Arab World History

Despite the turmoil of Arab nationalism and fundamentalism, Middle Eastern wars, and oil crises, the history of the Arab world has been little known and poorly understood in the West. One reason may be that, for more than half a century, there has been no up-to-date single volume work that chronicles the story of Arab civilization - until now.

This kaleidoscopic book covers almost 3,000 years of Arab history and shines a light on the footloose Arab peoples and tribes who conquered lands and disseminated their language and culture over vast distances. Tracing this process to the origins of the Arabic language, rather than the advent of Islam, Tim Mackintosh-Smith begins his narrative more than a thousand years before Muhammad and focuses on how Arabic, both spoken and written, has functioned as a vital source of shared cultural identity over the millennia.

In 2013, just two years after the popular overthrow of Hosni Mubarak, the Egyptian military ousted the country's first democratically elected president - Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood - and subsequently led a brutal repression of the Islamist group. These bloody events echoed an older political rift: the splitting of nationalists and Islamists during the rule of Egyptian president and Arab nationalist leader Gamal Abdel Nasser. Fawaz Gerges, one of the world's leading authorities on the Middle East, tells how the clash between pan-Arab nationalism and pan-Islamism has shaped the history of the region.

Arab stereotype portrays the Jew as a brutal, violent coward. The Jewish stereotype portrays the Arab as a primitive creature of animal vengeance and cruel desires. In this monumental Pulitzer Prize-winning work, revised in 2002, David Shipler delves into the origins of these prejudices that have been intensified by war, terrorism, and nationalism. Shipler examines the process of indoctrination, the far-ranging effects of socioeconomic differences, and the historical conflicts between Islam and Judaism.

Glass has reported extensively from the Middle East and travelled frequently in Syria over several decades. Here he melds together reportage, analysis, and history to provide an accessible overview of the origins and permutations defining the conflict, situating it clearly in the overall crisis of the region. His voice, elegant and concise, humane and richly informed, is a vital antidote to the sloganizing that shapes so much commentary and policy concerning the civil war.

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

In just over a hundred years - from the death of Muhammad in 632 to the beginning of the Abbasid Caliphate in 750 - the followers of the Prophet swept across the whole of the Middle East, North Africa, and Spain. Their armies threatened states as far flung as the Franks in Western Europe and the Tang Empire in China. The conquered territory was larger than the Roman Empire at its greatest expansion, and it was claimed for the Arabs in roughly half the time.

In the seventh and eighth centuries AD, armies inspired by the new religion of Islam burst out of Arabia to subjugate the Levant, southwest Asia, North Africa and the Iberian peninsula. These Arab conquests followed immediately after the Prophet Mohammed's death in 632. By this time, against all the odds, he had managed to unite the feuding tribes of Arabia at the point of his sword. The Muslim conquests lasted until 750, by which time several generations of marauding Arab armies had carved out an Islamic empire which, in size and population, rivalled that of Rome at its zenith.

Welcome to the Middle East conflict, a conflict that is technically 63 years old and counting but has its roots in over 2,000 years of history. With so much time and history, the peace process has become laden with unique, politically sensitive concepts, like the right of return, contiguous borders, secure borders, demilitarized zones, and security requirements, with players like the Quartet, Palestinian Authority, Fatah, Hamas, the Arab League, and Israel. Over time, it has become exceedingly difficult for even sophisticated political pundits and followers to keep track of it all.

The transatlantic slave trade was founded by the Portuguese in the 15th century for the specific purpose of supplying the New World colonies with African slave labor. It was soon joined by all the major trading powers of Europe, and it reached its peak in the 18th century with the founding and development of plantation economies that ran from the South American mainland through the Caribbean and into the southern states of the United States. The East African Slave Trade, on the other hand, was more complex, far older, and significantly more widespread.

Barely a year after the self-immolation of a young fruit seller in Tunisia, a vast wave of popular protest has convulsed the Middle East, overthrowing long-ruling dictators and transforming the region’s politics almost beyond recognition. But the biggest transformations of what has been labeled as the “Arab Spring” are yet to come. An insider to both American policy and the world of the Arab public, Marc Lynch shows that the fall of particular leaders is but the least of the changes that will emerge from months of unrest.

When Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in Sidi Bouzid, Tunisia, in December 2010, sparking a wave of popular uprisings that would topple dictatorial regimes across North Africa and the Middle East, observers hailed the onset of a great “Arab Awakening.” But this wasn’t the first time people in Tunisia, Egypt, and elsewhere across the region had taken to the streets demanding fundamental change.

The conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians is technically over 70 years old and counting but has its roots in over 2,000 years of history. With so much time and history, the Middle East peace process has become laden with unique, politically sensitive concepts like the right of return, contiguous borders, secure borders, demilitarized zones, and security requirements, with players like the Quartet, Palestinian Authority, Fatah, Hamas, the Arab League and Israel.

Albert Hourani's 1991 work, A History of the Arab Peoples, is unsurpassed as an overview of Arab history, from the rise of Islam to the late 20th century. Going far beyond the political history that had generally characterized previous examinations, Hourani integrates a wide range of scholarship to provide a deep analysis of social, cultural, and economic structures. His interest in the everyday lives of Arab people and his desire to understand what united - rather than divided - many different nationalities gives listeners a new and vital perspective on the region.

La historia de este largo, convulso y complejo tema histórico, que relata el por qué de la larga enemistad entre estos dos pueblos de Oriente Cercano, hoy enfrentados en una guerra que parece imposible de solucionar. En este primer capítulo, nos trasladaremos incluso a los antecedentes más remotos, para comprender el comienzo de tan largo conflicto, hasta el siglo XX, cuando tras el anuncio de la creación del Estado de Israel, se iniciaron los primeros enfrentamientos.