Drawing on research on three continents, this timely book takes the reader into the heart of a crisis as France, Great Britain, the Ottoman government and the Pasha of Egypt maneuver to defend their interests in the Eastern Mediterranean. Here are the passionate debates among French and British politicians as they struggle to control the Pasha without provoking a European war. Here are the battlefields?from the Euphrates to Beirut?on which Mehemet Ali's modernizing forces created the facts that fed the crisis. Here are the Sultan's ministers at Istanbul, buffeted by the threats of European...