of what 'collapse' is, " added Steven A. Cook, senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
But earlier yesterday, just down the road, about 100 students protested quietly, including Joshua Everett, a graduate in Middle Eastern studies and Arabic, wearing his cap and gown.
John Swenson-Wright is Senior Consulting Fellow of the Asia Programme at Chatham House and Senior Lecturer, Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, at the University of Cambridge.
BBC: Analysis: What is driving North Korea's nuclear test plan?
Joshua Landis, director of the Center for Middle East Studies and associate professor of Middle Eastern studies at the University of Oklahoma, said Alawites live "cheek by jowl" near Sunnis in Homs, Hama and Idlib province in the west.
But there could be a more complicated plan behind the recent attack, according to Elliott Abrams, senior fellow for Middle Eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations: to drive a wedge between the new Egyptian government and the military.
Abrams, senior fellow for middle eastern studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, said President Obama has a better chance of effectively employing sanctions against Iran than President Bush did due to two factors: the drop in cost of oil and the possibility of increased cooperation from Russia and China.
CENTERFORSECURITYPOLICY: Elliott Abrams predicts Obama, Bibi faceoff
Mr Rammell added that Dr Siddiqui's review, as well as other reports and conferences on Islam in higher education, suggested Islamic studies departments were concentrating too much on a Middle Eastern focus and ignore the realities of Islam in modern multi-cultural Britain.
BBC: NEWS | UK | Education | Teaching of Islam is 'out-dated'
应用推荐