After the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, a stunned public asked: How could this happen? Why did the attackers do what they did? What did they hope to accomplish? This wasn't the first battle in a conflict that has included bombings of U.S. embassies and planes, the Iran hostage crisis, and kidnappings or shootings of American citizens. This unique volume sets out to answer these questions using the unfiltered words of the terrorists themselves. Over many decades, radical forces in the Middle East have changed and evolved, yet their basic outlook and anti-Western views have remained remarkably consistent. Barry Rubin and Judith Colp Rubin have assembled nearly one hundred key documents, charting the evolution of radical Middle East movements, their anti-Americanism, and Western policy response. The buildup to the battle between a world superpower and Middle East revolutionaries is brought dramatically to life. Among the documents included are the charters of such organizations as Hizballah, Hamas, and World Islamic Front; speeches by Syrian president Hafiz al-Asad and former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein; al-Qa'ida recruitment materials; and terrorist training manuals. The book also shows and analyzes the often conflicting and deeply conflicted responses to September 11 by journalists, clerics, and activists in the Arab world. Supplemented by an annotated chronology, a glossary of terms, and sections that put each selection in context, this comprehensive reference serves not only as essential historical background to the ongoing aftermath of the September 11 attacks, but more generally as an invaluable framework for understanding a long-term, continuing conflict that has caused many crises for the United States.

Middle East expert Ilan Berman offers new thinking on counterterrorism strategy and provides the new administration with ways to close the gaps in current American counterterrorism strategy. --from publisher description.

Over the last sixty years, Washington has been a major player in the politics of the Middle East. From Iran in the 1950s, to the Gulf War of 1991, to the devastation of contemporary Iraq, US policy has had a profound impact on the domestic affairs of the region. Anti-Americanism is a pervasive feature of modern Middle East public opinion. But far from being intrinsic to ‘Muslim political culture’, scepticism of the US agenda is directly linked to the regional policies pursued by Washington. By exploring critical points of regional crisis, Kylie Baxter and Shahram Akbarzadeh elaborate on the links between US policy and popular distrust of the United States. The book also examines the interconnected nature of events in this geo-strategically vital region. Accessible and easy to follow, it is designed to provide a clear and concise overview of complex historical and political material. Key features include: maps illustrating key events and areas of discontent text boxes on topics of interest related to the Arab/Israeli Wars, Iranian politics, foreign interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq, the wars of the Persian Gulf, September 11 and the rise of Islamist movements further reading lists and a selection of suggested study questions at the end of each chapter.

The political Islam debate in the United States has become on eof the most controversial in academic circles. In this book Dr Pinto depicts the two major schools of thought on political Islam that have emerged and discusses the processes whereby political islam has been identified as one of the major security threats to the new international order, bringing to light the vested interests of certain political groups within the United States in disseminating this idea.

This insightful work explores one of the under-examined eras of US foreign policy toward the Palestinian question: the Reagan years. The Reagan tenure is often perceived as one of disengagement from the region, especially in the aftermath of the bombing in Lebanon. Nicholas Laham contends that this is not so and that the Reagan administration set the tone for US policy for the next two decades. Specifically the work analyzes the nexus between domestic actors and US foreign policy toward the Arab-Israeli conflict. Employing significant archival materials, the book probes in detail the machinations which produced new policies and new policy priorities during this era. This study is provocative but the arguments are well-supported and solid, thus offering a major contribution to the literature. The work will prove a valuable reference tool on the Reagan presidency, the Palestinian conflict, the Middle East and international relations more generally in light of the 2001 terrorist attacks, the war with Iraq and the continuing ramifications of the Arab-Israeli conflict.