Showing titles in Middle East

Jean-Pierre Filiu, acclaimed historian of Gaza, is intimately familiar with the land's people and places; he speaks the local dialect. But nothing prepared him for what he encountered there in December 2024. This is his unforgettable, unbearably intimate account of one month in a place shattered by Israel's all-out war.

O Jerusalem! is the epic drama of 1948, when Arabs and Jews fought for control of the city of Jerusalem. This story traverses centuries and continents, covering the time between WWII and the creation of the independent state of Israel. Based on five years of intensive research and thousands of interviews, this is a story of courage, terrorism, heroism, and ultimately, war.

"I first met al-Qaeda before there was an al-Qaeda, way back in the winter of 1984. It was an encounter that came within a split second of costing me my life." So begins Rob Schultheis's gripping account of his journey into the heart of one of the world's most dangerous places, on the trail of the world's most wanted man. A veteran war correspondent, Schultheis offers a first-hand look at how the seeds of al-Qaeda were planted by foreign jihadists in the 1980s, before most Americans knew what the word "jihad" meant.

Nika, studentessa, 16 anni? È caduta da un palazzo, dice il regime. Aida, 36, medico? Un amante l'ha spinta giù dal cavalcavia, dice il regime. Sono queste le storie quotidiane delle ragazze iraniane lungo le strade della «loro» Rivoluzione. Una generazione di giovani donne istruite che pagano col sangue il coraggio di mettere i propri corpi di traverso a un sistema vecchio, sessista, illiberale. Barbara Stefanelli raccoglie le storie delle ribelli iraniane e di chi ne ha sostenuto la battaglia. Per custodire i nomi e i volti, il sacrificio e le promesse.

In 1986, Laura Blumenfeld's father was shot in Jerusalem by a member of a rebel faction of the PLO responsible for attacks on several tourists in the Old City. Her father lived, but Blumenfeld's desire for revenge haunted her. This is her story. Traveling to Israel, Blumenfeld gathers stories and methods of avengers as she plots to infiltrate the shooter's life. Through interviews and extensive research, she explores the mechanics and the psychology of vengeance. 

What does ISIS really want? This is the definitive account of the strategy, psychology, and fundamentalism driving the Islamic State. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY FOREIGN AFFAIRS “Worthy of Joseph Conrad . . . gripping, sobering and revelatory.”—Tom Holland, New...

The true story of two young American men who came to Baghdad without a plan, were recruited into an occupation that knew the feeling, and witnessed enough corruption, confusion, and brutality to fill the pages of a very good book...

In this urgent, balanced, and passionate book, Nobel Peace Laureate and former President Jimmy Carter argues that the present moment is a unique time for achieving peace in the Middle East—and he offers a bold and comprehensive plan to do just that. President Carter has been a student of the...

The Jewish people are one of the oldest living people groups on the planet. The Jews lived alongside the ancient Egyptians, Babylonians, Phoenicians, and Sumerians - all of whom have since disappeared from the pages of history. Yet the Jews still remain. Despite all of the odds, Jewish culture, language, laws, and religion have remained intact over the course of thousands of years.

Retired army colonel and New York Times bestselling author Andrew J. Bacevich provides a searing reassessment of U.S. military policy in the Middle East over the past four decades. From the end of World War II until 1980, virtually no American soldiers were killed in action while serving in the...

“On All Fronts: The Education of a Journalist beautifully outlines . . . what it means to seek the truth. It gave me a new faith in the power of reporting.” —Oprah Winfrey The recipient of multiple Peabody and Murrow awards, Clarissa Ward is a world-renowned conflict reporter. In this...

A book as sweeping, colorful, and rich in extraordinary characters as the empire which it describes - Tom Holland The Ottoman Empire has long been depicted as the Islamic-Asian antithesis of the Christian-European West. But the reality was starkly different: the Ottomans' multiethnic...

A Financial Times Book Best Book of the Year 2020 A Foreign Affairs Best Book of the Year 2020 The gripping, untold story of how Saudi Arabia's secretive and mercurial new ruler rose to power. Even in his youth as a prince among thousands of princes, Mohammed bin Salman nurtured sweeping...

In this original and evocative book, we accompany Raja on six walks taken between 1978 and 2006. The earlier forays are peaceful affairs, allowing our guide to meditate at length on the character of his native land, a terrain of olive trees on terraced hillsides, luxuriant valleys carved by sacred springs, carpets of wild iris and hyacinth, and ancient monasteries built over 1,000 years ago. Shehadeh’s love for this magical place saturates his renderings of its history and topography.

Lawrence of Arabia is one of the most iconic figures of the First World War, seen by many as a heroic and romantic guerrilla leader in a period of savage and deeply impersonal industrial warfare. While Lawrence himself has been the subject of many biographies and an award-winning film, the context of his war in the desert, and his ideas on war itself, are less well-known. Lawrence of Arabia on War is a study of those ideas and of his campaign of irregular warfare which has informed tactical theory and decision-making down to the present day.

Jerusalem is the universal city, the capital of two peoples, the shrine of three faiths; it is the prize of empires, the site of Judgement Day, and the battlefield of today's clash of civilizations. From King David to Barack Obama, from the birth of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam to the Israel-Palestine conflict, this is the epic history of 3,000 years of faith, slaughter, fanaticism, and coexistence. How did this small, remote town become the Holy City, the 'centre of the world' and now the key to peace in the Middle East?

David Rundell - one of America's foremost experts on Saudi Arabia - explains how the country has been stable for so long, why it is less so today, and what is most likely to happen in the future. The book is based on the author's close contacts and intimate knowledge of the country where he spent 15 years living and working as a diplomat. Vision or Mirage demystifies one of the most powerful, but least understood, states in the Middle East and is essential for anyone interested in the power dynamics and politics of the Arab world.

Two insiders explain why the Israeli–Palestinian peace process failed, and anticipate what lies ahead. On October 7, 2023, Hamas fighters killed more than eleven hundred Israelis and took more than two hundred hostages, prompting an Israeli response that has in turn taken tens of thousands of...

Since the Second World War, Arab armed forces have consistently punched below their weight. They have lost many wars that by all rights they should have won, and in their best performances only ever achieved quite modest accomplishments. Over time, soldiers, scholars, and military experts have offered various explanations for this pattern.

Usama Bin Laden’s greatest fear was not capture or death, but the exposure of al-Qaeda’s secrets. At great risk to themselves and the entire mission, the US Special Operations Forces, who carried out the Abbottabad raid that killed Bin Laden, took an additional eighteen minutes to collect Bin Laden’s hard drives and thereby expose al-Qaeda’s secrets. In this ground-breaking book, Nelly Lahoud dives into Bin Laden’s files and meticulously distills the nearly six thousand pages of Arabic private communications.