In 1991, Gabriele Basilico and Fouad Elkoury were part of a group of six international photographers on a mission to Beirut city center at the end of the Lebanon war. Thanks to these pictures Beirut was put on the international photography map. In 2008, Elkoury proposed a new mission. With Beirut experiencing a unique period of change, it was essential to document its urban development by producing a photographic archive of quality and integrity, revealing the mission of Beirut itself as "one of the world's most complex, legendary, ever-vibrant, ever-troubled cities." Four photographers were selected to compile Beirut Mission, according to complementarities between their approaches and experiences. Fouad Elkoury and Klavdij Sluban were invited in 2009 and again in 2010, Robert Polidori in 2010, and Gabriele Basilico in 2011.

Lebanon and Libya have undergone critical political events in recent years. However, demands for reform from civic institutions during these transitions have not led to concrete political decisions. Civil Society and Political Reform in Lebanon and Libya reveals the deeply-entrenched historical patterns and elements of continuity that have led to path dependent outcomes in the political transitions of both countries. Motivated by personal experiences as an activist in Lebanon, the author draws together a wide range of data from participant observations, nation-wide surveys, interviews and focus groups in a careful analysis of these two civil society-led reform campaigns. The study demonstrates how the combination of weak states and power-sharing agreements marginalizes civic organisations and poses institutional constraints on the likelihood of reform. Written by an active participant in the political events discussed, this book offers new insight into two countries which present comparable and informative case studies. As such, it is a valuable resource for students, scholars and policymakers interested in civil society, politics and reform in the Middle East and North Africa.

For almost two decades of its history (1975-90), Lebanon was besieged by sectarian fighting, foreign invasions, and complicated proxy wars. In Posthumous Images, Chad Elias analyzes a generation of contemporary artists who have sought, in different ways, to interrogate the contested memory of those years of civil strife and political upheaval. In their films, photography, architectural projects, and multimedia performances, these artists appropriate existing images to challenge divisive and violent political discourses. They also create new images that make visible individuals and communities that have been effectively silenced, rendered invisible, or denied political representation. As Elias demonstrates, these practices serve to productively unsettle the distinctions between past and present, the dead and the living, official history and popular memory. In Lebanon, the field of contemporary art is shown to be critical to remembering the past and reimagining the future in a nation haunted by a violent and unresolved war.

Syria has been a major crossroads of civilizations in the ancient Near East since the dawn of human kind. This volume brings together scholars involved in archaeological activities in Syria and focusses on the scientific aspects of each explored site, allowing researchers to examine in detail each heritage site, its characteristics and identity.

Intimate, unbiased portraits of teenage girls in their bedrooms, investigating notions of identity and the move from child to adult.

The first history of indigenous photography in the Middle East The birth of photography coincided with the expansion of European imperialism in the Middle East, and some of the medium's earliest images are Orientalist pictures taken by Europeans in such places as Cairo and Jerusalem—photographs that have long shaped and distorted the Western visual imagination of the region. But the Middle East had many of its own photographers, collectors, and patrons. In this book, Stephen Sheehi presents a groundbreaking new account of early photography in the Arab world. The Arab Imago concentrates primarily on studio portraits by Arab and Armenian photographers in the late Ottoman Empire. Examining previously known studios such as Abdullah Frères, Pascal Sébah, Garabed Krikorian, and Khalil Raad, the book also provides the first account of other pioneers such as Georges and Louis Saboungi, the Kova Brothers, Muhammad Sadiq Bey, and Ibrahim Rif'at Pasha—as well as the first detailed look at early photographs of the annual pilgrimage to Mecca. In addition, the book explores indigenous photography manuals and albums, newspapers, scientific journals, and fiction. Featuring extensive previously unpublished images, The Arab Imago shows how native photography played an essential role in the creation of modern Arab societies in Egypt, Palestine, Syria, and Lebanon before the First World War. At the same time, the book overturns Eurocentric and Orientalist understandings of indigenous photography and challenges previous histories of the medium.

Beirut had been a renowned resort and a center of culture and style for hundreds of years, when, in the late twentieth century, it became the site of terrible violence and trauma. More than 15 years after the official end of Lebanon's civil war in 1990, political instability, bombings and assassinations still dominate the international headlines, obscuring years of swift change. In that time, Beirut became fertile ground for radical and innovative art-making and critical thought. "Out of Beirut" introduces new and recent work by artists who have been at the forefront of that activity, and who, in this new time of turmoil and change, will be watching Beirut's fate closely, chronicling it, and perhaps by their responses, changing it. With work by Fadi Abdallah, Gilbert Hage, Heartland, Bernard Khoury, Rabib Mroue, Walid Raad, Walid Sadek, Jalal Toufic, Paola Yacoub and Michel Lasserre and Akram Zaatari, among others.