In August 1953, in a covert operation, the CIA and MI6 jointly overthrew the democratically elected Prime Minister of Iran, Mohammed Mossadegh, installing the Shah in his place. Michael Luders illuminates the dark chain of cause and effect that flowed from this conveniently forgotten 'original sin' of postwar Western interference, extending right up to the present day. Along the way he examines other ill-fated interventions, from Iraq to Afghanistan to Libya to Palestine, blowing apart the...

On the surface, Diana Hutchins has everything—fabulous wealth, trips abroad, an apartment in the glittering city—but despite these riches, she suffers a profound malaise. Confronted with the realization that an authentic life might mean renouncing everything she’s taken for granted, Diana leaves the caged city for a wide-open world where a feral presence haunts—and then begins to inform—her every action. Meditative and haunting, In Tooth and Claw mines deep into the human experience, askin...

When a young rancher sets off to find his missing boy in 1950s Montana, seeming coincidence and vague clues lead him through a Dantean world of charred hills and forsaken prairie, past frozen wasteland and snow-bound settlements, finally into an improbable underworld populated by unsavory men. Along the way he is forced to confront the secrets of his family’s past. Allegorical and allusive, Past the Desolate Places is a story of hope and heartbreak, of dark histories and the hard grip of f...

It took a quarter-century of bad strategy, including more than a dozen years of Western air attacks and invasions in the Middle East, to bring the so-called "Islamic State" into existence. Can we somehow manage to avoid the well-trodden path of overreacting to the provocations of Islamist extremists?With the rise of ISIS, a new style of terrorism that publicly gloats over acts of extreme cruelty has reawakened the fears of the global audience. But in Don't Pani...

An updated edition of The Islamist Phoenix is now available as ISIS: The Terror Nation (978-1-60980-725-2)From its birth in the late 1990s as the jihadist dream of terrorist leader Abu Musab al Zarqawi, the Islamic State (known by a variety of names, including ISIS, ISIL, and al Qaeda in Iraq) has grown into a massive enterprise, redrawing national borders across the Middle East and subjecting an area larger than the United Kingdom to its own vici...

An E-book to beat the bombing - Expose the Big Lie in time to stop the war. Syria's situation is truly serious, under ruthless attack by enemies within and without. The so-called Syrian uprising is actually a cynical US-engineered plot using mercenaries, wahhabi fanatics and corrupt NGO's. They are determined to smash this independent Arab socialist state where oil wealth is spent on human welfare, like Libya before it was torn apart in the same way. Neighboring nations move in for the kil...

When you keep repeating that the worst is about to happen, it finally does. The threat of terrorism has caught up with us. By invading Iraq in 2003 and not intervening in Syria since 2011, we have helped fuel radicalization. And we continue to fuel it, by making diplomatic compromises with dictators, by refusing to heed the suffering of populations, and by failing to invent counter-speech. What is the responsibility of our societies in the creation of these new jihadists? How are they mold...

Understand the Middle East (since 1945)is an essential guide to one of the world's most turbulent regions. It examines the origins and development of the events which have dominated the headlines for the last six decades. Covering everything from religion and politics in the aftermath of the Second World War to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, war in Iraq and the terrorism of the present day it will change the way you think about the region.NOT GOT MUCH TIME?One, five and ...

From the author of the book that uniquely predicted the Egyptian revolution, a new message about the Middle East: everything we're told about the Arab Spring is wrong.When popular revolutions erupted in Tunisia and Egypt, the West assumed that democracy and pluralism would triumph. Greatly praised author and foreign correspondent John R. Bradley draws on his extensive firsthand knowledge of the region's cultures and societies to show how Islamists will fill the power vacuum in the w...

"The most clear and engaging history of the deadly, historic partnership between Western powers and political Islam."—Salon.comThe first comprehensive account of America's misguided efforts, stretching across decades, to dominate the strategically vital Middle East by courting and cultivating Islamic fundamentalism.Drawing on extensive archival research and interviews with dozens of policy makers and CIA, Pentagon, a...

"Carsten Wieland plumbs the contradictions of contemporary Syrian life and politics. He was among the first Westerners... in the early years of Bashar's presidency... to interview Syrian opposition members as well as government officials. He explored the reasons that many young Syrians had such high expectations of their young president even as so many reviled the government and the Baath Party for its corruption and repression. Their expectations, we now know, were dashed. Wieland is even...

Militant Islamic believers represents a small, but significant percentage of those who embrace the Muslim religion, it is powerful, well financed, and according to their own statements, hopeful of destroying the United States who they see as the Great Satan, the usurper of Muslim lands, the pilferer of Muslim resources and the one obstacle that stands in the way of their stated goal—an Islamic Caliphate controlling the entire world.And as the West is occupied by economic problems a...