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Book Reviews
The Arab World:
History, Diplomacy, and Politics
Review Article by Brice Harris

The Arabs: A History, by Eugene Rogan. New York: Basic Books, 2009. 497 pages.
Notes to p. 531. Index. $35.

Britain and Arab Unity: A Documentary History from the Treaty of Versailles to the
End of World War II, by Younan Labib Rizk. London and New York: Tauris, 2009. iii +
164 pages. Docs. to p. 241. Bibl. to p. 252. Index to p. 261. $75.

The New Authoritarianism in the Middle East and North Africa, by Stephen J. King.
Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2009. 209 pages. Notes to p. 243. Bibl. to p. 264.
Index to p. 279. $45.50.

The Arab State and Neo-Liberal Globalization: The Restructuring of State Power in
the Middle East, ed. by Laura Guazzone and Daniela Pioppi. Reading, UK: Ithaca Press,
2009. xii + 350 pages including notes. Bibl. to p. 380. Index to p. 388. $69.95.

Getting to Pluralism: Political Actors in the Arab World, by Marina Ottaway and Amr
Hamzawy. Washington, DC: Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2009.
iv + 107 pages including notes. Index to p. 115. $19.95.

T he five books under review present an extensive historical, diplomatic, and political
survey of Arabs from the Ottoman conquest in the early 16 century to the contemporary
th

problems of the late 20th and early 21st centuries. Eugene Rogan’s The Arabs: A History,
while covering the last 500 years, sets the stage for his overall theme that the West must
pay serious attention to history, especially its questionable role in the Middle East, in order
to understand and come to grips with the challenges facing the contemporary Arab world.
In Britain and Arab Unity, Younan Labib Rizk pursues the dubious role of the West in the
Middle East by concentrating specifically on Britain’s manipulative practice of undermin-
ing efforts toward Arab unity between the First and Second World Wars.
The following three books narrow the focus further by emphasizing the pervasive and
persistent condition of authoritarian rule in the region since the Second World War and/or
independence. What seems striking here is that the focus is on domestic factors and groups.
This may interact with broader global trends, but the policies and practices are often local
and in conflict with Western preferences. Whereas the theme of Rogan’s and Rizk’s is cyni-
cal meddling of the West in Arab affairs, these three additional books emphasize internal
interests rather than external forces.
In The Arabs: A History, Eugene Rogan, University Lecturer in the Modern History of
the Middle East and Director of the Middle East Centre at St. Antony’s College, Oxford,

MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL M Volume 64, No. 3, summer 2010

DOI: 10.3751/64.3.3
478 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL

juxtaposes the view of many in the United States and Europe that the major threat to their
own security and lifestyle comes from the Arab world and Islam with the similarly preva-
lent view by the latter that the West is the greatest source of potential harm to them. Thus
Rogan stresses the need for the objective study of history to demonstrate the relationship
between “Arab stagnation and frustration on the one hand and the terror threat that so preoc-
cupies Western democracies on the other” (p. 4).
Underscoring that these opposing perspectives are not new, Rogan wryly reminds us that
the West favors the term liberation, whether referring to Napoleon’s advance into Egypt in
1798 or America’s intervention in Iraq in 2003. Egyptians and Iraqis quickly came to see these
external invasions as occupations. Likewise, during the Ottoman-European naval contest for
control of the Western Mediterranean in the 15th century and afterward, North African Arabs
praised the Ottoman captains and sailors as heroes and holy warriors against Spanish and later
European expansion. The West labeled them as pirates and brigands — although in fact each
side seized the other’s ships, sold sailors as slaves, and held officers for ransom!
While Rogan correctly reports the sense of Arab pride in its world leadership role and its
significant accomplishments during the initial five centuries of Islam, he proceeds directly
to his overarching theme of the agonizing question of Arab anger, frustration, and stagna-
tion in the 21st century. Why is this, he asks? The author commences with an acute quote
from Samir Kassir, a Lebanese journalist assassinated in 2005 and a critic of Syria. Kassir
asks how Arabs became “so stagnant? How has a living culture become so discredited and
its members united in a culture of misery and death?” (p. 3).
Rogan begins his analysis with the Ottoman Turkish conquest of Arab areas in 1516,
which “marked the end of the medieval era and beginning of the modern age in the Arab
world.” The defeat of the Mamluks from Egypt in Northern Syria by the Ottoman Turks,
whose decorated cavalry and infantry swordsmen fell to gunpowder and muskets, the au-
thor argues, constituted a major turning point for the Arabs. They would henceforth be su-
pervised from Istanbul and would have to “negotiate their place in the world through rules
set in foreign capitals, a political reality that would prove one of the defining features of
modern Arab history” (p. 20).
While an author has to begin somewhere, the Ottoman triumph over the Mamluks and
seizure of the central Arab lands in 1516 seems as reasonable as any starting point. It should
be noted, however, that non-Arabs, such as Seljuk Turks, Crusaders, and Mongols, had
ruled over many Arab territories since the sack of Bagdad in 1055, and that the Mamluks,
who the Ottomans had defeated in 1516, were not themselves Arab. And yet, as Rogan
describes, in the centuries following the Ottoman victory, the geographically divergent and
dispersed Arab areas maintained considerable autonomy and veritable independence (e.g.,
the deys and beys of North Africa, the Maronites and Druze of Mount Lebanon, Muhammad
Ali in Egypt, and the Saudi-Wahhabi alliance in Arabia).
Nevertheless, Rogan’s theme of Arab dependence and destablization assumes increas-
ing validity in the last five centuries with Anglo-French imperialism, Ottoman efforts to as-
sert tighter central control, the results of World War One in the Middle East, the emergence
of Israel in the Arab heartland, and the American intervention in the region.
Rogan organizes the almost 500 pages of text chronologically into 14 topical chapters
divided essentially into four parts: the lengthy 400 years of Ottoman Turkish overrule, the
19th-20th century period of British and French imperialism (including settler colonialism in
Algeria), the Cold War, and the contemporary period of American attempts at hegemony.
The final three chapters — “The Age of Oil,” “The Power of Islam,” and “After the Cold
War” — demonstrate the organizational problems of incorporating distinct state or local
issues within a larger framework. A novice may lose track of the developments in Lebanon,
for instance, as these are distributed across several chapters.
The Arabs: A History is essentially a political, military, and diplomatic analysis. The
analysis is accompanied by frequent references and quotations of writers and witnesses of
the period, such as the historian Jabarti, who describes Napoleon’s venture in Egypt and
 middle east journal M 479

Ahmad al-Budayi, a mid-18th century barber, who relates life in Damascus.

Rogan is quite straightforward and judicious in his analysis of Arab history over the
last half millennium — let the chips fall where they may, like them or not! This approach
may displease partisans or ideologues of whatever persuasion. For example, he relates the
omnipresent violence shared by so many of the participants in Arab history past and pres-
ent — as by the French brutality in the occupation of Algeria, the Israeli onslaught at Dayr
Yassin, the Palestinian massacre on Mt. Scopus, Saddam Husayn in Iraq, Hafiz al-As‘ad in
Hama, Israel in Lebanon, and the United States in Iraq, to name a few.
The Arabs is an important book for the general reader interested in benefiting from Ro-
gan’s plea for a greater awareness of the significance of history in understanding the plight
of the Arab peoples today. It will also be a valuable resource for new lecturers and discus-
sion leaders, as well as aspiring students.

*****

Britain and Arab Unity by Younan Labib Rizk (1933-2008) narrows the critical focus of
the relations between the West and the Arab world to the first half of the 20th century. For-
merly a professor of History at Ain Shams University in Egypt, Rizk asserts an Arab nation-
alist perspective on British policy and practice in the Middle East focusing particularly on
its attitudes toward Arab unity 1919-1945. Relying on government documents, which are
included in the last half of the book, he demonstrates that Britain opposed Arab unification
efforts as threatening its strategic and economic interests and instead preferred a number of
smaller and separate states more easily controlled and manipulated.
Criticizing as insincere Foreign Secretary Anthony Eden’s Mansion House speech of
May 29, 1941, which suggested the need for Britain to feign a positive stance on Arab unity,
Rizk points out that “the British did their best to obstruct efforts to forge Arab unity. They
used all possible methods at their disposal, from issuing warnings to Arab governments, to
actually threatening them, to attempting to actively incite conflict between them. Finally,
it worked arduously to confine efforts towards Arab unity to the cultural and economic
domains” (p. viii).
Throughout Rizk’s pointed analysis of British policy and practice between the two
world wars, he appears to waver between characterizing them as “the embodiment of a
wilfully divisive policy” (p. 2) and as the working out of divergent British administrative or-
ganizations accommodating to not necessarily related situations. Whether calculated or not,
the effects of British policies and practices were to undermine “the unity the Arabs enjoyed
under the Ottomans” (p. 5). Though the latter point is significant, it is one that Rizk does not
develop or demonstrate. Nevertheless, his narrative — supported by documents of British
efforts initially to prevent and then to influence Arab unity — is persuasive.

*****

The New Authoritarianism, The Arab State and Neo-Liberal Globalization, and Get-
ting to Pluralism — as their titles suggest — focus specifically on the last half century of
Arab politics and economics to analyze the persistence of authoritarian regimes. Despite the
seeming trend to democratization elsewhere, why has this not evolved in Arab states? How
have authoritarian regimes reformulated themselves and still survived as authoritarian?
The essential theme is similar in these works: the old authoritarianism of post-indepen-
dence, single-party, and socialist-populist regimes successfully restructured themselves as
the new authoritarianism of crony capitalism, privatization, and economic liberalism, and
carefully manipulated multi-party states. Facing the challenge of complex factors such as
economic stagnation, non-competitive state industries, rising debts, growing and dissatis-
fied populations, and the fall of the Soviet Union as a supportive socialist model, the author-
itarian regimes refocused agendas and secured new bases of internal and external support.
480 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL

Stephen King notes the irony of the socialist-populist authoritarian regimes utilizing
patronage sources of former colonial rulers and privileged urban and rural elites to sustain
themselves while the new authoritarian governments have reversed the process by privatiz-
ing state resources for the benefit of what is essentially the old, now new, elite. What goes
around comes around!
While agreeing basically on how and why this reformulation of authoritarianism took
place, the authors pursue their analyses in different approaches. King, an Associate Profes-
sor of Government at Georgetown University, opens with a theoretical analysis of a funnel
approach through layers of variables to comprehend regime transformations. He proposes
a middle ground between the “voluntarist” and “structuralist” extremes which have domi-
nated the literature on regime change.
King especially criticizes the body of theoretical literature which appears to plot a di-
rect line from authoritarian rule to democracy: “Single-party institutional legacies and new
sources of patronage from the privatization of state-owned enterprises and land provided
autocrats in Egypt, Syria, Algeria, and Tunisia with tools to hold multiparty elections and
transform authoritarian rule in other ways while maintaining power and control” (p. 201).
Italian researchers Laura Guazzone and Daniela Pioppi place this continuation of au-
thoritarian regimes in “the process of state restructuring in the Arab world due to neo-liberal
globalization … subject to the same global trends affecting the rest of the world” (p. 345).
Chapters by 17 European, Middle Eastern, and American authors analyze this agenda of re-
structuring in Egypt, Lebanon, Saudi Arabia, and Morocco. The one American contributor,
Joel Beinin, in his chapter “Neo-liberal Structural Adjustment, Political Demobilization, and
Neo-authoritarianism in Egypt” (p. 19-46), is highly critical of President Hosni Mubarak’s
neo-authoritarian national security regime. He depicts the regime as increasingly entrenched
and defensive toward opposition groups — however divided, ineffective, and repressed.
Marina Ottaway and Amr Hamzawy of the Carnegie Endowment employ an empirical
approach to portray the roles of three sets of political actors — the entrenched incumbent
ruling regimes, the divided and almost irrelevant liberal or leftist secular parties, and the
more popular Islamic movements separated between those participating or not in the lim-
ited political openings permitted. In agreement with the other authors, they conclude that it
is difficult to cope with the power of incumbency fed by patronage, media that are manipu-
lated, elections that are controlled, and the threat posed by state security services. It is not
oft-mentioned explanations such as alleged Arab exceptionalism, a supposed value differ-
ence between Islam and the West, a presumed incompatibility of Islam and democracy, the
negative impact of the Arab-Israeli conflict, or the perverse effect of oil revenues but the
“imbalance of power” which “prevents opposition groups from developing into sophisti-
cated organizations capable of exerting real pressures on the governments (p. 6).
Of the three books under review, Getting to Pluralism is the most compact and the least
expensive. Therefore, it would be the most useful for general readers and for college and
university classes. Nevertheless, if Arab societies are getting to pluralism, there is a long
way to go before there will be a transition away from authoritarianism. With popular apathy
and malaise, divided and disorganized opposition groups, and state security services on the
look-out, the authors are justifiably pessimistic. King concludes: “Of course, to be effective
any changes would have to be fully implemented, something that would not occur automati-
cally in the present context” (p. 204). And then the King’s Dilemma: If a ruling authority
offers meaningful democratic opportunities, it might be voted out of power; if it entrenches
its repression, thereby seeking to preserve itself in power, popular resistance will grow. Ro-
gan, however, is slightly more hopeful. He concludes that “for the Arabs to break the cycle
of subordination to other people’s rules” will require “a commitment to reform from within
the Arab world itself.” Only then will they “move beyond a history of conflict and disillu-
sion to achieve their potential and fulfill their aspirations in the modern age” (p. 497).

