Middle East

As bombs rained down on Gaza in October 2023, images of mass death and destruction gripped the world, and openly genocidal statements from Israeli leaders foretold the magnitude of horrors to come. But the United States media was quick to downplay, obscure, and repackage an emerging campaign of...

5 de junho de 1967. O Estado de Israel está cercado por inimigos que desejam sua completa extinção. O resto do mundo vira as costas para a jovem nação diante do perigo iminente.10 de junho de 1967. Os exércitos árabes são rechaçados, suas divisões em solo, eliminadas, suas forças aéreas, destruídas. O ministro da Defesa Moshe Dayan adentra a Cidade Velha de Jerusalém pela Porta dos Leões, para juntar-se aos paraquedistas que libertaram o local mais sagrado do judaísmo: o Muro das Lamentações.

A major new history of revolutionary Iran, from the 1940s to the present Iran’s revolution in 1979 shook the world. The Pahlavi dynasty came crashing down, and the Islamic Republic rose in its place. But what led to this seismic event? How did the revolutionary movement gain such strength? And...

Il grande Maometto il Conquistatore, nelle stanze del palazzo reale di Costantinopoli appena sottomessa, andava recitando una triste poesia persiana. Trovandosi di fronte all'immensità della sua conquista, il vincitore dell'ultimo basileus non poteva evitare di provare la malinconia della decadenza. Tra il Trecento e il Novecento gli ottomani edificarono un enorme impero incastrato tra Occidente e Oriente, con il chiaro proposito di unire l'Asia e l'Europa.

Discover the remarkable history of the Arab Spring... The Arab Spring began unexpectedly on December 17, 2010, when Mohamed Bouazizi, a 26-year-old fruit seller in the city of Sidi Bouzid in Tunisia, committed suicide in a horrifying and public way. He doused himself in flammable liquid and then set himself on fire. Bouazizi had been driven to this act of despair, it was said, by constant harassment from local representatives of the regime of President Ben Ali, who had been the autocratic ruler of Tunisia for more than twenty years.

This groundbreaking work deconstructs the age-old legends surrounding the 'Holy Land' of Israel—and the prejudices that continue to suffocate it. What is a homeland, and when does it become a national territory? Why have so many people been willing to die for them throughout the twentieth...

On February 28, 2026, bombs fell on Tehran. The Supreme Leader was killed. Within hours, oil surged past $170 a barrel, global markets plunged, and the world stood on the edge of a wider war. This was not a sudden crisis. It was the detonation of a fuse lit decades earlier. Most people believe this conflict began in 1979 — with the Iranian hostage crisis, the birth of the Islamic Republic, and chants of “Death to America.” They are wrong.

For centuries following the fall of Rome, Western Europe was a benighted backwater, a world of subsistence farming, minimal literacy, and violent conflict. Meanwhile Arab culture was thriving, dazzling those Europeans fortunate enough to visit cities like Baghdad or Antioch. There, philosophers, mathematicians, and astronomers were steadily advancing the frontiers of knowledge, as well as keeping alive the works of Plato and Aristotle. When the best libraries in Europe held several dozen books, Baghdad's great library, The House of Wisdom, housed four hundred thousand .

Beneath the landscapes of the Old World lie silent witnesses to human history—ancient cities buried by time, temples swallowed by sand, and civilizations that disappeared long before their stories could be told. Secrets Beneath Old World Ruins is a captivating journey into these forgotten places, exploring the hidden truths they hold and the mysteries that continue to puzzle historians and archaeologists. This audiobook is more than a tour of ruins; it is an investigation into the lives, beliefs, and innovations of people who shaped the world in ways we are still discovering today.

The riveting story of the most audacious diplomatic enterprise of the last century—creating and securing the Jewish state—as seen through the eyes of the foremost Israeli diplomat of our generation. Zionist Diplomacy tells the untold story of how the Jewish people used diplomacy to restore...

