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Category Archives: Books
Review of Sohrab Ahmari’s “Arab Spring Dreams: Freedom and Justice from North Africa to Iran”
Preparing for my preliminary exams required a year of reading. After completing the exams on April 18, I pledged to continue tackling books at a steady pace. One book I recently read, Arab Spring Dreams: Freedom and Justice from North … Continue reading
Posted in Arab Spring, Books
6 Comments
Khalidi’s “Palestinian Identity”
I just finished reading Columbia University professor Rashid Khalidi’s seminal book Palestinian Identity: The Construction of Modern National Consciousness (Columbia Univ. Press, 1997) and I thought I’d share a paragraph that I found very concise: “Ironically, it is Israel, the … Continue reading
Charles Kurzman “The Unthinkable Revolution in Iran”
I just finished reading Charles Kurzman’s The Unthinkable Revolution in Iran. It is much like Stephen Kinzer’s All the Shah’s Men in that the entire book focuses on the unfolding of a major historical event. Kurzman’s book is devoted to … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Iranian Revolution
5 Comments
Vali Nasr on the Colbert Report
The good thing about going to school in the New England area is that in addition to our home school’s schedule of classes, we’re also allowed to take classes at Tufts University and MIT, both of which are very close … Continue reading
Posted in Books
2 Comments
Imam Musa as-Sadr on Shariati
In his eulogy to Dr. Ali Shariati, Imam Musa as-Sadr said: Men living through difficult times which fail to meet their aspirations split off into four categories. There are those who submit, become ‘pillars of society,’ become like the large … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Iran, Islamism, Shariati
16 Comments
Annapolis
So rejectionists like Benyamin Netanyahu and his right wing cheerleading bloggers have decided that the new conference is just another forum where Israel will offer one-sided concessions only to have them rejected by the warmongering Palestinians; that Israel offered the … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Palestine, The Conflict
9 Comments
Excerpt
A personal account from Sara Roy’s Failing Peace: Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict: “One story that my aunt Frania has always insisted on telling me took place when she and my mother were in the Auschowitz concentration camp: ‘Where I … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Palestine
11 Comments
Recent Read…
I’ve been reading relevant chapters of Sara Roy’s Failing Peace: Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict and I’m convinced it’s one of the best books out there on the conflict. Dr. Roy is a Jew herself whose parents are Holocaust survivors … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Palestine, The Conflict
4 Comments
Recent read…
I recently finished reading a solid book by NYU’s Zachary Lockman titled Contending Visions of the Middle East: The History and Politics of Orientalism and I wanted to share a couple excerpts with you: “… the ancient Greeks did of … Continue reading
Posted in Books
12 Comments
Recent reads…
I just got done reading Juan Cole’s Napoleon’s Egypt: Invading the Middle East, and I thought it was very interesting that Napoleon invaded Egypt under the premise that he was going to liberate Egypt from the tyranny of the Ottoman … Continue reading
Posted in Books, Islamism, Palestine, The Conflict
1 Comment