Professor Brice Harris, Department of Diplomacy and World Affairs, Occidental College
 middle east journal M 481

ALGERIA differently to economic crises? Alternatively,

could careful statecraft by a dedicated leader
Oil Wealth and the Poverty of Politics: or a small group of committed technocrats —
Algeria Compared, by Miriam R. Lowi. what today we would call “change teams” —
Cambridge and New York: Cambridge Uni- prevent those rent-induced phenomena? It is
versity Press, 2009. xix + 191 pages. Bibl. this inquiry about structure versus agency in
to p. 221. Index to p. 228. $90. Algeria — with a wider comparison to Iran,
Iraq, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia — that is
at the heart of Lowi’s wonderfully insightful
Reviewed by Diederik Vandewalle
and meticulously researched book.
It is almost ironic in retrospect that much
Even to close observers of the Arab
of Algeria’s initial blueprints for development
world, much about Algeria, with its tangle
— inspired by Destanne de Bernis, Francois
of often opaque, behind-the-scenes shifting
Perroux, and the French regulation school
political and military alliances and clans
— paid close attention to issues of statecraft
remains difficult to understand. Its descent,
that would help implement and consolidate
from a young revolutionary state with im-
the industries industrialisantes policies of
peccable tiers mondiste credentials into a
the country’s development approach. Ironic
sustained civil war whose roots remain part-
because, as Lowi amply demonstrates, de-
ly unaddressed today, has often led analysts
spite its revolutionary commitments to those
to seek to pinpoint the processes and turn-
issues, the Algerian regime arguably within
ing points by which this fall from grace took
a couple of decades after independence ex-
place. William Quandt’s classic Revolution
hibited all the social, political, and economic
and Political Leadership: Algeria, 1954-
pathologies of the stereotypical rentier state.
1968 had already laid bare the potential for
What happened? To what extent and
post-independence divisions, and John En-
how could the Algerian leadership have
telis and others in subsequent decades admi-
overcome some of the debilitating effects
rably chronicled and analyzed the country’s
of rent-induced development and responded
shifting fortunes.
to economic crises in ways that did not se-
It was clear from the beginning that hy-
verely compromise the country’s develop-
drocarbons would play an enormous role in
ment strategy? After an introductory section
the country’s economic and political future,
that admirably condenses a by now vast
and, not surprisingly, several accounts about
literature of the impact of hydrocarbons on
Algeria across the post-independence de-
development, Lowi, in a highly insightful
cades mirrored the insights of what since then
fashion, provides an answer to the first ques-
has become known as the rentier state litera-
tion in a lengthy historical recall that argu-
ture. In numerous accounts of oil exporters
ably extends halfway through the book. For
throughout the world, the concepts and buzz-
this section alone, Algeria observers — and
words that have since become part and par-
those interested more generally in the poli-
cel of that literature were also applied to the
tics of development in hydrocarbon econo-
Algerian case study: “Dutch disease,” rent-
mies — will want to consult Lowi’s book.
seeking, and the institutional shifts that make
The second question — essentially the
distributive institutions — dominated by new
structure versus agency debate centered on
state elites — mechanisms of both economic
the reaction to severe economic shocks —
and political control at the expense of extend-
is inherently the more difficult one to an-
ing the regulatory power of the state.
swer. In her comparative chapter and in the
As Lowi notes in the introduction and
conclusion to her book, Lowi valiantly and
throughout the book, many of these devel-
perceptively attempts to provide answers.
opments have been considered as virtually
It is an intellectual tour-de-force that con-
inevitable — structurally determined by the
trasts the variation to economic shocks the
processes unleashed by the rapid inflows of
author finds in her study of Algeria to that
hydrocarbon revenues. But were they in fact
of Iraq, Iran, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia.
inevitable? If so, why do oil states respond
Much like the author, this reviewer believes
482 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
that the willingness of leaders in hydrocar-
bon economies to manage shocks and their
impact can have a deep effect on the severity
or alleviation of those crises.
To argue that what matters most (p. 182)
is to account for the variation of outcomes,
however, seems hard to support. The pano-
ply of economic institutional arrangements,
often cemented long before shocks occur
(as Lowi demonstrates in the earlier part of
her book), often channel and determine the
options available — particularly in hydro-
carbon economies — to even those leaders
who have the best of intentions. It is difficult
to discern, even in this excellent compara-
tive account, what precisely would allow a
country’s leadership to overcome these in-
stitutional straightjackets.
Despite this quibble, Oil Wealth and the
Poverty of Politics: Algeria Compared is a
highly recommended book for anyone in-
terested in Algeria’s tortuous path since its
independence, in the problems of develop-
ment in general, and in those of hydrocar-
bon economies in particular. Meticulously
researched, and broadly comparative in
scope, this book is a welcome addition both
to the study of Algeria and to the larger the-
oretical question that provides its focus.
Diederik Vandewalle, Department of Gov-
ernment, Dartmouth College
ARAB-ISRAELI
CONFLICT
The Power of Inclusive Exclusion: Anato-
my of Israeli Rule in the Occupied Pales-
tinian Territories, ed. by Adi Ophir, Michal
Givoni, and Sari Hanafi. New York: Zone
Books, 2009. 634 pages. 52 illust. $38.95.
Reviewed by Paul Beran
This collection of studies by Israeli,
Palestinian, and American social scientists
is focused on power and the Israeli military
control of Palestinian life in the Occupied
Territories since the year 2000. It emerged
from a multi-year study program called “Ca-
tastrophe in the Making,” which analyzed
the spatial realities of the Israeli occupation,
its built infrastructure, use of legal frame-
works drafted and implemented by the Israeli
military on Palestinians, and the shrinking of
Palestinian physical territory and conceptual
space during the eight-year period, 2000-
2008. The approach to the studies, whether
through analytic discussion or photographic
essay, is political, meaning that values and
power, and how both are used to further the
Israeli military occupation, are central.
The book is, at some level, about the
modalities of Israeli military control over
the land and Palestinian residents of the Oc-
cupied Territories. Debating how they can
be unwound and ended is part of many sec-
tions. The 31 chapters include ten labeled
“Occupation’s Paper Trail” and five “Photo
Dossier” — all by Ariella Azoulay. This
blending of analysis with theory, case study,
and photographic essay is a refreshing ap-
proach to what can be dense information.
The combination helps to situate the analy-
sis of the occupation in terms of the human
disaster it continues to be for Palestinians
and its impact on ending the Israel-Palestin-
ian conflict. The introduction to The Power
of Inclusive Exclusion provides a tidy litera-
ture review of studies that together make up
its conceptual framework.
An argument that runs throughout is that
the occupation by Israel has been, is, and
will be implemented between two poles: the
violent application of values through brute
military force and their implementation by ad-
ministrative edict and bureaucratic control. No
matter the method, the authors imply that both
the political values and the power they harness
to deepen and solidify the occupation are inte-
gral to a fixed system of enduring control.
Of the many chapters, some are stellar.
“Photo Dossier I: The Architecture of De-
struction” by Ariella Azoulay documents
spatial changes resulting from the Israeli
military’s “walking through walls” tactics1
1. For a discussion of the Israeli Defense
Forces (IDF) urban warfare tactics, see Eyal
Weizman, “The Art of War: Deleuze, Guattari,
Debord, and the Israel Defence Force,” Au-
gust 3, 2006, http://www.metamute.org/?q=en/
node/8192.

begun during the Second Intifada in dense-
ly populated refugee camps in the West
Bank. “Where, Where To, and When in the
Occupied Territories: An Introduction to
Geography of Disaster” by Ariel Handel is
about the shrinking of Palestinian concep-
tualization of life in the Occupied Territo-
ries due to the Israeli military’s constric-
tion of movement, cantonment of land, and
creation of settlements. Whether Palestin-
ians are living on, using, or legally claim-
ing land is argued to be irrelevant, as they
can be turned out at any time by the violent
force or legal writ of the Israeli military.
The legal veneer of the military’s seizure
of land in the Occupied Territories and its
conversion to exclusively Israeli Jewish use
is graphically shown in “The Occupation’s
Paper Trail VII.” The bureaucratic normal-
ity of taking land is displayed by placing
land seizure orders side-by-side in Hebrew,
Arabic, and English. They appear banal,
despite their ability to create thousands of
internally displaced and refugee Palestin-
ians.
While having much to commend, the
book is too long and its subject too broad.
At over 600 pages, in small print, and about
dense topics, too much is crammed into
one volume. The materials perhaps could
have been organized into three volumes:
theory, case studies, and applied analysis.
The book’s unwieldy size detracts from the
potency of its many useful observations.
Regrettably, this ultimately might mean
that it will not be consulted as much as
it could be as a source for social science
analysis of the Israeli military occupation.
The study also falls somewhat into a rut of
having similar themes and voices through-
out. This, at times, leads one to feel that the
academic argument is less about debating
points of view and more about confirming
established ideas.
Despite its shortcomings, the book will
be useful to students and scholars of the Is-
rael-Palestinian conflict, military occupation,
legal studies, and the role of complex bureau-
cracies, among others. Many of the chapters
could be used as excellent readings in courses
to highlight specific topics for discussion. Us-
ing the whole book for an introductory class
would probably be overkill.
middle east journal M 483
While there are excellent chapters and
some that are not, the final one was well
placed. “Occupation as Disorientation: The
Impossibility of Borders” by Ronen Shamir,
closes with a disturbing note on the occupa-
tion’s long-term impact. The entrenching of
occupation by Israel makes fixing borders
and peace impossible. Is this a fitting end
to this collection of essays? Unfortunately,
it may be.
Dr. Paul Beran, Outreach Director, Center
for Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard Uni-
versity
GULF AFFAIRS
The International Relations of the
Persian Gulf, by F. Gregory Gause, III.
Cambridge, UK and New York: Cambridge
University Press, 2010. xi + 250 pages.
Maps. Tables. Index to p. 258. $85 cloth;
$29.99 paper.
Reviewed by Tom O’Donnell
In this meticulously researched book,
Professor F. Gregory Gause III tackles not
merely the origins of 9/11, but Saddam
Husayn’s decision to invade Iran, Ronald
Reagan’s decision to attack Iran in defense
of Iraq in 1987, Saddam’s decision to invade
Kuwait in 1991, George H.W. Bush’s deci-
sion to retaliate with Desert Storm and later
not to assist the Iraqi intifada, and George W.
Bush’s decision to invade Iraq in 2003. One
comes away considerably enlightened about
the events and beliefs underlying these fate-
ful decisions. In the process, Gause has sub-
stantially raised the standard for discourse
about Persian Gulf international affairs.
Gause argues that the Gulf became a
“special security zone” as Britain’s Labor
government decided to withdraw by 1971.
He opposes “parsimonious” classical Real-
ist balance-of-power interpretations of Gulf
affairs. Rather, Gause argues that “regional
states (act) more against perceived threats
to their own domestic stability emanating
from abroad ... ” arising from “ … the sa-
lience of transnational identities” (p. 9). The
Shah incited transnational Kurd and Shi‘i
484 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
insurgencies against Saddam Husayn, who
conceded the Algiers accords to save his
rule. Gause shows in detail how, after the
Islamic Revolution, it was only after persis-
tent identity-based (i.e., Shi‘a and revolu-
tionary-Islamic) provocations, and attempts
to uphold the Algiers accords that Saddam
finally, when convinced Iran’s campaign
constituted an existential danger to his re-
gime, invaded Iran. Gause also marshals a
compelling narrative of the events leading
to Saddam’s 1991 decision to take Kuwait.
He describes Saddam’s ire against Kuwait’s
suddenly pumping far above its OPEC quo-
ta, which depressed the price of oil as Iraq’s
massive war debt was coming due. Indeed,
Saddam’s impetus for attacking Kuwait was
his perception of a direct threat to his re-
gime’s stability. However, Gause’s model of
transnational identity instigation does not fit
this case. One is left wondering why Kuwait
and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) would
confront Iraq so brazenly after its victory
over Iran? Whence such resolve? An Ameri-
can hand is not considered; yet Washington
was then trying to shape a post-war relation-
ship with Saddam, its new anti-Iran ally.
Gause writes that “What drove Ameri-
can policy for most of the period under
study was the US interest in the Persian Gulf
oil” (p. 12). Yet, in US decisions to engage
in armed action there — Reagan’s in 1987
against Iran, George H.W. Bush’s to liberate
Kuwait, Bill Clinton’s to bomb and impose
sanctions on Iraq, and George W. Bush’s to
overthrow Saddam — never is oil consid-
ered a factor. This seems a contradiction. In
each case, Gause brings out important infor-
mation about the White House and National
Security Council’s decisions to use force,
which never include oil, though he affirms
near the start and finish that the fundamental
historical motivation for the US preoccupa-
tion with the Gulf is its interest in oil. Lesser
treatments might banish this contradiction
by saying simply that history is “like the
layers of the onion.” Gause instead, persists
in confronting theory with facts. In a sec-
tion titled “A war for oil?” he identifies two
versions of the “it’s about oil” school. One
is a “hard” version, which sees war simply
as enriching oil corporations; Gause rightly
shows that there is no evidence to support
this view. The other is a “soft” version of
the “war for oil” theory (represented by Pro-
fessor Michael Klare’s work): world sup-
plies are supposedly dwindling, geopoliti-
cal contention is rising over oil, and so the
United States needed to get Iraqi oil online.
He rightly rejects this view, too, as lacking
evidence. The problem, however, is with the
picture of today’s oil system he tests. Klare’s
is a mercantilist-like picture, whereas to-
day’s oil system is market-centered, and oil
is not peaking. Rather than geo-competition
among consuming states for oil fields as in
this out-of-date neo-colonial-era vision, a
cooperative OECD-based security system
exists with the United States as dominant
player, guaranteeing the playing field for all
oil companies. US Gulf policy ensures no
local oil-powerhouse dominates another’s
oil, undermining confidence in the global
market — the basis of global oil security. It
is unsurprising to me that US policymakers
do not often discuss the forest (oil), but ob-
sess about the trees (how and when to limit
or remove this or that Gulf oil-producing
state’s leadership). F. Gregory Gause has
provided a remarkably valuable discussion
of the latter, while respectably grappling
with how it is framed by the former. I can-
not imagine teaching about the Gulf again
without his work on the syllabus.
Dr. Tom O’Donnell, Graduate Program
in International Affairs (GPIA), The New
School University
IRAN
The Persians: Ancient, Mediaeval and
Modern Iran, by Homa Katouzian. New
Haven, CT and London: Yale University
Press, 2009. xii + 398 pages. Notes to p.
426. Bibl. to p. 433. Index to p. 452. $50.
Reviewed by Michael Morony
Homa Katouzian’s The Persians is a
comprehensive, analytic, critical, interpre-
tive, and dense account that combines the
cultural and literary history of Persians with
their political history. It begins with legend-
ary history according to the Shahnameh.

