Showing titles in Middle East

Here are elite soldiers, kibbutz-born, battle-bred. Their stories reveal their minds and souls, and what has tempered and annealed their hearts. They are citizen soldiers all - many officers - who refused career military appointments and returned to civilian life, as much as one can be a civilian in Israel. Descendants of Isaac who, like modern-day Ishmaels, seek peace while pursuing the Leviathan of war. Or are pursued by it. They also search for inner peace.

It's been 2,000 years after most Jews were exiled from Jerusalem and the rest of the Holy Land, and two generations since the Holocaust led to the founding of modern Israel. Still, small yet resilient Jewish communities continue to endure and thrive around the world - sometimes in the most unlikely places, and often in the face of extreme persecution. Journalist Annika Hernroth-Rothstein has spent two years of her life uncovering the hidden beauty of these largely forgotten Jewish enclaves.

Dubai is a city in the Arabain Desert, full of ambition with sights to behold, from the tallest building in the world, the biggest mega malls to keep even the keenest shoppers never thirsting for more, and huge manmade islands like the world has never seen. If you’ve never visited this "City of Gold", as it is often referred to, then you seriously need to consider doing so, and I’ve compiled 101 reasons in this guide that should hopefully persuade you to do so.

A product of beige California suburbs, Pam Mandel was overlooked and unexceptional. When her father ships her off on a youth group tour of Israel, he inadvertently catapults his 17-year-old daughter into a world of angry European backpackers, seize-the-day Israelis, and the fall out of Cold War-era politics. With no guidance and no particular plan, Mandel says yes to everything and everyone, embarking on an adventure across three continents and thousands of miles.

Join Zora O’Neill for a grand tour through the Middle East, to laugh with her in Egypt, delight in the stories she passes on from the Gulf region, and find yourself transformed by her experiences in Lebanon and Morocco. She’s packed her dictionaries, her unsinkable sense of humor, and her talent for making fast friends of strangers. From quiet, bougainvillea-lined streets to the lively buzz of crowded medinas, from families’ homes to local hot spots, she brings a part of the world that is often flattened by news headlines into real and colorful relief.

In "The Roman Empire the Empire of the Edomite," William Beeston throws a curveball at history, proposing a bold connection between the mighty Romans and the ancient Edomites of Jordan.

At first sight, modern-day Egypt is an unruly and chaotic place: a cacophony of sounds, an overload of smells, and a swirling visual feast. Ancient church domes and medieval minarets share the same space with fast-food chains and chic air-conditioned cafes. Egyptian society has undergone dramatic changes in recent years, yet tradition and deeply conservative views prevail. Culture Smart! Egypt explores the codes and paradoxes of Egyptian life, outlines the country's history, and shows the forces that have shaped its sensibility.

From a distance, Saudi Arabia may seem a subdued, or even dull place; but for those who take a closer look it emerges as a fascinating country, not necessarily because of its political and economic importance, but because of its people. Reticent perhaps but, on closer acquaintance, charming and warm, the Saudis form a far less monolithic society than one might expect.

The Sultanate of Oman, long regarded as one of the more mysterious countries of the Arabian Peninsula, is finally getting more of the attention it so deserves. An ancient land with a rich history and dramatic landscapes, Oman was largely cut off from the modern world until the accession to the throne of Sultan Qaboos in 1970. Since then this peaceful country has developed slowly but deliberately, placing a strong emphasis on retaining its cultural heritage while moving into the hi-tech era.

If you announce that you are going to Iran, someone will certainly advise you not to go. Ignore them – this is one of the most exciting countries on Earth. There is much to discover, and explore in Iran, not only cultural and historical sites but mountains, deserts and wilderness. Above all, this is a place defined by the hospitality and curiosity of Iranians despite a totalitarian regime. According to Lonely Planet's Atlas of Adventure – "it might well be the friendliest country you ever visit".

This fact-providing publication informs the listener about relocating to Dubai and provides handy tips to ensure preparation and success in the Emirate. Written in the first person with funny quirks, British Ex-Pat Jazmine details "everything you need to know to turn your dream of relocation into a reality."

The Global Citizen Language Learning vocabulary mastery audiobooks are intentionally and judiciously structured for vocabulary, definition, and pronunciation learning, retention, and recall for individuals who are completely new to the language!

Most visitors to Israel face an important task: crossing the highlights off their list. After guiding countless tours through the highlights, Shakked realized that they can never replace the excitement of discovering a hidden gem. In her book Secret Israel, Shakked reveals the Israel that she knows and loves, the one most people never get to see. Hidden sites off the beaten path are presented to the listener from a personal angle of a 10th-generation native Israeli Jewess with a spicy personality, guaranteeing a fun listen.

Turkey has grown to prominence as one of the world's most visited countries in recent years, thanks in part to the beauty of its cities, particularly Constantinople, now known as Istanbul, the Republic of Turkey's primary city, seaport, and financial center. It is a cultural and historical center. It is still a bustling metropolis, a favored place to visit by tourists when they plan a trip to this country.

Javier Reverte escogió esa frontera vaporosa y vulnerable, la más antigua del mundo, para realizar su último viaje. Eligió como puerta de entrada Estambul y su magnífico estrecho del Bósforo para después adentrarse en tren hasta remotas tierras iraníes.

After obtaining a married status contract in 1989, I worked on a five-star hotel project down on the Turkish Mediterranean Coast. Here, due to my wife and I loving both the people and area, we bought some land with a Turkish friend and had a house built. This turned out to be a major change in our lives, with our moving from our home in Plymouth to live in the Turkish countryside, just a short distance from what is now the resort town of Kemer. This move proved an excellent one, as we enjoyed many happy years among friendly people.

Two retired American high school teachers, former Peace Corps Volunteers, have sailed their 35 foot Nauticat sailboat from the US to the Caribbean, across the Atlantic, through the Mediterranean to Turkey. We begin this third book of the trilogy in 2008, with again launching our 35 foot sailboat Tapestry. We, along with 80 other boats, explore the Turkish Coast, Cyprus, and Syria, before the storm. Imagine Le Krak des Cehvaliers, a huge crusader castle, and the oasis of Palmyra, before the uprising and before they were vandalized, nearly destroyed.

This memoir tells the story of an American English teacher working in a new university in Palestine during a time of political strife and upheaval. Cynthia Yoder describes the joys of life in Palestine, against the backdrop of military occupation and the second intifada, which began soon after she arrived in 2000. Rather than give political analysis, the book gives glimpses into the lives of the Palestinian people the author met. Yoder details the effects of the occupation and describes her journey as a pacifist working amidst violence.

When journalist Taran Khan arrives in Kabul, she uncovers a place that defies her expectations. Her wanderings with other Kabulis reveal a fragile city in a state of flux: stricken by near-constant war, but flickering with the promise of peace; governed by age-old codes, but experimenting with new modes of living. Her walks take her to the unvisited tombs of the dead, and to the land of the living - like the booksellers, archaeologists, filmmakers and entrepreneurs who are remaking this 3,000-year-old city.

Jeremy Kroeker is a Mennonite with a motorcycle. He doesn’t have a funny beard, and he’s never even driven a buggy, but his family hails from the same Mennonite community that Miriam Toews fictionalized in A Complicated Kindness. From childhood through college, Kroeker attended Christian schools where he learned to think critically back to predetermined conclusions.