By looking at the political, military and intelligence components of the Yom Kippur War - and making use of unpublished materials, including recently declassified portions of the Agranat Commission that inquired into the intelligence failure - this work offers interpretations of Israel's conflict with the Arabs. The contributors, Israeli academics, some of them involved in the war, make a contribution to the understanding of this chapter in Israel's history.

Rethinking the Middle East runs counter to the received wisdom in modern Middle East studies. This discipline has been dominated by what may be termed a culture of victimization; it views the local populations of the Middle East Arabs in particular as the hapless victims of alien encroachment, and blames the region's endemic malaise on Western political and cultural imperialism. The author contends that the influence of the Great Powers has not been the primary force behind the region's political development, nor the main cause of its famous volatility. He argues that the main impetus has...

This volume provides a wide ranging historical survey of the special relationship between the Zionist movement and Israel with the Hashemite family and its far-reaching implications for Middle Eastern affairs in general, and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in particular. It includes chapters on Transjordan and the Yishuv, and the history of covert relations between Jordan and Israel.

The Iran-Iraq War, which ended in August 1988, one month short of its eighth anniversary, was one of the longest, bloodiest and costliest Third World armed conflicts in the twentieth century. Professor Karsh addresses the causes of the Iran-Iraq War, unpacking the objectives of the two belligerents and examining how far objectives were matched by strategy. He assesses the war's military lessons regarding such key areas as strategy, tactics and escalation and in particular the use of non-conventional weapons, Finally, he examines the utility of armed force as an instrument of foreign policy.

This Chatham House Paper examines the nature of Soviet relations with Syria, assessing the commitments made and the gains reaped by Moscow and Damascus in the economic, military and political spheres. After discussing Soviet interests in the region in general and with regard to Syria in particular, the author traces the evolution of the relationship between Moscow and its major Middle Eastern ally since Asad came to power in 1970.

While the study argues that huge Soviet military aid has intensified the pro-Soviet alignment of Syrian policy, it contends that Asad's perception of his...

This book draws on the research of some of the leading scholars in the fields of Jewish-Islamic relations, the Israeli-Arab conflict and political Islam. These highly topical essays examine the relationship between Israel and the Islamic world from both a thematic and geo-strategic perspective.

Divided into two distinct sections, the first section of the book deals with issues relating to contemporary Jewish-Muslim relations and, in particular, looks at the attitude towards the Jewish state amongst opinion-makers, religious institutions and leaders in the Muslim world. Key issues...

This book is a wide-ranging and innovative study of Israeli-Lebanese relations from the birth of the Jewish state in 1948 to the Israel-Lebanon War of 2006. Israel's relationship with its Arab neighbours is a subject of perennial interest in the Middle East. The relationship between Israel and Lebanon has taken numerous forms since the establishment of the Jewish state in 1948 and the chapters in this timely and important volume provide a comprehensive, detailed and informative analysis of the evolving ties between the two countries up to the present day. The contributors are drawn from...

This Chatham House Paper examines the nature of Soviet relations with Syria, assessing the commitments made and the gains reaped by Moscow and Damascus in the economic, military and political spheres. After discussing Soviet interests in the region in general and with regard to Syria in particular, the author traces the evolution of the relationship between Moscow and its major Middle Eastern ally since Asad came to power in 1970.

While the study argues that huge Soviet military aid has intensified the pro-Soviet alignment of Syrian policy, it contends that Asad's perception of his...

An examination of the nature of Soviet policy towards Syria during the last two decades, which seeks to assess Moscow's objectives and the means of achieving those objectives. The study argues that the overriding concern of Soviet policy is preservation of regional stability.