The earlier chapters summarize the pre-
modern history of Iran and contain select
bibliographies. Footnotes start with chapter
seven on reform and modernization under
Naser al-Din Shah. Fully one-half of this
book is about Iran in the 20th century. For
the modern period, Katouzian provides the
details of political intrigue and maneuver-
ing up to mid-2009. He makes effective use
of documents, memoirs, letters, speeches,
and even the Internet to record the range
of views and differences of opinion among
Iranians with regard to most issues. There
is a good account of the tug-of-war among
conservative, reformist, and radical Islamist
factions during the most recent two decades
of the Islamic Republic.
As useful as this information is, the real
importance of this book lies in Katouzian’s
arguments about the nature of Iranian so-
ciety and its history. There is no long-term
continuity in Iranian history but rather a
series of consecutive short-term successes.
This is partly due to insecurity but mostly
due to the lack of independent, continuous,
long-standing classes and institutions in
Persian history (p. 9). Iranian society is both
short-term and arbitrary. For Katouzian, the
“state” is an actor, and the arbitrary nature
of power leads to confrontations between
the state and society (for the pre-modern pe-
riod one might prefer to speak of confron-
tations between rulers and subjects). What
binds Iranian history together from begin-
ning to end is the repeating pattern of arbi-
trary rule (estabdad) alternating with chaos
(harj-o-marj). This is a view that represents
Iranian history as homeostatic and abounds
with teleology.
Katouzian makes a point of distinguish-
ing arbitrary from absolutist government,
the latter having some kind of legitimizing
theory, while the former is only given ad hoc
legitimacy by success and by rendering jus-
tice. Justice has been associated with Iranian
monarchy since at least the time of Cyrus
and Darius, but for Katouzian, in an Iranian
context, the “just ruler” is an arbitrary ruler
who, nevertheless, provides stability, peace,
prosperity, and security, and does not allow
his officials to act unjustly by exceeding the
power and authority he gave them. This list
should have included equity and the appoint-
middle east journal M 485
ment of fair and efficient subordinates.
There are some odd mistakes and in-
accuracies. The use of “orthodox” is inap-
propriate in an Islamic context. “Muluk al-
Tawa’if” is translated as “Kings of Tribes”
(p. 42), when “kings of the factions” would
be more accurate. A couple of the maps are
inaccurate as well. The map of the Parthian
Empire (p. 45) includes eastern Arabia while
the map of the Sasanian Empire (p. 46) does
not. It was the other way around. Dinars are
called silver coins, and drachmas (dirhams)
are called gold coins (p. 103); that was the
other way around, too. Barack Obama was
election as US President is given as Novem-
ber, 2009 (p. 391), not November, 2008.
Katouzian’s explanations of the nature
of Iranian history are likely to prove con-
troversial. It is questionable how useful the
arbitrary exercise of power and the alterna-
tion of order and chaos are as explanations
or how unique these are to Iran (e.g. Iraq
under and after Saddam Husayn).
Michael Morony, Department of History,
University of California, Los Angeles
IRAQ
Iraq: A Political History from Indepen-
dence to Occupation, by Adeed Dawisha.
Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press,
2009. 298 pages. Notes to p. 341. Bibl. to
p. 357. $29.95.
Reviewed by Eric Davis
Prior to 2003, Iraq was relatively un-
known in the West. Those interested in Iraqi
politics and society had to turn to Hanna
Batatu’s magisterial study, The Old Social
Classes and Revolutionary Movements of
Iraq. However, at over 1,200 pages, only the
most intrepid scholars took on the task of
reading this important yet difficult work.
After the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, nu-
merous “instant experts” appeared, prog-
nosticating Iraq’s imminent fragmentation
and condemning it to permanent ethnosec-
tarian strife. While most have now moved
on to the next crisis, we are fortunate to have
scholars, such as Adeed Dawisha, who con-
486 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
tinue to grapple with Iraq’s political com-
plexities as evidenced by his important new
study, Iraq: A Political History from Inde-
pendence to Occupation.
Devoid of social science jargon, Profes-
sor Dawisha offers the reader an eminently
clear and well-focused study of modern
Iraqi politics. Clarity of text is accompanied
by a sophisticated conceptual framework
built around the notions of state institutions,
attitudes towards democracy, and national
identity. Each of these three concepts forms
the core of distinct, but mutually constitu-
tive processes, which, when taken together,
allow us to comprehend Iraq’s political
development, both prior to and after 2003.
In Professor Dawisha’s view, the failure of
state institutions, the weakness of commit-
ments to democracy, and the problem of
defining a “coherent national identity” con-
tinue to shape Iraqi politics and society.
Despite what appears at first glance to be
a rather negative assessment of Iraqi politics,
Professor Dawisha argues that applying an
“all or nothing” approach to the possibility of
democratization in Iraq is highly problematic.
While the monarchical period (1921-58) was
by no means democratic, there existed a modi-
cum of individual freedoms, political partici-
pation, and freedom of expression as seen in
a vigorous press, a vibrant civil society, and
programmatic political parties. To apply ide-
alized Western notions of democratization to
Iraq leads us to the “spurious and patently
false conclusion” that there was no difference
between the Hashimite monarchy and Saddam
Husayn’s Ba‘thist regime (p. 42).
Suggesting parallels with events that
would occur almost a century later, Iraqis
participated with great vigor in the 1908
Ottoman provincial elections following the
seizure of power by the “Young Turks” (the
Committee on Union and Progress). During
World War I, and prior to the British occupa-
tion of Iraq, the residents of al-Najaf ruled
themselves for two years. With the outbreak
of the 1920 Revolution, Najafis held sponta-
neous elections, as did Iraqis in many other
towns that were able to temporarily rid them-
selves of British forces. After the promul-
gation of the Organic Law (constitution) of
1925, Iraqis voted in parliamentary elections
until the 1958 Revolution that overthrew the
Hashimite monarchy. Thus democracy was
not something unknown to Iraqis in 2003.
Professor Dawisha analyzes Arab-Kurd-
ish relations, which all too often are miss-
ing from studies of modern Iraqi politics.
As he observes, prior to 2003 most Arab
leaders viewed the Kurds as a “gross incon-
venience” because they interfered with the
interests of the (Sunni) Arab political elite
(p. 206). This historical legacy suggests that
the Kurds will need to be given meaningful
power in Baghdad if they are going to devel-
op an enduring loyalty to the new federally-
organized Iraqi nation-state.
Iraq: A Political History ends on the
same ambiguous note with which it begins.
According to Professor Dawisha, Iraq still
possesses a political culture that demon-
strates a weak commitment to democracy.
Iraq’s main ethnic groups — the Sunni Ar-
abs, Shi‘ite Arabs, and Kurds — have yet to
agree on the form of the Iraqi nation-state.
Yet since this study was published, elec-
tions were held for provincial legislatures
in the Arab south in January 2009, for the
Kurdish Regional Government Parliament
in July 2009, and for the national Parliament
in March 2010. In all these elections, sectar-
ian entrepreneurs were dealt a major blow
as Iraqis voted in large numbers for political
parties, many of which were secular, that of-
fered services rather than spurious religious
symbolism and sectarian appeals. In the
national parliamentary elections, increased
voter maturity was evident, as fully 62% of
the members of Iraq’s old Parliament lost
their seats. Many power brokers received an
embarrassingly small number of votes, fail-
ing to win parliamentary seats. The propor-
tion of young representatives (ages 30-40)
increased to 22%. When Prime Minister
Nuri al-Maliki sought to nullify the elec-
tions, which he lost to the secular al-Iraqiya
Coalition, Iraq’s courts ruled against him,
causing his efforts to fail.
While Professor Dawisha’s study pro-
vides an excellent overview of elite politics,
I would have liked to have seen greater fo-
cus on “politics from below.” After all, it is
the populace at large that, since 2007, has
forced political elites to construct cross-
ethnic political coalitions, offer open-list
voting, and eschew sectarian appeals. That

Nuri al-Maliki changed the name of the po-
litical party under which he ran for office
from the more religious and sectarian Is-
lamic Call Party to that of the State of Law
Coalition is just one indicator of the power
of mass publics.
More attention might also have been
paid to exogenous variables, namely the
impact of foreign powers. Indeed, Professor
Dawisha underscores the negative impact of
British silence in the face of the consistent
rigging of parliamentary elections under the
monarchy by the perennial prime minister,
Nuri al-Sa‘id and the Regent, ‘Abd al-Ilah
(p. 122). While the argument is counterfac-
tual, what type of polity might have been
formed had the British taken their League of
Nations’ mandate over Iraq seriously, using
their influence to promote expanded political
participation and the use of the country’s oil
wealth to implement positive social change?
Likewise, had the Bush Administration re-
spected Iraqis by listening to their goals and
aspirations for the future, rather than trying
to impose its own “neo-conservative” vision
of democracy on Iraq, could much of the
post-2003 violence and sectarian cleansing
have been avoided?
For the specialist, Adeed Dawisha’s
study suggests many new hypotheses, al-
ways the sign of excellent research and
analysis. For the student and educated lay
reader, Iraq: A Political History from Inde-
pendence to Occupation offers a highly ac-
cessible and insightful work on one of the
most important and complex countries in
the Middle East.
Eric Davis, Department of Political Sci-
ence and Center for Middle Eastern Stud-
ies, Rutgers University, New Brunswick,
New Jersey
LEBANON
Beware of Small States: Lebanon,
Battleground of the Middle East, by Da-
vid Hirst. New York: Nation Books, 2010.
iv + 427 pages. Notes to p. 460. Index to p.
480. $29.95.
middle east journal M 487
Reviewed by Kail C. Ellis
The weakness of Lebanon’s inter-sect
political system12and its strategic location in
the Middle East has since the 19th century al-
lowed outside forces to influence its domes-
tic affairs, and has led the small state into
both regional conflicts and entanglements
with the Great Powers. David Hirst’s Beware
of Small States demonstrates the disastrous
effect of these deficits on Lebanon’s recent
history. Hirst, a 50-year resident of Leba-
non as a reporter for The Guardian, relates
in vivid detail a tragically familiar chronol-
ogy, culminating in the attacks of 9/11 and
a new era of upheaval: Lebanon’s slide into
the Arab-Israeli conflict after the 1967 War;
the establishment of the Palestine Libera-
tion Organization’s (PLO) state-within-a-
state; the disintegration of Lebanon and its
collapse into civil war in the 1970s; Israel’s
invasion in 1982; the rise of Hizbullah, with
Iranian support; the ascendancy of funda-
mentalist Islam; and the attempt to redraw
the map of the Middle East to make Israel
the cornerstone of a peaceful region.
Israel’s role in Lebanon features promi-
nently in Hirst’s narrative. He acknowledges
that this book did not start out as a history
of the Arab-Israeli conflict. At every stage,
however, that conflict intruded on his sub-
ject, and became the lens through which he
viewed Lebanon. Hirst’s history of Lebanon
encompasses the history of the Arab-Israeli
struggle, including the ways in which not
only Israel, but Syria, Iran, Iraq, and the PLO
— all of which fought proxy wars in Leba-
non — contributed to Lebanon’s destruction.
Syria’s occupation of Lebanon was both
strategic and pragmatic: it ruled the Leba-
nese Government through compliant agents
and plundered it financially of several bil-
lion dollars a year. Syria also exerted mili-
1. Readers may be more familiar with the
term “confessional” system as it relates to Leba-
non. However, “inter-sect” is used here with re-
spect to the 19th century when the Great Powers
aligned themselves to the various sects to pro-
mote their interests in the Ottoman Empire. The
confessional system did not come into play until
the National Pact of 1943.
488 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
tary pressure on Israel through its Lebanese
agents without engaging its own military.
Iran, through its support of Hizbullah’s fight
against Israel, used Lebanon to enhance its
pan-Islamic credentials.
Hirst’s chapter on Husayn Nasrallah, the
Secretary General of Hizbullah, whom he calls
the “Warrior-Priest,” contains a crucial account
of the issue of Hizbullah’s sophisticated weap-
onry, which has engendered sectarian ten-
sions, especially between Sunnis and Shi‘ites.
According to the Lebanese Government and
its supporters, it was Hizbullah’s weaponry
that brought the catastrophe of a month-long
Israeli invasion in 2006, and then the threat of
civil war in 2008. Yet Hizbullah enjoys signifi-
cant support among Lebanese Shi‘ites — one
third of the population — because its weap-
onry connects the concept of resistance with
the Shi‘ite need for empowerment.
One chilling result of Hizbullah’s July 2006
conflict with Israel is the latter’s Dahiya Doc-
trine, named after the southern suburb of Beirut
where Hizbullah had its headquarters, which
the Israeli Air Force reduced to rubble. Under
the Dahiya Doctrine — and here Hirst quotes
Israeli military leaders — there will be no dis-
tinction between civilian and military targets in
Israel’s next round of war with Hizbullah. Hirst
asserts that since 1973, when Israel ceased fight-
ing wars against regular Arab armies, and began
battling non-state militias (first Fatah, and then
Hizbullah and Hamas) it never has truly won a
war. Alarmed that its deterrent power had been
declining, Israel has developed not only new
military tactics, but also new ethical codes. Is-
raeli leaders concluded, according to Hirst,
“that the whole body of international law
which governs the conduct of conventional
warfare was no longer applicable to these
new forms of unconventional, ‘asymmetri-
cal’ or Islamist warfare; as far as Israel is
concerned, to continue to abide by the old
moralities was effectively to deny one side,
the legitimate state, the right and ability to
defeat the other, the ‘terrorists’ who would
destroy it” (p. 412).
Hirst takes the title of his book from an
1870 letter that Russian anarchist Mikhail
Bakunin wrote to a friend, in which Bakunin
advised “beware of small states,” because
although these polities are vulnerable to the
machinations of larger states, they also can
be a source of trouble for their tormentors.
Hirst leaves readers with this question, in
the age of fundamentalist Islam: “[C]ould
it even be said that Lebanon — the eternal
victim — has now become the perpetrator
too, posing no less a threat to greater states
than they habitually pose to it?” (p. 4). One
can only hope that all parties — Israel, Hiz-
bullah, Iran, and Syria — will realize that
the cost of a new conflict in Lebanon will be
so high that incentives to avoid fighting are
greater than the pressures to go to war.
Kail C. Ellis, Dean of the College of Liberal
Arts and Sciences, Villanova University
MOROCCO
Imagined Museums: Art and Modernity
in Postcolonial Morocco, by Katarzyna
Pieprzak. Minneapolis and London: Uni-
versity of Minnesota Press, 2010. xxix +
177 pages. Illust. Notes to p. 196. Bibl. to
211. Index to p. 223. Illust. $75 cloth; $25
paper.
Reviewed by Mary Vogl
Imagined Museums is a richly document-
ed, provocative, and timely study of Moroc-
can museums from the Protectorate (1912-
1956) to the present, focusing on contempo-
rary art and the post-independence period.
It begins by enumerating complaints from
Moroccan artists and intellectuals about the
lamentable current state of Morocco’s 15
state-run museums and small number of pri-
vate museums and foundations. The author
probes narratives of decay and decline, of
“run-down” and “visually depressing” exhi-
bition spaces, of “cemeteries for artworks.”
She takes the reader on a quest to find out
why museums appear to have failed and
what is being done about it. The result is
both sobering and inspiring.
The first half of the book examines mu-
seums as “Monuments,” arguing that the
current conception of the national museum
has its roots in a Protectorate-era mentality
where the museum’s role was to preserve
“authentic” culture and display it to adminis-
trators, tourists, and artisans. Pieprzak shows