Lucie Azema livre un témoignage rare et précieux sur le quotidien en Iran, ses luttes, espoirs et traditions – loin des clichés et des regards occidentaux. Grâce à son expérience de vie à Téhéran, elle éclaire la richesse, la complexité et les paradoxes d’un pays souvent...

Are we doomed to endless conflict, or is there a revolutionary path to lasting peace in the Middle East? For decades, Western peace plans have failed, leaving the region caught in a cycle of bloodshed with consequences for the entire world. But what if the true solution was never about separation, but about rediscovering a shared heritage? Forged in the fire of the regional war that began on October 7, 2023, a new movement has emerged from unprecedented discussions among leaders representing the region's diverse peoples and faiths.

For millennia, the Mediterranean Sea has been a global crossroads, carrying people, goods, ideas, beliefs, and conflicts across the waters. Great empires have fought to control it, great adventurers have made their fortunes on it, and great legends have been told about it.

Nika, studentessa, 16 anni? È caduta da un palazzo, dice il regime. Aida, 36, medico? Un amante l'ha spinta giù dal cavalcavia, dice il regime. Sono queste le storie quotidiane delle ragazze iraniane lungo le strade della «loro» Rivoluzione. Una generazione di giovani donne istruite che pagano col sangue il coraggio di mettere i propri corpi di traverso a un sistema vecchio, sessista, illiberale. Barbara Stefanelli raccoglie le storie delle ribelli iraniane e di chi ne ha sostenuto la battaglia. Per custodire i nomi e i volti, il sacrificio e le promesse.

A leading Israeli American scholar of the Holocaust explores and explains his native country's intensifying turn toward violence and exclusion. The distinguished historian Omer Bartov was born on a kibbutz, grew up in Tel Aviv, and served in the Israel Defense Forces during the Yom Kippur War...

Runt om i världen sörjer, skriker, firar människor när Hamid Noury grips i Stockholm. Fallet leder oss tillbaka till sommaren 1988–då tusentals politiska fångar avrättades i Iran. En av de som misstänks ha varit delaktig i avrättingarna är Hamid Noury. Nu är han här, i det lilla landet i norr. Hitlurad av en familjemedlem och genom osannolikt polisarbete gripen. Förberedelserna har pågått i flera och nu står han åtalad, misstänkt för folkrättsbrott och mord.

Le 14 mai 1948, l'État d'Israël est proclamé. S'intéressant aux origines de cette naissance, Michel Abitbol décrypte l'arrière-plan historique de la déclaration Balfour de 1917 et la résolution de l'ONU du 29 novembre 1947 (préconisant le partage de la Palestine entre un État juif et un État arabe). L'auteur évoque ensuite les sources du conflit entre les deux peuples, et suit pas à pas l'émergence d'une « nation » israélienne et d'une culture hébraïque moderne nées du brassage des vagues successives d'immigrants.

As the last rays of a fading empire fall across the Anatolian highlands, one figure walks among the ruins—seeking truth, vengeance, and the buried heartbeat of a civilization in collapse. From the embattled satrapies of the Royal Road to the firelit temples of forgotten gods, Persian Dusk: Echoes over Anatolia is a sweeping historical epic that weaves together the final days of Persian rule with the fractured hopes of those caught between East and West.

Le 14 mai 1948, l'État d'Israël est proclamé. S'intéressant aux origines de cette naissance, Michel Abitbol décrypte l'arrière-plan historique de la déclaration Balfour de 1917 et la résolution de l'ONU du 29 novembre 1947 (préconisant le partage de la Palestine entre un État juif et un État arabe). L'auteur évoque ensuite les sources du conflit entre les deux peuples, et suit pas à pas l'émergence d'une « nation » israélienne et d'une culture hébraïque moderne nées du brassage des vagues successives d'immigrants.

"Rich and complex . . . [A] beautifully observant book." —Jennifer Szalai, The New York Times Book Review “A dizzying tour de force . . . From Life Itself leaves the reader with a sense of wonder.” —Elif Batuman, author of Either/Or and The Idiot One neighborhood in Istanbul: a window on...