Civil and Uncivil Violence in Lebanon by
In this long-awaited work, Samir Khalaf analyzes the history of civil strife and political violence in Lebanon and reveals the inherent contradictions that have plagued that country and made it so vulnerable to both inter-Arab and superpower rivalries. How did a fairly peaceful and resourceful society, with an impressive history of viable pluralism, coexistence, and republicanism, become the site of so much barbarism and incivility? Khalaf argues that historically internal grievances have been magnified or deflected to become the source of international conflict. From the beginning, he shows, foreign interventions have consistently exacerbated internal problems. Lebanon's fragmented political culture is a byproduct of two general features. First, it reflects the traditional forces and political conflicts caused by striking differences in religious beliefs and communal and sectarian loyalties that continue to split the society and reinforce its factional character. Second, and superimposed on these, are new forms of socioeconomic and cultural stress caused by Lebanon's role in the continuing international conflicts in the region. Khalaf concludes that Lebanon is now at a crossroads in its process of political and social transformation, and proposes some strategies to re-create a vibrant civil and political culture that can accommodate profound transformations in the internal, domestic sphere as well as mediate developments taking place internationally. Throughout, Khalaf demonstrates how the internal and external currents must be considered simultaneously in order to understand the complex and tragic history of the country. This deeply considered and subtle analysis of the interplay of complex historical forces helps us to imagine a viable future not only for Lebanon but also for the Middle East as a whole.
Inventing Home by
Between 1890 and 1920 over one-third of the peasants of Mount Lebanon left their villages and traveled to the Americas. This book traces the journeys of these villagers from the ranks of the peasantry into a middle class of their own making. Inventing Home delves into the stories of these travels, shedding much needed light on the impact of emigration and immigration in the development of modernity. It focuses on a critical period in the social history of Lebanon--the "long peace" between the uprising of 1860 and the beginning of the French mandate in 1920. The book explores in depth the phenomena of return emigration, the questioning and changing of gender roles, and the rise of the middle class. Exploring new areas in the history of Lebanon, Inventing Home asks how new notions of gender, family, and class were articulated and how a local "modernity" was invented in the process. Akram Khater maps the jagged and uncertain paths that the fellahin from Mount Lebanon carved through time and space in their attempt to control their future and their destinies. His study offers a significant contribution to the literature on the Middle East, as well as a new perspective on women and on gender issues in the context of developing modernity in the region.
Lebanon Society and Culture Complete Report by
Need to know it all? Our all-inclusive culture report for Lebanon will get up to speed on all aspects of culture in Lebanon, including lifecycle, religion, women, superstitions & folklore, sports, holidays & festivals, and etiquette.
Letters to Dalia by
From the Introduction: Letters to Dali is the book I’ve always dreamed of writing. It is a collection of letters meant to be easily read. Each letter covers a topic I believe has had an impact on our lives as Arabs living in the Middle East. And as Lebanese who have suffered, but did not learn, from the terrible consequences of civil war. The letters’ main purpose is to send a simple message: no one idea or person holds the ultimate truth. Truth, as portrayed by politicians and the clergy, as a path to follow, to die or kill for, is not truth. It is a means to an endtheir means and their end. On their path the individual becomes a helpless tool. It is this individual for whom Letters to Dalia is written. This individual can be anyone.
Beirut Fragments by
Both an autobiography of Makdisi--born in Jerusalem, raised in Egypt, educated in the West, and a resident of Beirut since 1972--and a biography of the city, transformed by 15 years of civil war from grandeur to ruins. Published by Persea Books, 60 Madison Avenue, New York, 10010. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR
Lebanon and Arabism by
How did the Lebanese, traditionally so defined by their religious and sectarian allegiances, respond to the rise of Arab nationalism in the 1930s and 1940s? This book examines the interaction between Lebanese local sentiments and ‘Arabism'between 1936-1945, a period characterised by significant changes at the international, Arab and Lebanese levels. It highlights the developments which helped to shift Lebanon towards Arabism, moving the country away from a sceptical attitude towards active engagement in founding the Arab regional system in the mid-forties. The book also focuses on the internal changes which led to the inclusion of the Arab nationalists of Lebanon in the political process which culminated in the so called Lebanese National Pact and the independence of the country in 1943. It provides numerous insights for students of Arab and Lebanese politics, regional integration and constitutional democracy. The book is based on a variety of sources including archival material from Britain, France and the USA, private papers, published material and private interviews with leaders from different parts of the Arab world.