that since the 1960s, artists and writers have
constantly critiqued the Moroccan state for
being unwilling to invest in making muse-
ums truly modern and relevant to public life,
and not merely projected images of moder-
nity to attract tourists and foreign investors.
They decry the “stagnation of political will
for change that would transform the deposi-
tory model of museums created during the
Protectorate into a museum that engages and
serves the general public with dynamic ex-
hibits that educate and also encourage every-
day Moroccans to reflect on different cultural
practices present in the nation and beyond”
(p. 31). Having demanded a national art mu-
seum for the past 50 years, Moroccans are
still waiting. Although a museum is finally
under construction, Pieprzak seems skeptical
that the government’s grandiose plans will
result in a model of museum best-practices.
The second chapter investigates corpo-
rate art collections in Morocco. Although
Moroccan corporations, particularly banks,
hold stunningly large and beautiful collec-
tions, Pieprzak is the first to analyze their
exploitation of the idea of a museum to at-
tract income, investment, and prestige for
themselves. For these corporations, eager
to “balance their identities as global citi-
zens and local subjects” (p. 65), art collec-
tion and patronage is a financial investment,
but benefits have not trickled down to the
general public. Part I ends with an investi-
gation of the Belghazi Museum as a private
“cabinet of curiosity” which functions, once
again, as a space that excludes most Moroc-
cans from their patrimony.
The second half of the book offers an
eye-opening perspective on alternative prac-
tices that serve some of the museum roles
that state and private institutions have failed
to fill. “Discursive museums” built through
the work of Moroccan cultural journals in
the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s opened
discourse on art to a broader audience.
“Ephemeral museums” in the form of five
art-in-the-streets projects strove to bring
modernist and contemporary art closer to
the Moroccan public in a concrete manner.
The conclusion describes the “portable lit-
erary museum” of a poet and the stateless
“nomadic museums” conceived by artists
and videographers. This “proliferation of
middle east journal M 489
museological products that meaningfully
engage both local and global communities”
(p. 177) is a clear sign that many Moroccans
remain as optimistic as the author about “the
potential of Moroccan art and its architec-
tures of invention as a radical transformative
social force and [… about] the museum as a
central site for the negotiation and staging
of the future” (p. xxix).
Pieprzak, Associate Professor of Com-
parative Literature and French, approaches
her work not as an art historian per se but
as an expert in Middle East Studies and
cultural studies. This book represents the
epitome of the latter discipline. It is thor-
oughly researched, drawing on archival work
in private and public libraries, colonial and
postcolonial journals on art and culture, tour-
ism magazines, pamphlets, brochures, travel
narratives, comments from museum visitors,
blogs, and quotes from journalists, writers of
poetry, and fiction. Pieprzak’s sources also
include interviews with museum administra-
tors, artists, and other culture brokers. She
deserves praise for the way she “privileges
voices from practitioners of art and literature
in North Africa” (p. xxvi). The book is sup-
ported by a critical framework that includes a
wealth of judiciously chosen sources in mu-
seum studies and anthropology, particularly
studies of representation, memory, and iden-
tity. Issues of power and domination are high-
lighted. The book raises many questions and
offers many answers, but perhaps it is up to
the political scientists to resolve the question
of why the Moroccan state has not (cannot?)
managed to transform its museums. Imag-
ined Museums is a highly original and sig-
nificant contribution to postcolonial museum
studies, contemporary Moroccan art history,
and cultural studies of the Maghreb.
Mary Vogl, Department of Foreign Lan-
guages & Literatures, Colorado State
University
490 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
What Moroccan Cinema?: A Historical
and Critical Study, 1956–2006, by Sandra
Gayle Carter. Lanham, MD: Lexington
Books, 2009. xii + 323 pages. Appendix
to p. 342. Bibl. to p. 367. Index to p. 379.
$85.
Reviewed by Brian T. Edwards
When it comes to interpretation, cinema
is notoriously elusive as a cultural object.
Films would seem to offer an immediately
accessible window into a particular time and
place. But films and filmmakers themselves
are caught up in a complex network of eco-
nomic, political, and creative forces. As stu-
dents and scholars attempt to explain or un-
derstand movies and the culture they seem
to transmit, however, they have only rarely
found ways to put the various extra-textual
forces acting on cinema into dialogue with
careful analysis of the film text itself.
National cinemas of formerly colonized
countries, such as Moroccan cinema, seem to
provide a perfect window for understanding
the particularity of life in countries fraught
with contradictions in all these realms. Yet
these cinemas have been even more dif-
ficult to account for without reducing out
the complexity of their origins, audiences,
and economic factors, which consistently
implicate the relationship between former
colonizer and post-colonial film indus-
try, whether via funding sources, language
choice, or the circulation of film among its
public(s). And so, it is common to read rich
analyses of individual films as art objects,
more often by scholars of literature than not,
in which the film “text” stands alone as an
aesthetic object that may transmit to us so-
ciocultural “meaning” if only we learn how
to read it correctly. Such readings, however,
tend to put the film in a hermetic hermeneu-
tic box, protected from the messy economic
and social worlds outside it. Film cannot be
separated from the world within which it
circulates.
Sandra Gayle Carter has taken up the
formidable challenge of taking on Moroc-
can cinema caught between these multiple
forces. Her magnificent book What Moroc-
can Cinema?: A Historical and Critical
Study, 1956-2006 draws on a huge amount
of research to give readers a rich context
for understanding Moroccan cinema in its
first 50 years since independence. In so do-
ing, Carter provides a model for just what it
would take to comprehend films from this
nation without reducing out questions of
funding, audience, changing social history,
and the media worlds within which cinema
always operates. And she does so without
neglecting to provide readings of a substan-
tial number of individual films along the
way, regularly juxtaposing discussion of the
film text with its reception and financial fate.
Her comprehensive study is an invaluable
resource for those who want to understand
both individual Moroccan films in their his-
torical context, and for those interested in
the larger question of the place of Moroccan
cultural production (including film, videos,
media and — by extension — literature) in
Moroccan society.
For Carter, the story of Moroccan cin-
ema is one that moves from state patron-
age — as the Moroccan film industry
gradually and belatedly detached from its
French antecedents — to those individual
film voices of the past decade (including
Moroccan filmmakers resident outside of
Morocco) who are less interested in pro-
viding a template for the Moroccan nation
and more determined to represent contem-
porary, sometimes controversial, social re-
ality. She balances snapshots of a range of
Moroccan filmmakers and well selected in-
dividual films with wider-angle landscapes
of the changing Moroccan film industry,
the Centre cinématographique marocain
(CCM), funding sources, and shifts in Mo-
roccan aesthetics. Carter’s is a big book,
comprehensive yet made approachable with
many short sections, and with useful bibli-
ography, notes, and a detailed appendix of
films and filmmakers. Her four long chap-
ters — with dozens of sub-sections — move
us from pre-independence French filmmak-
ing in Morocco to the recent controversy
over Laila Marrakchi’s Marock (2005), and
beyond. Preceding this trajectory is a long
and important introduction that establishes
the context within which Moroccan cinema
operates and suggests Carter’s own nuanced
way of reading film.
Appreciation of Moroccan cinema, as

Carter has us consider it, cannot ignore its
relationship to the industry from which it
emerges, the challenges of keeping cinema
houses open and full, and the media worlds
within which it operates and with which
it competes. When a new Moroccan film
is released, it competes for screen space
with Hollywood and Bollywood pictures
(though not generally in the same cinema
houses), to say nothing of Hong Kong and
Egyptian films. Or it hopes to make it onto
Moroccan television, but then competes
with everything the satellite dishes have to
offer. Debates about Moroccan films take
place within Moroccan media, from daring
magazines such as Tel Quel to internet chat
rooms, and these discussions are a part of
the social meaning of a film, which itself
emerges from social worlds it seeks to ad-
dress. Audiences may take up a film, as they
did with Abderrahman Tazi’s hugely suc-
cessful A la recherche du mari de ma femme
(1993), or they may pass it by, as was the
case commercially in Morocco with Hamid
Bennani’s award-winning but aesthetically
challenging Wechma (1970). Carter is an
excellent guide for helping us to under-
stand the multiple registers within which
the dynamic and ever changing Moroccan
cinema has operated and continues to oper-
ate as Moroccan art and society continue
to change. She has done Middle East and
North African film studies and Moroccan
cultural studies a great service.
Brian T. Edwards, Associate Professor of
English and Comparative Literary Studies,
Northwestern University
TURKEY
Islamism, Democracy and Liberalism
in Turkey: The Case of the AKP, by
William Hale and Ergun Özbudun. London
and New York: Routledge, 2010. xxi + 158
pages. Notes to p. 189. Sources to p. 192.
Bibl. to p. 204. Index to p. 214. 72 BP.
Reviewed by Metin Heper
Perceiving Turkey having a foot both in
democratic and Islamic camps, this book
middle east journal M 491
studies the ideological agenda of the Justice
and Development Party (AKP) as well as
that party’s performance in office with spe-
cial reference to political reform and cultural,
economic, and foreign policies. The purpose
of the book is that of examining how the
AKP has dealt with such divisive questions
as to whether citizens should be allowed to
wear dress reflecting their religious prefer-
ences in public spaces in Turkey. With this
goal in mind, the authors tackle some critical
issues on which people in Turkey have long
been deeply divided. The following are some
significant conclusions the authors have ar-
rived at concerning such issues.
The AKP takes secularism as a sine qua
non of democracy. It is against the exploita-
tion of religion for political purposes. The
party is a champion of “passive secularism,”
i.e. acting neutral toward various religions
and allowing the public visibility of religious
symbols. The AKP displays the old center-
right tradition; it does not adopt Islam as a
political ideology. The AKP does not sub-
scribe to “active secularism”; consequently
the party does not tend to interfere with the
manner in which people live their religions.
In the view of the AKP leaders, there is no
conflict between Republicanism and democ-
racy. In Turkey, however, there is no consen-
sus on the true meaning of secularism.
The AKP is in favor of pluralistic de-
mocracy; it considers the strengthening of
the civil society organizations as necessary.
The party has a positive view of the West.
The [1982] Constitution does not allow
the Constitutional Court to review the com-
patibility of a constitutional amendment
with the first three Articles of the Constitu-
tion, which cannot be amended. It follows
that the recent decision of the Court that
abrogated a constitutional amendment on
the grounds that it violated the first three
Articles in question not only overlooked
its earlier rulings, but it also amounted to
a “usurpation of power.” The Court deci-
sion was a violation of the explicit text of
Article 138. The source of the secular es-
tablishment’s threat perception is primarily
the alleged Islamist identity of the AKP. The
threat perception in question has led the sec-
ularist state elites to resort to acts of dubious
democratic legitimacy.
492 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
As compared to the past and present
center-right parties, the AKP seems to have a
stronger commitment to liberal and pluralis-
tic values, and displays deeper sensibilities to
religious values. The latter attitude in no way
works against the former one. In any case, in
Turkey economic factors play a far more im-
portant role than religious ones. Moreover,
Recep Tayyip Erdogan, leader of the AKP and
Prime Minister, has a charismatic personality
and a “man of the people” image; these two
factors also shape the votes of the people.
This reviewer concurs with the authors’
above-mentioned observations, but differs
from the authors on some other matters.
The authors raise the question of whether
or not Necmettin Erbakan and Erdoğan at-
tribute only an instrumental role to democ-
racy or see democracy as an end in itself.
They conclude that various statements made
by these leaders lend support to the former
view. In the case of Erdogan, it is not dif-
ficult to disagree with the authors. It is true
that Erdogan once pointed out that for him
democracy was a means, not an end. Yet, he
has also been of the opinion that Islam, too,
is a means, not an end. According to Erdo-
gan, what was important was the purpose
for which people opted for democracy and/
or Islam, He has argued that one may use
democracy in order to come to power for
one’s personal ends or to serve the people,
and that one may exploit religion for politi-
cal purposes or take Islam simply as a belief
system and a source of morality.
The authors also make the point that [to-
ward the end 2009] the AKP seemed to be
at a crossroads; they think that the party will
either remain committed to liberalism and
internationalism, or adopt a nationalist and
authoritarian posture. Here it should be re-
membered that the AKP had a genuinely lib-
eral and democratic draft constitution drawn
up by a committee of law professors headed
by one of the authors; it shelved it only when
the party came to the conclusion that it faced
insurmountable resistance from the Repub-
lican establishment. The AKP, however, has
not given up its efforts to further liberalize
and democratize Turkey; at the writing of this
review the government had submitted to Par-
liament a number of constitutional amend-
ments with the same goal in mind.
Yet another view of the authors is that
the 1961 Constitution is more democratic
than the previous one (1924). One may in-
stead argue that the 1961 Constitution is
more liberal but less democratic than its
predecessor. The framers of the 1961 Con-
stitution placed emphasis on the protection
of the individual against the state. Thus,
they enlarged the scope of the basic rights
and liberties, and the limitations brought to
those rights and liberties were more clearly
defined. The framers of the 1961 Consti-
tution also circumscribed the authority of
political governments by creating the Con-
stitutional Court and the National Security
Council, and granting more powers to the
Council of State.
Finally, one may also argue that the in-
clusion of the military in the Republican es-
tablishment with regard to the post-August
2008 period may not be appropriate. Since
he became Chief of the General Staff, Gen-
eral Ilker Basbug tended to make public
declarations only 1) on matters of security
now rather narrowly defined, 2) for defend-
ing the military against those accusations
against the military, which Basbug thought
were less than justified, and 3) in a related
manner, when he came to the conclusion
that the prestige of the military in the eyes
of the public was at stake.
Despite some such relatively minor mat-
ters, the book under review is a very sig-
nificant and timely contribution to studies
on Turkish politics in particular and com-
parative studies of Islam and democracy in
general. It persuasively expounds Turkish
exceptionalism regarding the interplay be-
tween Islam and democracy. This reviewer
recommends the book to all those who wish
to make sense of the recent trials and tribu-
lations of politics in Turkey.
Professor Metin Heper is the Chair of the
Department of Political Science and Pro-
vost at Bilkent University.

