From The First World War To The Arab Spring

Offering a comprehensive, up-to-date examination of the complex web of wars and proxy wars, revolutions and counter-revolutions that are ripping the Middle East apart, this book puts these events in their historical context and leads readers through the labyrinth that is the new Middle East. This book seeks answers to pressing, contentious questions. Why are there so many hereditary heads of state in the Middle East when the Prophet Muhammad did not appoint a successor? Why do Western countries claim to want democracy in the Middle East, yet support dictators? Why did Israel become a democracy while the Arab states did not? Why are there so many wars in the Middle East? And, most importantly, what happened to the hope and optimism of the Arab Spring? M.E. McMillan offers fresh answers to these difficult questions. Firmly grounded in historical research and insightful analysis of current events, this book gives readers a new understanding of what’s really going on in the Middle East.

The First World War in the Middle East is an accessibly written military and social history of the clash of world empires in the Dardanelles, Egypt and Palestine, Mesopotamia, Persia and the Caucasus. Coates Ulrichsen demonstrates how wartime exigencies shaped the parameters of the modern Middle East, and describes and assesses the major campaigns against the Ottoman Empire and Germany involving British and imperial troops from the French and Russian Empires, as well as their Arab and Armenian allies. Also documented are the enormous logistical demands placed on host societies by the Great Powers' conduct of industrialised warfare in hostile terrain. The resulting deepening of imperial penetration, and the extension of state controls across a heterogeneous sprawl of territories, generated a powerful backlash both during and immediately after the war, which played a pivotal role in shaping national identities as the Ottoman Empire was dismembered. This is a multidimensional account of the many seemingly discrete yet interlinked campaigns that resulted in one to one and a half million casualties. It details not just their military outcome but relates them to intelligence-gathering, industrial organisation, authoritarianism and the political economy of empires at war.

Offering a comprehensive, up-to-date examination of the complex web of wars and proxy wars, revolutions and counter-revolutions that are ripping the Middle East apart, this book puts these events in their historical context and leads readers through the labyrinth that is the new Middle East. This book seeks answers to pressing, contentious questions. Why are there so many hereditary heads of state in the Middle East when the Prophet Muhammad did not appoint a successor? Why do Western countries claim to want democracy in the Middle East, yet support dictators? Why did Israel become a democracy while the Arab states did not? Why are there so many wars in the Middle East? And, most importantly, what happened to the hope and optimism of the Arab Spring? M.E. McMillan offers fresh answers to these difficult questions. Firmly grounded in historical research and insightful analysis of current events, this book gives readers a new understanding of what’s really going on in the Middle East.

Turkey, Iraq, Qatar, Jordan, Egypt, and Tunisia The “Arab Spring” all started when a young Tunisian fruit seller set himself on fire in protest of a government official confiscating his apples and slapping his face. The aftermath of that one personal protest grew to become the Middle East movement known as the Arab Spring—a wave of disparate events that included protests, revolutions, hopeful reform movements, and bloody civil wars. The Fires of Spring is the first book to bring the post-Arab Spring world to light in a holistic context. A narrative of author Shelly Culbertson’s journey through six countries of the Middle East, The Fires of Spring tells the story by weaving together a sense of place, insight about issues of our time, interviews with leaders, history, and personal stories. Culbertson navigates the nuances of street life and peers into ministries, mosques, and women’s worlds. She delves into what Arab Spring optimism was about, and at the same time sheds light on the pain and dysfunction that continues to plague parts of the region. The Fires of Spring blends reportage, travel memoir, and analysis in this complex and multifaceted portrait.

A concise guide on how and why the Arab Spring failed, this book presents a detailed narrative of events in the Arab World, from the moment Mohammed Bouazizi lit himself – and the region – on fire. It presents an original investigation into why the Arab Spring cannot be seen as a wave of democratization, due to the contribution of intolerant Islamist actors in its failure, through their application of a distinctive conception of “the good” inconsistent with liberal democracy.

This book offers the first detailed, in-depth account of how and why some Arab foreign fighters subsequently became involved in Islamist terrorism. Drawing on a personal dataset of 3,010 Arab foreign fighters compiled using biographies, martyrdom eulogies, and postings on 'jihadi' websites, Terrorist Movements and the Recruitment of Arab Foreign Fighters suggests that the subsequent involvement in Islamist terrorism by some Arab foreign fighters is primarily forged in the crucible of defensive jihad.

Killing the Arab Spring tells the stories of the Arab Spring uprising in 15 Middle East states, from the point of view of a secular Middle Eastern political analyst familiar with the politics, the culture of the people and the history of the area. Dr. Hasan views the vast majority of the Arab rulers deriving their absolute authority from inheritance or military coups, or in the case of the Saudis from conquest, not at the pleasure of the governed. Arab leaders do not believe that government is a trust on behalf of the people. They believe that if there is democracy and their societies are composed of equal and competing individuals, there will be a tendency towards anarchy. People involved in the Arab Spring uprisings demanded inclusive and equitable democracy, social justice and economic development. There were no civil society institutions strong enough to challenge the weapons of authoritarianism that included ideology, repression, payoffs and the solidarity of the crony capitalists. The author argues that Saddam Hussein’s 1980 war on Iran was the spark that started a chain of bloody wars and events which eventually led to the US invasion of Iraq and the Arab Spring uprisings. The revolts and the counter revolts took different forms in each country based on its history, the type of government and the economy. The author argues that the Arab Spring is a step of a long process toward democracy rather than an aberration between periods of authoritarian regimes. To understand the Arab Spring causes and its aftermath, the book provides the reader with a review of the Middle East common culture that includes the history of Islamic religion, Islamic-sects and Arab tribalism, and brief history of each country. There are few activities more controversial than writing history of a nation involved in a conflict. Even while witnessing history unfolding in a country, different historians provide different narratives, different causes and different conclusions. This becomes more obvious when the history of the conflicts is viewed through the prism of the politics of sectarianism ethnicity and tribalism. The author strives for an objective view, but he does not hide his strong support to liberal democracy and human rights.

A decade since the eruption of Arab Spring protests in the Middle East and North Africa, the region continues to confront the primary causes of the popular disenchantment including economic deprivation, bad governance, corruption and limited avenues for political expression. Democratisation, the buzzword in 2011 has given way to debates around conflict management and resolution. Simultaneously, there are mounting economic challenges throughout the region that have been aggravated by the COVID-19 pandemic. But there are some silver linings such as a focus on reforms, greater scrutiny against corruption, demand for better governance, and awareness regarding women empowerment and rights of minorities. The volume, Politics of Change in the Middle East and North Africa since Arab Spring: A Lost Decade?, commemorates the ten years of the eruption of Arab Spring protests. It captures some of the prevailing political, economic, strategic and social issues in MENA through thematic or country-specific essays that explore the ongoing transformations and underline how despite the hopelessness, the MENA societies have made progress on various fronts. Print edition not for sale in South Asia (India, Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Bhutan).