Struggle in the Levant by
The 1950s in Lebanon were marked by bitter infighting, slander, rivalry and rumour. Much was left unsaid, much was misunderstood, much was lied about. Caroline Attié's book seeks to explain the truth behind the intrigues and cloak-and-dagger politics that dominated the country for the decade. It aims to correct, for example, the misperceptions surrounding the role of foreign interventionism, its causes and purpose, and looks for fact behind the rumours. Did the Egyptians and Syrians (then joined in the United Arab Republic) provide support for the rebels? Did Camille Chamoun try to amend to constitution to allow him a second presidential term? Many of these questions have gone unanswered until now. Attié's book, useful to all students of the modern Middle East, sheds penetrating light into these shadowy regions of Lebanese history.
Studies in Middle Eastern History by
In this impressive synthesis, William Harris narrates the history of the sectarian communities of Mount Lebanon and its vicinity. He offers a fresh perspective on the antecedents of modern multi-communal Lebanon, tracing the consolidation of Lebanon's Christian, Muslim, and Islamic derived sects from their origins between the sixth and eleventh centuries. The identities of Maronite Christians, Twelver Shia Muslims, and Druze, the mountain communities, developed alongside assertions of local chiefs under external powers from the Umayyads to the Ottomans. The chiefs began interacting in a common arena when Druze lord Fakhr al-Din Ma'n achieved domination of the mountain within the Ottoman imperial framework in the early seventeenth century. Harris knits together the subsequent interplay of the elite under the Sunni Muslim Shihab relatives of the Ma'ns after 1697 with demographic instability as Maronites overtook Shia as the largest community and expanded into Druze districts. By the 1840s many Maronites conceived the common arena as their patrimony. Maronite/Druze conflict ensued. Modern Lebanon arose out of European and Ottoman intervention in the 1860s to secure sectarian peace in a special province. In 1920, after the Ottoman collapse, France and the Maronites enlarged the province into the modern country, with a pluralism of communal minorities headed by Maronite Christians and Sunni Muslims. The book considers the flowering of this pluralism in the mid-twentieth century, and the strains of new demographic shifts and of social resentment in an open economy. External intrusions after the 1967 Arab-Israeli war rendered Lebanon's contradictions unmanageable and the country fell apart. Harris contends that Lebanon has not found a new equilibrium and has not transcended its sects. In the early twenty-first century there is an uneasy duality: Shia have largely recovered the weight they possessed in the sixteenth century, but Christians, Sunnis, and Druze are two-thirds of the country. This book offers readers a clear understanding of how modern Lebanon acquired its precarious social intricacy and its singular political character.
The View from Istanbul by
The history of Ottoman Lebanon in the 16th and 17th centuries has, until now, received only the most limited attention. What work has been done has been based upon limited local and European literature. As the first work to make detailed studies and extensive use of Ottoman chancery documents, The View From Istanbul serves to fill many lacunae in the historical record. How did the Ottomans run their empire? How did they view Lebanon? What were their prime concerns in the region? Each section is prefaced by a short introduction that places the documents in historical context and analyses their content and scope. The View From Istanbul is an indispensable reference work that will remain a standard in the field.
The Shi'Is of Jabal 'Amil and the New Lebanon by
Tamara Chalabi highlights the development of a 'politics of demand' and the increased political activism of this community in a time of great change. It also explores how Arab nationalism was transformed from an ideology of opposition and empowerment of marginal communities, into a tool for the assertion of political domination.