Turkey’s Entente with Israel and Azer-
baijan: State Identity and Security in
the Middle East and the Caucasus, by
Alexander Murinson. London and New
York: Routledge, 2010. x + 151 pages.
Notes to p. 200. Bibl. to p. 212. Index to p.
219. $130.
Reviewed by Michael B. Bishku
In addition to surveying the characteris-
tics of an interesting Middle Eastern — a term
that currently includes the Caucasus — tri-
lateral relationship, the purpose of this book,
which evolved from a doctoral dissertation,
is to develop a more suitable framework for
the examination of informal alliances in the
post-Cold War era and age of globalization.
Alexander Murinson utilizes the “core con-
cepts” of the Constructivist school in Inter-
national Relations and the theory of Transna-
tionalism, which hold that transnational and
subnational actors play a greater role in state
identities than in the past and that the forma-
tions of alignments between countries are not
“driven exclusively by rational calculations
of power balances” (p. 3).
After introducing theoretical arguments,
Murinson analyzes the “building blocks of
the relationship” between Turkey, Israel, and
Azerbaijan: their shared identities as “garri-
son” states, which give high priority to secu-
rity concerns; their “like-minded or Wester-
nistic” [Murinson’s term] orientations (i.e.,
pro-Western, secular, and constitutionally
nationalist characteristics); and their “lone-
liness” (i.e., rejection by their neighbors).
Murinson focuses on events from 1992
(Azerbaijan achieved its independence with
the breakup of the Soviet Union at the end
of 1991), through 2005, when the moderate-
ly Islamist Justice and Development Party,
or AKP, began to consolidate its power in
Turkey, having been elected into office three
years earlier. Murinson prefers the term “en-
tente” to describe this “brief period of con-
vergence of foreign policy interests,” which
peaked in 1999, as being unlike an alliance
and more like a “tenuous arrangement” with
greater susceptibility “to fluctuations in do-
mestic politics and foreign policy calcula-
tions of its members” (pp. 1-3). While Ofra
middle east journal M 493
Bengio13and Efraim Inbar24have published
monographs concentrating on the Turkish-
Israeli angle, Murinson includes Azerbai-
jan, which was a part of this post-Cold War
United States-supported “informal alliance”
that counterbalanced the one backed by
Russia, which included Armenia and Iran.
Murinson examines the roles of the mil-
itary-industrial complexes in Turkey and Is-
rael, as well as with the security apparatus in
Azerbaijan in the formation and evolution of
the entente. He also examines the influence of
the American Jewish lobby, think tanks (es-
pecially in the United States), and petroleum
interests. In addition, he discusses the com-
mon threat perceptions of the three countries
during the 1990s. According to Murinson,
the increasing role of public opinion and Is-
lamism (especially following the al-Aqsa, or
Second Intifada) and the unpopularity of the
2003 Iraq War in Turkey, along with greater
civilian control in Turkish politics and the
AKP’s emphasis on improving relations with
Turkey’s Middle Eastern neighbors, contrib-
uted to what he describes as the “involution
of the trilateral axis” (p. 115). It is true that
both Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan and President Abdullah Gul have
made official visits to Israel. Interestingly,
Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev has not.
Nor has Azerbaijan opened an embassy in Tel
Aviv. However, Erdogan’s strong criticism of
Israel’s behavior during the 2009 Gaza War
and Turkey’s recent rapprochement with Ar-
menia have had negative effects on Turkish-
Israeli and Turkish-Azerbaijani relations, re-
spectively. Unfortunately, Murinson does not
mention developments beyond 2005, though
he does conclude: “The strategic Turkish-Is-
rael-Azerbaijani axis is bound to dissolve as
the AKP government realigns Turkish foreign
policy in the direction of greater cohesion with
its Middle Eastern neighbors” (p. 151).
Murinson provides a thorough account
of Turkey-Israel-Azerbaijan relations — the
motivations behind their actions and the var-
1. Turkish-Israeli Relationship: Changing
Ties of Middle Eastern Outsiders (New York:
Palgrave Macmillan, 2004).
2. The Turkish-Israeli Entente (London, UK:
Mediterranean Studies Monographs, 2001).
494 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
ious actors who have shaped or influenced
these relationships. Yet, while the book is
well documented and includes a fairly exten-
sive bibliography, it fails to include two of
this reviewer’s works.3 Murinson also mis-
takenly identifies Jacob Abadi — for whom
there are three citations in the bibliography
— as “Israeli” instead of “Israeli-born” or
“American” (p. 5). These comments aside,
this book is a quite useful source for all who
are interested in the contemporary politics
of the Middle East and South Caucasus as
well as American foreign policy.
Michael B. Bishku, Professor of History,
Augusta State University in Georgia
CULTURE
Simple Gestures: A Cultural Journey
into the Middle East, by Andrea B. Rugh.
Washington, DC: Potomac Books, Inc.,
2009. xiii + 311 pages. $29.95.
Reviewed by Rebecca Torstrick
First as a diplomat’s wife and mother of
three sons, and later as a professional anthro-
pologist, Andrea Rugh spent her adult life
coming to know the people and cultures of
various Middle Eastern countries. She so-
cialized with the elite as an ambassador’s
wife and worked among the very poor as an
anthropologist on various development proj-
ects. She vividly shares her own painstak-
ing journey to knowledge as she negotiated
varying roles and relationships across Egypt,
Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Syria, the United Arab
Emirates (UAE), Pakistan, and Afghanistan.
They show her interest and willingness to
learn more about local culture and move out-
side of the comfortable expatriate circle. In
time, this curiosity led her to enroll in and com-
plete her doctorate in anthropology while home
between her husband’s diplomatic postings.
3. Michael B. Bishku, “The South Caucasus
Republics and Israel,” Middle Eastern Studies,
Vol. 45, No. 2 (2009), pp. 295-314; and Michael
B. Bishku, “How Has Turkey Viewed Israel?” Is-
rael Affairs, Vol. 12, No. 1 (2006), pp. 177-194.
They show her interest and willingness to
learn more about local culture and move out-
side of the comfortable expatriate circle. In
time, this curiosity led her to enroll in and com-
plete her doctorate in anthropology while home
between her husband’s diplomatic postings.
After completing her PhD and back in
Egypt, she applied to the US Agency for In-
ternational Development (USAID) for con-
tract work so that she could put her training
to good use. Her first contract work there
focused on the educational system and led
her to become an expert on educational de-
velopment. Her descriptions of the vagaries
of development in the region are some of the
best — and most tragic — parts of this work.
In Egypt, a need for big and costly projects
led to a plan to build schools and provide
materials for “basic” education (i.e., teach-
ing home economics, carpentry, electric-
ity, or agriculture). The schools that were
built ended up costing more and were often
poorly constructed; over time, they were not
maintained and so began to fall apart. The
“practical education” courses were ill-con-
ceived; parents wanted their children to gain
an education that would lead to a good job.
Rugh’s descriptions of her work on edu-
cational reform in Pakistan and Afghanistan
are compelling. In Pakistan, she details the
painstaking work of beginning a major re-
form in basic education in the North-West
Frontier Province and Balochistan. Slowly,
she and her colleagues were able to intro-
duce a focus on actual student learning into
the schools where they were working. We
share in their struggles to create meaningful
textbooks, to transform the teacher training
process, to change classroom pedagogy, to
develop a culture of evaluation of what stu-
dents were learning. We also learn of the nu-
merous abuses they uncovered and the fine
line they had to tread in order to keep their
program moving forward. In the end, they
were defeated not by actions within Pakistan,
but by the American government’s decision
to suddenly suspend assistance to Pakistan.
The program, which should have continued
for six more years in order to be fully real-
ized, ended abruptly four years after it began,
and as Dr. Rugh notes, “… in the space of a
year everything was gone” (p. 244).
A similar effort to develop appropri-

ate educational curricula in Afghanistan,
spearheaded by UN Children’s Fund (UNI-
CEF), also ended in complete disaster when
USAID pulled rank with Afghan officials to
keep books developed by the University of
Nebraska in the 1980s in Afghan schools.
The Nebraska books were not very effec-
tive for student learning, filled as they were
with militaristic images. Working with in-
ternational curriculum experts and Afghan
teachers and staff members, UNICEF had
developed an appropriate Afghan curricu-
lum that addressed the particular circum-
stances facing their system. The books
included instructions for teachers and les-
son formats that could be used by a liter-
ate person anywhere in the country to teach
students. Just as the UNICEF books were
ready for publication, USAID intervened. A
photo of Laura Bush standing in front of a
display of the Nebraska books had appeared
in American newspapers with the announce-
ment that USAID would pay for textbooks
for Afghan students. No compromises could
be reached; both the UNICEF books and
the Nebraska books were sent to Afghan
schools. Within a short time, the UNICEF
books were dropped from the public schools
and used only informally. Once again, an
opportunity to provide quality education to
children was aborted. between Zionist ideals and the reality of
This work could easily be used in a
number of different courses. It is rich with
details about women’s lives and struggles,
contains concrete examples of the ins and
outs of government-sponsored develop-
ment, and vividly paints a portrait of life in
the Middle East through the eyes of a sym-
pathetic outsider who came to understand so
much more about her own culture because
of her experiences there.
Rebecca Torstrick, Professor of Anthropol-
ogy, Indiana University South Bend
middle east journal M 495
MODERN HISTORY
AND POLITICS
Exiled in the Homeland, by Donna Robin-
son Divine. Austin: University of Texas Press,
2009. 209 pages. Notes to p. 230. Gloss. to p.
232. Bibl. to p. 245. Index to p. 255. $55.
Reviewed by Ylana Miller
As the title suggests, Donna Divine’s
study is based on the perception that Zion-
ist rhetoric suggesting a seamless process
by which Jews could “return” to their roots
and feel at home must be understood as the
outcome of a complex historical process in
which the everyday, very difficult, experi-
ences of immigrants were often subordinated
to a larger historical project whose meaning
was created primarily by Labor Zionists. Her
analysis examines the “immigration of Zion-
ists to Palestine during the 1920s in years
when their experiences were turned into myth
and when their struggle to make the land of
Israel their home was ignored” (p. 14).
Divine’s analysis makes three signifi-
cant contributions to our comprehension of
this process. The first is based on her argu-
ment that it is necessary to analyze the link
immigration “to understand how a national
identity settled into the minds of Zionist im-
migrants” (p. 6). According to Divine, cen-
tral to this process was the construction of a
discourse which could be used as a political
instrument and was selective in its deploy-
ment of a narrative that often excluded the
daily realities of immigrant existence. Sec-
ond is her perception of the ways in which
the Palestine Mandate’s support for a Jewish
National Home policy challenged the Zion-
ist leadership to deal with internal contradic-
tions while simultaneously working to meet
British imperial expectations with regard
to economic development. Finally, Divine
brings out the complex relationship between
state and nation building, illuminating the
fallacies of accepting ideologically based
categories of opposition between capital-
ists and labor, and diaspora and homeland,
without further critical analysis. Through-
out, this study makes evident patterns of La-
496 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
bor Zionist adaptation which have had long
term consequences for the Israeli state and
for the ways in which Israelis came to un-
derstand their own history.
The book consists of six chapters, each
with its own coherence. The first three are
focused on a reading of Zionist ideologies,
British policy, and Zionist policy — all spe-
cifically with regard to immigration. These
discussions are among the most thought pro-
voking precisely because they cover ground
which has received significant attention but
which yields new insights as a result of the
lens Divine is using and the questions she is
raising. Thus her chapter on Zionist writers
(Pinsker, Herzl, Ahad Ha-Am, Smilansky
and Arlosoroff) focuses our attention on the
centrality of demography and immigration
to Zionism while making the argument that
“the very concepts and idioms structuring
debates always held something back, hav-
ing been forged to manage contradictions,
not to resolve them or to establish priori-
ties” (p. 23). Her chapters on British and
Zionist policies then consider the specific
historical circumstances and relationships
within which policies were forged, making
clear both constraints and conflicts that she
argues contributed to disparities between
Zionist rhetoric and behavior.
The second half of the book consists of
three chapters which are intended to illus-
trate the actual experiences of immigrants
belonging to three groups: those Divine calls
“visionaries” who were driven by desires to
transform Jewish character and society; the
broader array of Labor Zionists; and, finally,
those who constituted a majority of immi-
grants, who settled in the cities of Palestine
and whose way of life often challenged the
ideological equation of immigration with
rejection of the diaspora. These chapters
are interesting and suggestive, drawing on a
range of evidence from personal letters and
memoirs to recent scholarship.
This study is a valuable contribution to
the literature on Zionism as a work in prog-
ress and as a movement that took shape in
Palestine in relationship to its dependence
on Great Britain. There is no room here for
any substantial consideration of the ways in
which the consciousness of immigrants was
shaped by the presence of Palestinian Ar-
abs and Zionist rhetoric was constructed to
strengthen communal boundaries. The use
of evidence, moreover, is clearly shaped by
the arguments being made and thus should
encourage further scholarly exploration at a
number of levels. Well written and stimulat-
ing, this study is a welcome addition.
Ylana Miller, Department of History, Duke
University
Russia and the Arabs: Behind the Scenes
in the Middle East from the Cold War to
the Present, by Yevgeny Primakov. New
York: Basic Books, 2009. x + 387 pages.
Notes to p. 398. Index to p. 418. $29.95.
Reviewed by Stanley A. Riveles
Yevgeny Primakov — Russia’s premier
Arab expert since the 1960s and Foreign and
Prime Minister under President Boris Yeltsin
— was a thorn in the side of US and UN ef-
forts to contain Saddam Husayn from Mikhail
Gorbachev to Vladimir Putin. Primakov’s role
in Russia’s Middle East policy is uniquely
controversial. Secretary of State James Baker
referred to him as the “ranking Arabist” in the
Soviet leadership around Gorbachev, during
the run-up to the First Gulf War. And he did
not mean that as a compliment:
[Primakov] was a personal
friend of, and apologist for,
Saddam Husayn ... he had abet-
ted Saddam’s strategy to weak-
en the Arab coalition by linking
the Kuwaiti crisis with the larger
Arab-Israeli conflict.15
President George H.W. Bush and his
National Security Adviser Brent Scow-
croft blamed Foreign Minister Edvard
Shevardnadze’s resignation in December
1990 on “Primakov’s machinations regard-
ing Saddam.”26Bush and his team counted
1. James A. Baker, III (with Thomas M. De-
Frank), The Politics of Diplomacy, pp. 396-398.
2. George H.W. Bush and Brent Scowcroft,
A World Transformed (New York: Knopf, 1998),
p. 431.

