Lebanon by
Lebanonnbsp;examines the ideological, political and social underpinnings of the attempted coup against General Chihab's government in Lebanon in 1961. The author analyzes the role of the Syrian Socialist Nationalist Party, the history of the army in Lebanon and it role in Lebanese politics and the impact of the coup on Lebanese political life. This book providesnbsp;an extraordinarynbsp;insight into the mechanisms of military coups in the Arab world and will be of interest to students and researchers of the history and politics of the Middle East.
Reconstructing Beirut by
Once the cosmopolitan center of the Middle East, Beirut was devastated by the civil war that ran from 1975 to 1991, which dislocated many residents, disrupted normal municipal functions, and destroyed the vibrant downtown district. The aftermath of the war was an unstable situation Sawalha considers "a postwar state of emergency," even as the state strove to restore normalcy. This ethnography centers on various groups' responses to Beirut's large, privatized urban-renewal project that unfolded during this turbulent moment. At the core of the study is the theme of remembering space. The official process of rebuilding the city as a node in the global economy collided with local day-to-day concerns, and all arguments invariably inspired narratives of what happened before and during the war. Sawalha explains how Beirutis invoked their past experiences of specific sites to vie for the power to shape those sites in the future. Rather than focus on a single site, the ethnography crosses multiple urban sites and social groups, to survey varied groups with interests in particular spaces. The book contextualizes these spatial conflicts within the discourses of the city's historical accounts and the much-debated concept of heritage, voiced in academic writing, politics, and journalism. In the afterword, Sawalha links these conflicts to the social and political crises of early twenty-first-century Beirut.
Power Sharing in Lebanon by
This book studies the origins and evolution of power sharing in Lebanon. The author has established a relationship between mobilization, ethnurgy (ethnic identification), memory and trauma, and how they impact power sharing provisions. The book starts with the events in the 1820s, when communities began to politicize their identities, and which led to the first major outbreak of civil violence between the Druze and the Maronites. Consequently, these troubled four decades in Lebanon led to the introduction of various forms of power-sharing arrangements to establish peace. The political systems introduced in Lebanon are: the Kaim-Makamiya (dual sub-governorship), a quasi-federal arrangement; the Mutassarifiya, the prototype of a power-sharing system; the post-independence political system of Lebanon which the book refers to as semi-consociation, due to the concentration of executive powers in the Presidential office; and finally, the full consociation of the Taif Republic. In each of these phases, there was a peculiar interaction between the non-structural elements that had a direct impact on power shÅ this led at times to instability, and at other times it brought down the system, as in 1840-1860 and 1975. Power Sharing in Lebanon is the first academic work that emphasizes the influence of the non-structural elements that hinder power sharing. This volume is now a key resource for students and academics interested in Lebanese Politics and the Middle East.
Lebanon by
In a time of great political change and unrest in the Middle East, this highly topical text offers a succinct account of the contemporary political environment in Lebanon. Tom Najem provides both a developed understanding of the pre-civil war system and an analysis of how circumstances resulting from the civil war combined with essential pre-war elements to define politics in Lebanon. Systematically exploring Lebanon's history, society and politics, the author stresses the importance of the crucial role of external actors in the Lebanese system. The analysis encompasses: the formation of the state weaknesses and dynamics of the Lebanese state the civil war post-war government and change the Lebanese economy foreign policy. Written in a clear and accessible manner, this book fills a conspicuous gap in the existing academic literature on Lebanon. It will be of interest not only to students of international politics and Middle East studies, but also to anyone travelling in or wanting to learn more about the region.
Lebanon by
For most Americans, the civil war in Beirut is their sole point of connection with Lebanon. But Lebanon, a crossroads of major religious communities, has held a central place in the geopolitical significance of the eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East for many centuries. In this book,William Harris synthesizes the history of Mount Lebanon and the surrounding areas within the modern Lebanese state - from the Islamic conquest of the Levant to modern times.Harris relates the communities that characterize Mount Lebanon and its vicinity, while interpreting the evolution of modern Lebanon in its multi-communal context. He traces the consolidation of Lebanon's Christian, Muslim, and Islamic derived sects from their origins between the sixth and eleventhcenturies. 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 the Druze lord Fakhr al-Din Ma'nachieved domination of the mountain under the Ottomans in the early seventeenth century. The book offers a fresh perspective on subsequent trends, knitting together the interplay of the elite under the Sunni Muslim Shihab relatives of the Ma'ns after 1700 with demographic instability as Maronitesovertook 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 entrench 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 MaroniteChristians 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 andthe country fell apart.The book contends that Lebanon has not found a new equilibrium and has not transcended its sects. 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.
Civil-Military Relations in Lebanon by 
Encyclopedia of the Arab-Israeli Conflict by
This exhaustive work offers readers at multiple levels key insights into the military, political, social, cultural, and religious origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict. The Encyclopedia of the Arab-Israeli Conflict: A Political, Social, and Military History is the first comprehensive general reference encompassing all aspects of the contentious Arab-Israeli relationship from biblical times to the present, with an emphasis on the era beginning with World War I. The Encyclopedia of the Arab-Israeli Conflict goes beyond simply recapping military engagements. In four volumes, with more than 750 alphabetically organized entries, plus a separate documents volume, it provides a wide-ranging introduction to the distinct yet inextricably linked Arab and Israeli worlds and worldviews, exploring all aspects of the conflict. The objective analysis will help readers understand the dramatic events that have impacted the entire world, from the founding of modern Israel to the building of the Suez Canal; from the Six-Day War to the Camp David Accords; from the assassinations of Anwar Sadat and Yitzhak Rabin to the rise and fall of Yasser Arafat, the 2006 Palestinian elections, and the Israeli-Hezbollah War in Lebanon. With more than 750 alphabetically organized entries covering everything from important people, places, and events to a wide range of social and cultural topics--each entry featuring cross references and suggestions for further reading A separate documents volume offering an unprecedented collection of more than 150 essential primary sources Over 500 images, including maps, photographs, and illustrations A comprehensive introductory overview by retired general Anthony Zinni
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