Aftermath by
Rosen-who the Weekly Standard once bitterly complained has "great access to the Baathists and jihadists who make up the Iraqi insurgency"--has spent nearly a decade among warriors and militants who have been challenging American power in the Muslim world. In Aftermath, he tells their story, showing the other side of the U.S. war on terror, traveling from the battle-scarred streets of Baghdad to the alleys, villages, refugee camps, mosques, and killing grounds of Jordan, Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, and finally Afghanistan, where Rosen has a terrifying encounter with the Taliban as their "guest," and witnesses the new Obama surge fizzling in southern Afghanistan. Rosen was one of the few Westerners to venture inside the mosques of Baghdad to witness the first stirrings of sectarian hatred in the months after the U.S. invasion. He shows how weapons, tactics, and sectarian ideas from the civil war in Iraq penetrated neighboring countries and threatened their stability, especially Lebanon and Jordan, where new jihadist groups mushroomed. Moreover, he shows that the spread of violence at the street level is often the consequence of specific policies hatched in Washington, D.C. Rosen offers a seminal and provocative account of the surge, told from the perspective of U.S. troops on the ground, the Iraqi security forces, Shiite militias and Sunni insurgents that were both allies and adversaries. He also tells the story of what happened to these militias once they outlived their usefulness to the Americans. Aftermath is both a unique personal history and an unsparing account of what America has wrought in Iraq and the region. The result is a hair- raising, 360-degree view of the modern battlefield its consequent humanitarian catastrophe, and the reality of counterinsurgency.
Seeds of Hate by
In the aftermath of 9/11, America has been haunted by one question: why do they hate us? This book answers that question, tracing the roots of the crisis back to American's involvement in the Middle East, and in particular Lebanon. Journalist Lawrence Pintak was a correspondent for CBS in Beirut in the 1980s, where he witnessed the birth of the current'terror'. In Seeds of Hate, he explores how America's flawed policy in the Lebanon transformed Muslim perceptions of the US - from impartial peacekeeper to hated enemy of the Lebanese Muslims. Pintak explores the links between those who carried out the terror war in Lebanon and the current wave of terror, examining the role played by key figures behind the Beirut bombings. He considers how the template for shaping would-be terrorists is being replicated from Saudi Arabia to Indonesia and speaks with victims of the earlier wave of terror.
Syria's Terrorist War on Lebanon and the Peace Process by
This study demonstrates that Syria's role in the Middle East has been, since 1974, an unabated terrorist war against all attempts to resolve peacefully the Arab-Israeli conflict. Marius Deeb provides evidence that Syria's role in Lebanon, since 1975, has been to perpetuate the conflict among the various Lebanese communities in order to keep its domination of Lebanon.
A Political Economy of Lebanon, 1948-2002 by
This work assesses Lebanon's development experience during 1948-2002, a case study of laissez-faire performance over more than 50 years. The text analyzes the strong monetary crisis of the mid-1980s and the reconstruction policy that produced weak growth and high government indebtedness.
Lessons of Lebanon by
Since 1945, over 200 intrastate conflicts have taken place in countries that achieved independence from colonial rule after the second world war. The case of Lebanon offers a striking illustration of these interlocking influences on projects of national economic development. The persistently sectarian nature of the country's political institutions, the relatively poor quality of governance, and the major civil war that engulfed the country from 1975 to 1990, together define not only the context in which the achievements and failures of Lebanese development must be assessed, but also the continuing challenges that it must face in the era of globalization. This book offers an in-depth analysis of Lebanese economic development during the second half of the twentieth century with special emphasis on the civil war and its aftermath. Makdisi offers a definitive assessment of the principal phases of national development since Lebanese independence in the 1940s, and a study of those conditions requisite for sustainable development for Lebanon, as for many other developing countries.
Beirut, Lebaon