on Shevardnadze to ensure that Gorbachev
would not weaken in his commitment to the
UN Security Council consensus on uncon-
ditional withdrawal. They feared Shevard-
nadze’s removal would tip the balance toward
the “Arabists and traditionalists,” who urged
Gorbachev to find a face-saving exit strategy
for Saddam. But Saddam failed to oblige.
Richard Butler, the last head of the UN
Special Commission on Iraq (UNSCOM),
created in 1991 to monitor fulfillment of
Saddam’s disarmament obligations, had
even less flattering things to say about Pri-
makov. In his view, Russia’s Middle East
policy was perverted by Primakov’s pecuni-
ary interests in Saddam’s regime. Based on
what he concluded were reliable intelligence
reports, Butler believed Primakov was re-
ceiving “personal payoffs” from Saddam.37
Now Foreign Minister [Primakov] was
seeking to bury known facts that were es-
sential to the disarming of Saddam, not only
for reasons of Russian political interest but
also, apparently, for personal gain.48
These charges are serious and deserve
a response. But if you were hoping for his
side of the story, this book is not the place
to look. Part history and part reminiscence,
this retrospective account offers little insight
into the sources of Soviet and later Russian
behavior, slight explanation of his own ac-
tions, and no real contribution to our under-
standing of Kremlin decision making from
Gorbachev to Putin.59
This is not to say that Russia and the
Arabs, ably and readably translated by Paul
3. Richard Butler, The Greatest Threat: Iraq,
Weapons of Mass Destruction and The Crisis
of Global Security (Cambridge, MA: Perseus
Books, 2000).
4. Richard Butler, p. 107. See also Charles
Duelpher, Hide and Seek: The Search for Truth
in Iraq (New York: Public Affairs, 2009), p.
102. Duelpher, head of the postwar Iraq Survey
Group, substantiates the charge on the basis of
Iraqi sources he interviewed.
5. An earlier book by Primakov contains addi-
tional details on his meetings with Saddam. See
Yevgeny Primakov, Russian Crossroads: Toward
the New Millennium (New Haven, CT: Tale Uni-
versity Press, 2004).
middle east journal M 497
Gould, does not command the reader’s at-
tention or interest. As Pravda’s Middle East
correspondent beginning in the 1960s, he
had the freedom to range far and wide across
the region that few other Soviet observers
enjoyed. He used this access to develop un-
paralleled contacts with Arab modernizers,
with whom he deeply sympathized. He had
entry into the Soviet intelligence commu-
nity that gave him a ready-made channel to
the political establishment. Eventually, he
parlayed these assets into a policy role for
himself as official and unofficial envoy to
the Arab world, and even during the 1970s
as secret interlocutor with the Israelis. His
support for Gorbachev during the coup at-
tempt of late 1991 and for Yeltsin following
the break-up of the Soviet Union lent him
political standing and assured him of lead-
ership positions. In the late 1990s, he even
campaigned briefly to succeed Yeltsin as
Russia’s President.
The areas where Primakov offers new
information and a different perspective are,
first, the account of the ideological conflicts
that beset Soviet Middle East policy in the
post-Stalin period and, second, his encoun-
ters with the Palestinians and Israelis.
Primakov belonged to the then new
generation Soviet “realists” of the 1950s
and 1960s who saw in post-colonial Arab
nationalism opportunities for the spread of
Soviet influence in the Third World. They
also saw that Communism — as a social
and economic system — had little appeal
to the Arab leaders or their populations.
By the 1960s, Primakov says, “… nothing
could mask the reality that communism was
a lost cause in the Middle East” (p. 75). This
narrative is generally familiar. But what is
interesting is that the tension between ide-
ology and interest in Soviet Middle East
policy took many years to resolve itself. Lo-
cal Communist Parties waged a rearguard
battle against Moscow’s support for nation-
alist leaders, and they enjoyed the abiding
sympathy of some Soviet politicians. Thus,
what appeared to Western observers as So-
viet manipulation of local Communists was,
according to Primakov, often renegade be-
havior by self-willed local leaders, e.g. in
Yemen and Sudan, abetted by misguided
sympathizers in Moscow. The result was
498 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
often a loss for Soviet policy and a defeat
for Arab nationalism.
The chapters describing Primakov’s
dealings with Yasir ‘Arafat and the Israe-
lis expose other contradictions in Soviet
Middle East policy. Primakov remains an
unabashed admirer of ‘Arafat and far too
tolerant of Palestinian goals and tactics.
Following the Six-Day War, the Russians
sought inroads with the Palestinians. They
regarded ‘Arafat as a leader they could work
with, and who would work with them. Pri-
makov asserts that ‘Arafat’s political jour-
ney away from rejection of the Israeli state
began in the early 1970s with the idea of
a “temporary” two-state solution. In the
summer of 1971, ‘Arafat gave Primakov a
hand-drawn map of Palestine divided into
two states (p. 232). But, ‘Arafat insisted,
two states did not mean acceptance of UN
Security Council Resolution 242 — which
would involve explicit recognition of Israel.
It would be the late 1980s before the PLO
would accept UNSC Resolutions 242 and
338 and renounce terrorism. Primakov ac-
knowledges major mistakes by Arafat: his
support for Saddam during the first Gulf
War and his rejection of President Clin-
ton’s 2000 proposals for a final resolution of
Israeli-Palestinian outstanding differences.
Both of these weakened the Palestine cause.
Nevertheless, he argues that ‘Arafat’s death
(in which he suspects foul play) and the as-
cendancy of Hamas in Gaza have worsened
the prospects for peace.
From 1971 to 1977, Primakov partici-
pated in a series of secret meetings in Jeru-
salem and Vienna with leaders of several Is-
raeli governments to explore possible bases
for agreement. During this period, the Sovi-
ets apparently believed that their ties with
the Palestinians gave them standing and
possible leverage to act as a go-between.
Primakov writes:
It would be better for the Soviet
Union not to keep to the sidelines
of the [peace] process, especial-
ly one that looked so promising
in terms of the region’s history.
Soviet links with Fatah not only
might help the Middle East
peace process along but could
also boost Moscow’s influence
in the region, including in the
planned new [Palestinian] state,
no matter what form it took (p.
233).
Though Primakov does not speculate on
Israel’s motives, it seems likely that an open
channel to the Soviets enabled the Israelis to
explore various options and keep informed
on Soviet views. But they were not inter-
ested in a Palestinian state or installing the
Soviets as Middle East mediators. Primakov
met a last time with Prime Minister Men-
achem Begin in 1977 and found him to be
straightforward and congenial (as well as
a Russian speaker). But contacts with the
Soviets lapsed once Sadat made clear he
would negotiate a separate peace. Primakov
remains proud of Moscow’s persistent ad-
vocacy of a Palestinian state. But he realizes
that Moscow’s negotiating credibility was
undermined by the legacy of Stalin’s anti-
Semitic show trials; by Soviet mistreatment
of its Jewish population; and by its arming
of the Arabs against the Israeli state.
Notwithstanding Primakov’s standing as
a “realist,” he remains very much a roman-
tic about Soviet and later Russian efforts to
resolve Middle East conflicts. His efforts to
mediate with Saddam Husayn between 1990
and 2003 were not only met with hostility in
the West. They were also contemptuously
rejected by Saddam who regarded them as
appeasement of his enemies! Elsewhere,
while the Russians championed a Palestin-
ian state early on, they were unable to bring
this vision closer to fruition through negotia-
tion because they lacked sufficient influence
with the Palestinians and credibility with the
Israelis. As a political figure, Primakov pro-
vided continuity and transition between the
Soviet and Russian eras. But his thinking
is stuck firmly in the past. One cannot look
to him to understand the real interests that
Russia’s Middle East policy should serve.
Dr. Stanley A. Riveles is a consultant with
the Institute for Defense Analyses. He
represented the US in arms control negotia-
tions with Russia for 20 years. He retired
from the State Department in 2006.

The Urban Social History of the Middle
East 1750–1950, ed. by Peter Sluglett.
Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press,
2008. 344 pages. $34.95.
Reviewed by Nelida Fuccaro
This edited book on the urban social
history of the Middle East between 1750
and 1950 is extremely welcome. It presents
a review and critical overview of the field
by combining a discussion of relevant his-
toriography in the introduction and a fine
collection of essays (Chapters 2-8), both of
which are supplemented by a very useful
50-page bibliography. In the introduction
Peter Sluglett and Edmund Burke present a
cogent historiographical discussion which
ranges from key literature on European ur-
ban social history to French and American
scholarship on Middle Eastern and African
cities (pp. 1-42). In particular, Sluglett’s
thematic excursus over some of the litera-
ture of post-mediaeval European cities (pp.
7-15) reminds urban historians of the Mid-
dle East of the importance of keeping an eye
on Europe, as well as on the historiography
of Asian and African cities.
Both the editor and the contributors to
the volume are leading specialists of the
Arab world (mostly historians) with an out-
standing portfolio of publications on cities
and urban societies, an area of study whose
importance for the development of Middle
Eastern history can be hardly overstated.
Since the 1960s the urban history of the re-
gion has not only engaged successive gen-
erations of historians, but has also served
as a platform to challenge traditional Ori-
entalist historiography on the Arab world,
Ottoman Empire and beyond, as suggested
by the work of illustrious scholars such as
Albert Hourani and André Raymond. In the
last few decades, the achievements of urban
historians can be measured by their ability
to generate lively debates on institutional
power, social elites, and civic life — debates
which have been at the forefront of new ap-
proaches to the study of the history of the
early modern and modern Middle East.
The value of this edited volume is pre-
cisely that it addresses some key issues on
state, society, and power relations arising
middle east journal M 499
from these debates in order to stimulate
further academic interest and research in
the field. The contributions, in fact, follow
a thematic and largely comparative rubric,
an approach which deserves much praise
for its originality. As it is abundantly clear
from the long bibliography at the end, most
of the historiography of early modern and
modern cities in the Arab world and Middle
East has been confined to case studies and
to very specific local settings. The range of
themes covered in this volume and the lines
of argument pursued by its contributors con-
form to an understanding of urban history
as a field of study which places emphasis on
the intersection between institutional power
and social practice. Thus, the focus is gener-
ally on key relationships and specific social
contexts that have underpinned available
studies on individual urban centres such as
the interconnections between the urban and
rural worlds and city and state, minorities
and urban popular movements.
Particularly illuminating in this respect
are the contributions by Sarah Shields, Dina
Khoury, and Sami Zubaida. Shields (pp.
43-66) discusses relations between city and
countryside in the 19th century, focusing on
the political economy of cereal, wool, and
meat production, mostly in Iraq and Syria.
Central to her argument is the growing influ-
ence of urban notables in cementing urban/
rural relations and the importance of social
history as an analytical tool to understand
the nature of these relations. Khoury’s ex-
cellent chapter on power relations between
city and state mostly before the Ottoman re-
forms (pp. 67-103) sketches a new research
agenda on Arab provincial capitals. She ad-
vocates a combination of local and imperial
perspectives while challenging monolithic
understandings of the Ottoman Empire
and of the concept of urban notables. She
also proposes a tentative categorization of
city types in order “to start thinking more
creatively about relations between city and
state in the Ottoman context.” Zubaida’s
lucid contribution to the volume (pp. 224-
256) tackles the issue of urban politics and
political modernity by analyzing urban
popular movements over two centuries.
Concentrating on Egypt and Iran until the
1950s, his main concern is to illustrate the
500 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
shift from pre-modern to modern forms of
political mobilization against a set of condi-
tions which underscored the consolidation
of political modernity.
While these contributions are written
as critical essays, the chapters by Gudrun
Krämer on minorities (pp. 182-223), by Ab-
dul Karim Rafeq on the economic organiza-
tion of the cities of Ottoman Syria (pp. 104-
140), and by Bernard Hourcade on urban
demography and space (pp. 154-181) are
more descriptive and empirical. Hourcade,
in particular, provides an extremely useful
overview of the demography and urban ex-
pansion of Middle Eastern cities in the 19th
and 20th centuries bringing together census
statistics in order to explain the fluctuation
of urban systems across the region. This
type of comparative quantitative analysis
is particularly valuable as social urban his-
torians tend to lose sight of the wider pic-
ture. Rafeq’s excursus on guilds and busi-
ness practices in Ottoman Syria brings to
the attention of the reader the use of court
records, one of the key historiographical
trends discussed in the introduction (pp.
25-28) which Rafeq pioneered in the 1960s
with Andre Raymond. The chapter by Leila
Fawaz and Robert Ilbert on the relations be-
tween city and state in the colonial period
(pp. 141-153) is more difficult to character-
ize as its coverage of the mid-20th century is
somewhat cursory.
The rather original choice of periodiza-
tion — covering both the imperial and
post-WWI eras — also provides food for
thought, prompting an immediate reflec-
tion on the largely unexplored issue of the
continuities and discontinuities in urban life
which marked the period. The Urban Social
History of the Middle East seems to have
been conceived as a companion for graduate
students and young scholars interested in
the topic, and for the benefit of experienced
urban specialists wishing to draw further in-
spiration for the advancement of the field. It
is not aimed at an undergraduate audience,
although some of the more empirically-
based contributions might feature in the
reading lists of advanced courses dealing on
urban societies. Understandably, this vol-
ume is not comprehensive and exhaustive in
terms of geographical, bibliographical, and
thematic scope but it has inaugurated a new
type of discussion on the urban social his-
tory of the Middle East. As the first word on
an important topic, hopefully it will be built
upon by others in the future.
Nelida Fuccaro, School of Oriental and
African Studies, University of London
PRE-20TH CENTURY
HISTORY
Pashas: Traders and Travellers in the
Islamic World, by James Mather. New
Haven: Yale University Press, 2009. xxiii +
244 pages. Notes to p. 278. Bibl. to p. 292.
Index to p. 302. $35.
Reviewed by Lydia Beyoud
With the signature of a 1581 charter
establishing the Levant Company, a joint-
stock company granted exclusive trading
rights with the Ottoman Empire, Queen
Elizabeth I effectively cut out the Catholic
middle men controlling the primary trade
routes between the Near East and the Brit-
ish Isles. Thus began a notable period of
British-Middle East history when sustained
contact between a Christian European na-
tion and the mightiest Muslim empire of the
day resulted in a mutually beneficial, if not
always amicable, relationship. Such collab-
oration often seems unattainable in today’s
context of strained post-9/11 relations.
In his first book, Pashas: Traders and
Travellers in the Islamic World, Cambridge
and Harvard educated James Mather focus-
es on the notable yet little studied 250-year
period of interaction between the English
traders, or “pashas,” of the Levant Company
and their Ottoman patrons. Mostly devoid of
the sense of cultural superiority and armed
aggression accompanying the mercantile
ventures of its better-known contemporary,
the East India Company, Mather claims the
“trading milieu which [the pashas] inhabit-
ed represented the most numerically signifi-
cant of Britons’ encounters with any Islamic

civilization” (p. 9) prior to the establishment
of the Raj in India. The entire experience of
the Levant Company lies in sharp contrast
to the era of colonial England’s ascendancy
over lands once decidedly within the do-
main of Dar al-Islam.
Divided into three sections named for
the most important Levantine trading ports
— Aleppo, Constantinople, and Alexandria
— the book draws heavily upon the trad-
ers’ firsthand accounts and original records
to chronicle their adventures and the com-
pany’s rise to a position of prominence both
abroad and in England. Much of the book
describes the functioning of the company, a
description of expatriate life in the Orient,
and the traders’ attempts to assimilate to Ot-
toman culture through appearance, behav-
ior, language, and, occasionally, religion.
Mather uses one trader’s exhortations to
an apprentice that upon arrival his “‘chief-
est business is to get the language’” (p. 98)
and become familiar with the religion as an
illustration of the merchants’ shrewd under-
standing that commercial success relied as
much upon cultural knowledge as econom-
ics. Such examples serve to underscore his
point that the English traders accepted the
reality of their ambiguous place in Ottoman
society. As neither tithe-paying dhimmis nor
Muslim citizens afforded full rights by law,
the pashas occupied a grey area shared with
other “franks” residing in the Levant by the
Sultan’s official sanction.
Of the book’s many subjects, the most
intriguing are those that concern the direct
impact of Levant Company operations upon
English society. Mather argues that the com-
pany was an engine of social mobility and
ties it directly to the birth of early-modern
British consumerism. He further qualifies
its lifespan as an era of “proto-globaliza-
tion” brought about by increased traffic in
knowledge as much as goods.
It is his research into this last subject,
the commerce of ideas, namely those found
within costly Arabic and Persian language
texts, which comprises the most compelling
chapter of Pashas. These books, purchased
by Levant traders for private collections and
the libraries of England’s most esteemed
universities, were the foundation for the
development of Middle East studies as an
middle east journal M 501
academic pursuit in Britain. This is arguably
the most enduring legacy of this exchange
between England and the Ottoman Empire.
Mather demonstrates that the relationship of
trade to the acquisition of texts for academia
was substantial enough that in the 1630s the
Archbishop of Canterbury and Chancellor
of Oxford University, William Laud, nearly
succeeded in establishing a mandate that
each ship returning from the Levant “be re-
quired to carry with it an Arabic or Persian
manuscript” (p. 164). Though ultimately
unsuccessful, the belief that there was much
to learn of religion and science from the
Muslims’ texts endured. Mather claims the
acquisition of Oriental books and wider
availability of better translations fueled a
positive shift in English society’s perception
of Islam. He suggests that this resulted in
the late 17th century as being “probably …
the most benign period in English attitudes
towards Islam before the later twentieth
century” (p. 168).
Though careful not to paint too rosy a
picture of the encounters between the trad-
ers and the Ottomans, Mather frames his
inquiry as a reexamination of the assump-
tions of an inevitable clash of civilizations.
In so doing, he not only adds perspective
and nuance to the existing literature of his-
toric English-Muslim relations, but has also
succeeded in producing that rare feat of aca-
demic writing: a work of scholastic merit
with direct bearing upon contemporary is-
sues that will appeal to academics and ca-
sual readers alike.
Lydia Beyoud is a translator and writer in
Portland, Oregon.
502 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
RECENT
PUBLICATIONS
Prepared with assistance from Nathalie
Fayad, Cheyva Lerhman, Evan Norris,
Szuszanna Lippai, and Hannah White.
ARAB-ISRAELI CONFLICT
European Union Policy Towards the Arab-Israe-
li Peace Process, by Constanza Musu. London: Pal-
grave Macmillan, 2010. xii + 178 pages. Notes to p.
195. Bibl to p. 216. Index to p. 224. $85. The Arab-
Israeli conflict and peace process has been one of
the most strongly debated issues among European
Union (EU) Member States and a high priority on
the European foreign policy agenda. In this book,
Constanza Musu contends that EU countries have
been unable to adapt their policy to a changing situ-
ation on the ground and examines why the EU has
failed to develop an effective, autonomous strategy
vis-à-vis the Arab-Israeli conflict. By analyzing
European efforts regarding the peace process from
the beginning of the integration process to the pres-
ent, Musu identifies the factors and interests that
shape the EU’s Middle East policy and questions
the Member States’ commitment to harmonize and
implement their different political, economic, and
strategic interests in the region. (ZsL)
Where Heaven and Earth Meet: Jerusalem’s Sa-
cred Esplanade, ed. by Oleg Grabar and Benjamin
Z. Kedar. Jerusalem: Yad Ben-Zvi Press and Austin:
University of Texas Press, 2009. 391 pages. Notes
to p. 407. Gloss. to p. 410. $75. As political ten-
sion rises over the status of Jerusalem and the issues
of settlements, accounts about the Holy Site are
increasingly emotional and symbolic. Grabar and
Kedar warn against “treating [the subject] passion-
ately” and explain their attempt to remain as objec-
tive as possible in their presentation of Jerusalem’s
sacred Esplanade. The volume’s three main sections
cover the history of the Esplanade from 10th cen-
tury BCE to the present day, thematic issues, and
personal views. The book also contains numerous
illustrations, maps, and photographs from the past
and the present. (ZsL)
It’s Easier to Reach Heaven than the End of the
Street: A Jerusalem Memoir, by Emma Williams.
Northampton, MA: Olive Branch Press, 2010. xxxv
+ 379 pages. Notes to p. 403. Gloss. to p. 410. Emma
Williams, a medical doctor, arrived in Jerusalem in
August 2000, four weeks before the outbreak of the
second intifada. During the three years she spent
there, she experienced violence, turmoil and ex-
treme emotions and heard personal accounts from
DOI: 10.3751/64.3.4
Palestinians and Israelis alike. Williams’ memoir is
an account of her life in the divided city, mirroring
the realities of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict with
honesty, humanity, and fair judgment. (ZsL)
Mornings in Jenin, by Susan Abulhawa. New
York: Bloomsbury, 2010. 352 pages. $15. This
book by Susan Abuhawa, author and founder of the
NGO Playgrounds for Palestine, is an emotionally
wrought novel that describes the heart-wrenching
tale of a Palestinian refugee family. Set in the refu-
gee camp of Jenin, Amal’s family was forced out
of their village by the founding of Israel in 1948.
As the people fled, an Israeli soldier took Amal’s
older brother. The story traces the familial, physical,
and emotional loss experienced by Amal’s family,
struggle for survival spanning over sixty years of the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the transformative
nature of marriage, motherhood, and love. (NF)
IRAQ
The Jews of Iraq: 3,000 Years of History and
Culture, Nissm Rejwan. 2nd ed. Louisville, KY:
Fons Vitae, 2009. i + 248 pages. Appendix to p. 259.
Source Notes to p. 266. Index to p. 274. $23.95. For
3,000 years, Jews lived and thrived in the ancient
society of Iraq, as told in Nissm Rejwan’s meticu-
lous historical account. Rejwan begins in the pe-
riod of Babylonian captivity in 731 BCE and the
development of the Babylonian Talmud, continues
through the Islamic rule beginning in 641 CE, and
concludes in the 20th century with the mass immigra-
tion to Israel in 1951. This second edition includes
a Foreword by Joseph V. Montville, who places the
book in the greater context of the shared history and
similarities between Islam and Judaism. Montville
notes that although this connection is particularly
relevant to contemporary politics, it is frequently
overlooked. (CL)
Erasing Iraq: The Human Costs of Carnage,
by Michael Otterman and Richard Hill with Paul
Wilson. London: Pluto Press, 2010. xvi + 213
pages. Notes to p. 237. Index to p. 248. $20. Us-
ing in-depth interviews with Iraqi refugees living in
Syria, Jordan, Sweden, and Australia, the authors of
Erasing Iraq trace the effects of wars and sanctions
on the Iraqi population. Although the 2003 Amer-
ican-led invasion of Iraq serves as its centerpiece,
the book recapitulates in sometimes graphic detail
the human costs of conflicts and punitive measures
which predated it, including the 1991 Gulf War and
UN economic sanctions. In their final analysis, the
co-authors of Erasing Iraq argue that the death and
destruction visited upon Iraq after 2003 threaten not
only life and liberty, but constitute a total assault on
Iraq’s cultural history and national identity. (EN)
The Lonely Soldier: The Private War of Women
Serving in Iraq, by Helen Benedict. Boston: Bea-

con Press, 2009. 264 pages. Appends. to p. 236.
Notes to p. 255. $26.95. Focusing on the lives of
five very different women, Helen Benedict chron-
icles the hardships that female soldiers faced, and
continue to face, before, during, and after serving in
the Iraq War. The accounts shed light on the male-
dominated military culture and the unfortunate toll
this culture takes on its female constituents, both
physically and psychologically. With interviews
from over 40 soldiers and veterans, The Lonely
Soldier makes it clear again and again that these
women often have more to fear from their male
counterparts than from their more apparent enemy.
After 222 pages of disturbing description, Benedict
gives readers a reason to hope by offering sugges-
tions on how to improve conditions for women in
the military and listing resources for women in need
of support. (HW)
Israel
Militarism and Israeli Society, ed. by Gabriel
Sheffer and Oren Barak. Bloomington, IN: Indiana
University Press, 2010. 358 pages. Appends. to p.
377. Index to p. 386. $26.95. The 15 contributors
in this volume examine the relationship between
Israel’s security and civilian sectors since 1948.
They help illuminate the dynamic and complex
interaction between the military and civil society
with respect to media, gender relations, religion, the
economy, and the educational system. Several cur-
rent issues are also discussed including the Israeli
security barrier and the impacts of the wars in Iraq
and Afghanistan. (ZsL)
LEBANON
Lebanon: Through Writers’ Eyes, edited by T.J.
Gorton and A. Feghali Gorton. London: Eland Pub-
lishing Ltd and Dufour Editions, Inc., 2010. 296
pages. $31.95. Passages selected by authors Ted
Gorton and Andree Feghali Gorton are written by
a vriety of creative writers ranging over three mil-
lennia. The book is organized thematically, with
works from Antiquity, the Middle Ages through the
Crusades, and followed by writings from Western
travelers commenting on the Orient. The section
titled “Identities” provides a diverse collection of
works representing Lebanon’s political, religious,
and artistic identities. The compilation sheds light
on the ethnic and religious diversity in Lebanon,
and paints a vibrant image of the country and its
people as seen through many eyes. (NF)
Language, Memory, and Identity in the Middle
East: The Case for Lebanon, by Franck Salameh.
United Kingdom: Lexington Books, 2010. vii + 272
pages. Bibl. to p. 283. Index to p. 289. $80. Franck
Salameh argues that classical Arabic is the source
of most of the conflicts in the Middle East today.
Western scholars and politicians have long made the
middle east journal M 503
critical error conglomerating all nations that speak
colloquial forms of Arabic into the “Arab World,”
which implies homogeneity, or at least similarity,
among a range of entirely different cultures. The
same scholars often associate national identity with
language and ethnicity, which leads to misconcep-
tions. Although the idea of Pan-Arab identity is
widespread, it oversimplifies, as Salameh contends,
the region’s diversity and excludes many Middle
Eastern peoples. He uses Lebanon as a case study
because it often serves as a barometer of regional
change. (CL)
PALESTINE AND PALESTINIANS
Palestinian Identity, by Rashid Khalidi. New York,
NY: Columbia University Press, 2010. xiii+209p.
Notes to p.265. Bibl to p. 285. Index to p. 310. $29.
Rashid Khalidi, Professor of Middle Eastern Stud-
ies at Columbia University and advisor to the Pales-
tine Liberation Organization (PLO) during the Oslo
negotiations, presents a fascinating account of the
formation and evolution of Palestinian identity. The
author takes readers on a journey through the past to
explore the events that influenced the development
of Palestinian identity throughout the centuries: the
Crusades, the earliest Zionist settlements, the after-
math of the Balfour Declaration, and the period fol-
lowing the Nakba. (ZsL)  
MODERN HISTORY AND POLITICS
Deterritorialized Youth: Sahrawi and Afghan
Refugees at the Margins of the Middle East, ed.
by Dawn Chatty. New York and London: Berghahn
Books, 2010. viii + 247 pages. Fig. Tables. Ap-
pends. Contribs. to p. 251. Index to p. 275. $90.
This book is based on three years of research among
Afghan refugee youth in Tehran and Mashhad, Iran
and Sahrawi refugee youth in Algeria and Spain.
The contributors draw upon fieldwork to explore
how young refugees in these two cases cope with
conditions of prolonged displacement. (HW)
Halliburton’s Army: How a Well-Connected Tex-
as Oil Company Revolutionized the Way Amer-
ica Makes War, by Pratap Chatterjee. New York:
Nation Books, 2010. xvi + 224 pages. Notes to p.
262. Acknowl. to p. 268. Index to p. 284. $16.95. In
his most recent book, Pratap Chatterjee follows the
rise of contracting mega-corporations Halliburton
and KBR, and analyzes their seemingly effortless
ability to acquire military and government contracts
in war-torn countries. Though generally describing
the US military’s shift toward civilian-supported
missions, Chatterjee’s real focus is on the roles that
former Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary
of Defense Donald Rumsfeld play in the balancing
act between necessity and profiteering. (HW)
Al Qaeda In Its Own Words, ed. by Gilles Ke-
pel and Jean-Pierre Milelli. Translated by Pascale
504 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
Ghazaleh. Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard
University Press, 2010. 267 pages. Notes to p. 348.
Index to p. 363. $17.95. Since September 11, 2001,
the United States and the rest of the Western world
have been fascinated and terrified by al-Qa‘ida. Yet
despite the great attention paid to al-Qa‘ida and
the frequent media appearances by its leaders, al-
Qa‘ida’s essential philosophy remains elusive. In
order to illuminate it, Gilles Kepel and his collabo-
rators have collected original texts of key leaders
of the movement and written extensive explanatory
annotations. The texts are selected from the writ-
ings, interviews, and speeches of Usama bin Ladin,
‘Abdullah ‘Azzam, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and Abu
Mus‘ab al-Zarqawi, introduced and annotated by
scholars of Arabic and Islam. Kepel’s compilation
fills a critical gap in Western scholarly literature.
(CL)
How You Can Kill Al Qaeda (in 3 Easy Steps), by
Howard Clark. New Orleans: Light of New Orleans
Publishing, 2009. 67 pages. Notes and Bibl. to p. 76.
$9.95. In this brief manual Howard Clark lays out
a three-step plan which he hopes will effectuate the
downfall of al-Qa‘ida. The crux of the plan involves
moderate opinions being disseminated over the In-
ternet to the extent that pro-al-Qa‘ida messages are
drowned out. Essentially, by implementing this plan
Clark intends to co-opt popular support, which he
sees as the lifeline of the organization. As a former
Marine officer and intelligence analyst for the De-
partment of Homeland Security, Clark explains his
manual is not intended for regional scholars, but is
geared more toward non-experts who might find
themselves working on the subject. (HW)
Interpreting the Middle East, ed. by David S. So-
renson. Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 2010. viii +
405 pages. Gloss. to p. 411. Bio. to p. 420. Chron.
to p. 422. Index to p. 444. $49. Sorenson presents a
timely collection of essays from prominent Middle
East scholars on the most significant and controver-
sial issues of the region. The volume is comprised
of five main chapters covering demography, poli-
tics, economy, society, and international relations
in the Middle East, which are further divided into
topical case studies. The contributors touch upon a
wide range of subjects, such as the consequences
of demographic development, civil-military rela-
tions, the gender factor, the revival of Islamism, the
Israeli-Palestinian conflict, energy issues, and so on,
making it an ideal tool for those wishing to become
familiar with the region’s essentials features. The
book closes with a useful chronology and bibliog-
raphy. (ZsL)
The Dönme, by Marc David Baer. Stanford, CA:
Stanford University Press. xxiii+ 262 pages. Notes
to p. 314. Index to p. 332. $24.95. Baer’s book is
the first comprehensive work on the controversial
Dönme community’s ethno-religious identity and
their history from their origins to their near-total
dissolution. The volume’s three sections cover the
period between the late 19th and the mid-20th centu-
ry, describing the Dönme’s social networks, as well
as their socio-economic impact and political clout
during the last decades of the Ottoman Empire. The
author also touches upon the challenges the Dönme
faced in Istanbul and briefly describes how their
community was affected by the Holocaust. The
book provides ample knowledge on the Dönme’s
history and identity and offers an unbiased account
of their economic and political influence. (ZsL)
Quicksand: America’s Pursuit of Power in the
Middle East, by Geoffrey Wawro. New York: The
Penguin Press, 2010. 612 pages. Notes to p. 663.
Bibl. to p. 672. Index to p. 702. $37.95. Wawro ap-
proaches the history of American-Middle Eastern
relations with a wide lens, looking at the entire re-
gion from 1917 to 2002. By examining history in
this way, the author contends, it becomes clear that
contemporary American administrations have fre-
quently repeated the mistakes of previous genera-
tions. According to Wawro, perhaps the most egre-
gious of these mistakes is their tendency to impose
culturally insensitive doctrines on Middle Eastern-
ers. Wawro argues that only when Americans stop
viewing the Middle East through a culturally and
historically restrictive lens will they have a chance
to truly understanding their modern predicament.
(HW)
Faith, Reason, and the War Against Jihadism, by
George Weigel. New York: Image Books/Double-
day Religion, 2009. 157 pages. Afterword to p. 173.
Acknowl. to p. 177. Notes to p. 211. $13. George
Weigel asserts that there are certain things about
which the US cannot afford to be ignorant. In 15
lessons, divided into three parts, Weigel outlines
what Americans, as a society, should have learned
after September 11, 2001. This includes the cultural
and historical context from which jihadism sprang,
the religious aspect of Islamic jihadism, and the dif-
ficulties of engaging an unconventional, non-state
enemy such as al-Qa‘ida. (HW)
A Concise History of the Middle East, by Arthur
Goldschmidt Jr. and Lawrence Davidson. Boul-
der, CO: Westview Press, 2009. xvi + 470 pages.
Glossary to p. 502. Bibl. to p. 531. Index to p. 555.
$49. The ninth edition of this comprehensive and
informative volume has been revised to reflect the
latest scholarship and current events in the Middle
East. The book gives an extensive account of the
region’s history, starting from the era before the
Prophet Muhammad and ending with the post-9/11
“War on Terror” The authors highlight major his-
torical figures and developments, examine impor-
tant socio-economic and religious phenomena, and
offer ample political analysis of recent events in the
Middle East. (ZsL)
Islam in America, by Jane I. Smith. New York: Co-

lumbia University Press, 2010. 304 pages. $24.50.
Jane I. Smith, Senior Lecturer in Divinity and As-
sociate Dean at Harvard Divinity School, wrote
the accessible yet thorough introduction to Islam
particular to the American experience in a vari-
ety of communities. The first chapters discuss the
founding beliefs characterizing Islam for American
communities, examines the lives, experiences, and
influences of important characters and their roles in
Islam, and outlines the visibility of Islam in Ameri-
can culture through immigration and African Amer-
ican culture. The final chapters confront the range
of issues that Muslims face living in America and
wanting to live faithfully; concerns regarding family
life, women’s roles, and dress are all written about
with great insight. Finally, the author discusses the
post-9/11 struggles Muslims living in America face,
including effects of the “War on Terror.” Ultimately,
the text offers a detailed and important account of
the rise of Islam in America. (NF)
PHILOSOPHY, RELIGION, AND SCIENCE
Two Faiths, One Banner: When Muslims
Marched with Christians across Europe’s Bat-
tlegrounds, by Ian Almond. Cambridge: Harvard
University Press, 2009. 222 pages. Notes to p. 234.
Bibl. to p. 242. Index to p. 246. $29.95. Attempt-
ing to dispel the common “clash of civilizations”
theory, Ian Almond provides readers with examples
of Christian-Muslim shared history. By shedding
light on the multi-partite history of Europe Two
Faiths, One Banner complicates the tendency of
some modern persons to “airbursh Muslims and
Jews out of [European] heritage.” Almond adds a
disclaimer, explaining his book is not intended to
address every aspect of inter-cultural exchange, but
rather is meant to serve as a reminder of Europe’s
culturally-diverse history. (HW)
Islamic Jurisprudence in the Classical Era, by
Norman Calder, ed. by Colin Imber. Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2010. v + 200 pages.
Afterword to p. 222. Sources to p. 224. Index to p.
233. $95. In this book, Colin Imber has compiled
four previously unpublished essays by scholastic
luminary Norman Calder in the book Islamic Juris-
prudence in the Classical Era. Originally intended
as a sequel to his previous work, Studies in Early
Muslim Jurisprudence, the four chapters describe
typologies of juristic traditions, their evolution, and
the impact of jurisprudence on medieval daily life.
Additionally, Calder draws distinctions between the
various titles given to scholars of juristic traditions
(e.g., mufti, qadi, etc.) and describes the roles of
these jurists in their communities. Before his un-
timely death in 1998, Calder was one of a handful
of Western scholars to engage with this complex
subject. (HW)
Muhammad and the Believers: At the Origins
of Islam, by Fred M. Donner. Cambridge: The
middle east journal M 505
Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2010.
xviii + 224 pages. Appends. to p. 236. Notes to p.
256. Gloss. to p. 264. Illust. Credits to p. 266. Index
to p. 280. $25.95. Beginning with pre-Islamic em-
pires and proceeding chronologically, Muhammad
and the Believers provides readers with a history
of early Islam. Throughout the text, Donner makes
a point to highlight an aspect of early Islam called
“the Believers’ movement,” a monotheistic reform
effort which included Jews, Christians, and Mus-
lims, and emphasized a single god and righteous
behavior according to God’s laws. The book ends
with a discussion of the codification of religious tra-
ditions, when Islam began to resemble its modern
incarnation. (HW)
Apocalyptic Islam and Iranian Shi‘ism, by Ab-
bas Amanat. London: I.B. Tauris & Co. Ltd., 2009.
xvii + 251 pages. Notes to p. 280. Index to p. 286.
$97. In this monograph, Abbas Amanat traces the
progression of messianic traditions from the Middle
Ages to the present in an effort to explain millenar-
ian movements and their resurgence in modern Is-
lam. Amanat first reviews general characteristics of
apocalypticism and then provides specific examples
of messianic movements throughout history, paying
special attention to the role of Muslim clerics in shap-
ing and perpetuating a millenarian culture. (HW)
Religious Diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah,
ed. by Francesca Stavrakopoulou and John Barton.
London: T&T Clark International, 2010. xvi + 193
pages. Index to p. 207. $34.95. Stavrakopoulou and
Barton examine the conceptual, socio-religious, and
geographical diversities of ancient Israelite and Ju-
dahite religions in three different sections of Reli-
gious Diversity in Ancient Israel and Judah. Their
stated goal is to deconstruct common assumptions
about ancient religions, especially those which
come from studying the Hebrew Bible, and to re-
construct an understanding of the various religious
traditions according to historical realities and socio-
cultural contexts. (HW)
Memories of Muhammad: Why the Prophet
Matters, by Omid Safi. San Francisco: Harper-
One, 2009. 306 pages. Notes to p. 324. $24.99. The
Prophet Muhammad stands at the center of Islam,
and there is no way of understanding Islam with-
out looking closely at his life. That is the underly-
ing assumption of Omid Safi’s biography of Islam’s
founder, vilified by certain non-Muslims, but char-
acterized by many Muslims as an exemplar of per-
fect wisdom, conscience, and piety. Delving into the
context of Muhammad’s life, including the battles
in which he fought and his marital life, Safi traces
the legacy of the social and religious revolution he
inspired. Also included are Western representations
of Muhammad — positive, negative, and grotesque
— and the ways in which Muslims have interpreted
the events of Muhammad’s life in historically and
spiritually meaningful ways. (EN)
506 M MIDDLE EAST JOURNAL
The Borders of Islam: Exploring Samuel Hun-
tington’s Faultlines, from Al-Andalus to the
Virtual Ummah, ed. by Stig Jarle Hansen, Atle
Mesoy, and Tuncay Kardas. New York: Columbia
University Press, 2009. vii + 315 pages. Gloss. to
p. 319. Notes to p. 375. Contributors to p. 380. In-
dex to p. 388. $30. The term “clash of civilizations”
dates back to a 1990 article by Bernard Lewis, but
it was most famously used and elaborated upon by
Samuel Huntington who predicted that the borders
between Western and Islamic civilizations would
increasingly be filled with war and conflict. Bring-
ing together specially commissioned essays penned
by 20 international authors, the edited work The
Borders of Islam produces in-depth case studies of
Islamic “border zones” in the hope of determining
whether local conflict increases global confronta-
tion between Islamic and other civilizations. Areas
of interest include countries which host Muslim
majorities like Afghanistan, Bosnia, Ethiopia, Paki-
stan, and Turkey, as well as countries which, by way
of migration and technological advances, find them-
selves on new fault lines geographically removed
from what is traditionally described as Islamic civi-
lization. (EN)
The Middle East: The Politics of the Sacred and
Secular, by Shahrough Akhavi. London: Zed Books,
2009. viii + 249 pages. Notes to p. 273. Bibl. to p.
282. Index to p. 291. $24.75. Part of the World Po-
litical Theories series, which examines non-Western
political thought in particular political regions, The
Middle East: The Politics of the Sacred and Secular
looks to deconstruct contemporary Middle Eastern
political theories on issues like the nature of society,
the role of the individual, and the conceptualization
of state. By characterizing the nature of politics in
several historical periods, including early Islam,
Umayyad kingship, Abbasid imperial rule, the late
Ottoman period, and the 20th century Middle East of
the author, Shahrough Akhavi makes the case that
ideas and theories over that span of time were gen-
erated by jurists, philosophers, and thinkers in re-
sponse to concrete historical developments. Themes
which emerge include patrimonial politics, the sa-
cred and secular in Muslim political thought, and
the rights of society versus the rights of individuals.
(EN)
A History of the Arabian Peninsula, ed. By Fahd
al-Semmari. London: I.B. Tauris, 2010. viii + 301
pages. Index to p. 312. $50.00. In this collection
of selected articles and research studies, originally
published in Arabic in Al Darah Quarterly, over a
dozen Arab authors discuss several aspects of the
historical Arabian Peninsula, the cradle of Islamic
civilization. Historical subjects include the origins
of Saudi Arabian history, industry in Saudi Arabia
in Umayyad times, the reform movement of Shaykh
Muhammad ibn ‘Abd al-Wahhab, Arab travelers’
accounts, the state-building program of King Abdul
Aziz, Riyadh city architecture, and Soviet diploma-
cy in Arabia in the 1920s. A History of the Arabian
Peninsula marks the first time leading Saudi Ara-
bian scholars have created a history of the Arabian
Peninsula from their own unique, indigenous per-
spectives. (EN)
Militant Islamist Ideology: Understanding the
Global Threat, by Youssef H. Aboul-Enein. An-
napolis: Naval Institute Press, 2010. xvii + v214.
Notes to p. 224. Gloss. to p. 241. Index to p. 250.
About the Author to p. 252. $37.95. Written by
Commander Youssef H. Aboul-Enein, US Navy, a
top adviser at the Joint Intelligence Task Force for
Combating Terrorism, Militant Islamist Ideology
argues that the US armed forces lack a consistent
definition of the threat posed by militant Islamists
and, unfortunately, confuse “Islam,” “Islamist,”
and “militant Islamist.” That confusion undermines
American national security objectives, strains rela-
tions with US allies, and feeds into the image broad-
cast by al-Qa‘ida as a defender of injustice visited
upon Muslims. Using Qur’anic verses, Islamic his-
tory, and the written works of Muslim political
thinkers, Aboul-Enein attempts to marginalize the
violent ideology of al-Qa‘ida and other militant Is-
lamist organizations. (EN)
The Other Muslims: Moderate and Secular, ed.
by Zeyno Baran. New York: Palgrave Macmillan,
2010. 191 pages. Contribs. to p. 199. Index to p.
211. $30. This edited work brings together ten self-
described moderate and secular Muslim voices
from a variety of backgrounds: academia, theology,
theater, activism, military, etc. Living in Europe or
the United States, these authors defend the compat-
ibility of Islam with universal human rights and
identify Islamism as a dangerous, totalitarian, and
exclusive ideology which leads first to radicalism
and finally to terrorism. In three parts, The Other
Muslims presents the danger Islamism poses to sec-
ular societies in America, Europe, and North Africa,
recounts personal stories of authors’ experiences
with Islamism, and, finally, identifies ways to set in
motion a renaissance within Islam which allows it
to coexist with secular democracies in Europe and
the United States. (EN)
PRE-20TH CENTURY HISTORY
Tribes and Empire on the Margins of Nine-
teenth-Century Iran, by Arash Khazeni. Seattle
London: University of Washington Press, 2009. xi
+ 199 pages. Notes to p. 255. Gloss. to p. 259. Bibl.
to p. 279. Index to p. 292. $60 cloth; $30 paper. In
writing this history of Qajar Iran, Khazeni takes a
distinctive approach — one that departs from the
cultural and political center and deals with issues of
tribal-state interactions on the periphery of the 19th
-century Iranian state. The Bakhtiyari tribal confed-
eracy, located in the Zagros Mountains, is the focal
point of Khazeni’s study, and provides a platform
 middle east journal M 507

for discussions about imperial projects such as road Women and War in the Middle East: Transna-
building and oil exploration, and the impact these tional Perspectives, ed. by Nadje Al-Ali and Ni-
projects had on pastoral nomads. (HW) cola Pratt. New York: Zed Books, 2009. viii + 272
pages. Index to p. 285. $33.95. The contributors to
The Ottoman Age of Exploration, by Giancarlo this volume provide a critical examination of the
Casale. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2010. xix relationship between gender and transnationalism
+ 203. Notes to p. 248. Works cited to p. 270. Index in the context of conflict, peace-building, and post-
to p. 281. $49.95. Representing a challenge to tradi- conflict reconstruction. They place special empha-
tional narratives of European seafaring dominance sis on examining how gender roles and identities are
in the 16th century, The Ottoman Age of Exploration construed and employed in post-conflict situations.
presents a comprehensive account of a century of The volume explores the paths international actors
Ottoman imperial contact with the trading world of — whether governmental or non-governmental,
the Indian Ocean. Author Giancarlo Casale argues
that the Ottoman Empire shared four key character- national or transnational — choose to ameliorate
istics with European countries, such as Portugal and women’s situation in conflict zones and the impact
Spain, which in the 16th century, explored the outside it has on gender roles and relations. In addition, the
world via seafaring ships in an unprecedented way. authors also examine women’s role and participa-
The book is not a comparative history, but rather a tion in peace-building and post-conflict reconstruc-
narrative written from the Ottoman perspective fea- tion processes, contributing an important gender-
turing individual political figures, including Sultan related element to the current debate on this topic.
Selim, who conquered Egypt in 1517 and brought (ZsL)
his empire, for the first time, into direct contact with
the trading routes of the coveted and much-disputed
Indian Ocean. (EN)
Textile Imports into Qajar Iran: Russia Versus
Great Britain, The Battle for Market Domina-
tion, by Willem Floor. Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda
Publishers, Inc., 2009. ix + 191 pages. Bibl. to p.
207. Index to p. 212. $35. The battle for domination
of the textile market in Qajar Iran is described in
great detail by Willem Floor in this, his most recent
book. Floor sheds light on the intricate dance coun-
tries like Great Britain and Russia had to engage in
order to be competitive in the Iranian market. For
the expert reader, Floor also describes the nature
and importance of various textile imports. He in-
cludes a reproduction of James Brant’s influential
report to the British government, in which Brant
proposed a strategy to successfully dominate the
import markets of Qajar Iran. (HW)

WOMEN

Women’s Roles in the Middle East And North

Africa, by Ruth Margolies Beitler and Angelica R.
Martinez. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood, 2010. x
+ 206 pages. Notes to p. 209. Gloss. to p. 212. Bibl
to p. 220. Index to p. 225. $55. Beitler and Martinez
explore the changing roles of women throughout
the Middle East, offering a topical, chronological,
and geographical overview. The book’s six chap-
ters touch upon different spheres of women’s lives:
work, family, religion, law, politics, and culture to
analyze how women’s situation evolved in the dif-
ferent countries of the region. The authors take both
a historical and contemporary approach and provide
an extensive and detailed picture of women’s lives
in the Middle East and North Africa from the begin-
ning of Islam to the present day. (ZsL)