The "evil" Arab has become a stock character in American popular films, playing the villain opposite American "good guys" who fight for "the American way." It's not surprising that this stereotype has entered American popular culture, given the real-world conflicts between the United States and Middle Eastern countries, particularly since the oil embargo of the 1970s and continuing through the Iranian hostage crisis, the first and second Gulf Wars, and the ongoing struggle against al-Qaeda. But when one compares the "evil" Arab of popular culture to real Arab people, the stereotype falls apart. In this thought-provoking book, Tim Jon Semmerling further dismantles the "evil" Arab stereotype by showing how American cultural fears, which stem from challenges to our national ideologies and myths, have driven us to create the "evil" Arab Other.
Semmerling bases his argument on close readings of six films (The Exorcist, Rollover, Black Sunday, Three Kings, Rules of Engagement, and South Park: Bigger, Longer & Uncut), as well as CNN's 9/11 documentary America Remembers. Looking at their narrative structures and visual tropes, he analyzes how the films portray Arabs as threatening to subvert American "truths" and mythic tales—and how the insecurity this engenders causes Americans to project evil character and intentions on Arab peoples, landscapes, and cultures. Semmerling also demonstrates how the "evil" Arab narrative has even crept into the documentary coverage of 9/11. Overall, Semmerling's probing analysis of America's Orientalist fears exposes how the "evil" Arab of American popular film is actually an illusion that reveals more about Americans than Arabs.

 Did you know that Gaddafi has his own herd of camel to supply milk wherever he goes? Or that Kim Jong-Il flies in chefs from Japan to cook live fish?
Terrifyingly delicious recipes from the ‘Axis of Evil’ and ‘the ‘Axis of Somewhat Evil’
Including dictators’ favourite dishes, fascinating facts, colour illustrations

When they’re not actively attempting to develop weapons of mass destruction, ‘Axis of Evil’ countries such as Iraq, Iran and North Korea are busy enjoying their region’s finest dishes. And their ‘Axis of Somewhat Evil’ cohorts, such as Cuba and Syria, are at it too.

With over one hundred recipes, from soups and salads to meat dishes and desserts, this unique cookbook includes snapshots of each country as well as profiles of famous leaders. Regional recipes appear alongside dictators’ favourite dishes – from Kim Jong-Il’s ruthless appetite for shark fin soup to Saddam’s celebrated rack of fresh roasted gazelle.

Full of cultural anecdotes, political insight (eg. there’ve been around 637 assassination attempts on Castro, including bombs disguised as underwater molluscs) and delectable recipes (dog stew, for example, and its vegetarian quorn substitute), The Axis of Evil Cookbook is an intriguing and forbidden treat.

Palestine Peace Not Apartheid (Hardcover)
by Jimmy Carter

Following his #1 New York Times bestseller, Our Endangered Values, the former president, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, offers an assessment of what must be done to bring permanent peace to Israel with dignity and justice to Palestine.

President Carter, who was able to negotiate peace between Israel and Egypt, has remained deeply involved in Middle East affairs since leaving the White House. He has stayed in touch with the major players from all sides in the conflict and has made numerous trips to the Holy Land, most recently as an observer in the Palestinian elections of 2005 and 2006.

In this book President Carter shares his intimate knowledge of the history of the Middle East and his personal experiences with the principal actors, and he addresses sensitive political issues many American officials avoid. Pulling no punches, Carter prescribes steps that must be taken for the two states to share the Holy Land without a system of apartheid or the constant fear of terrorism.

The general parameters of a long-term, two-state agreement are well known, the president writes. There will be no substantive and permanent peace for any peoples in this troubled region as long as Israel is violating key U.N. resolutions, official American policy, and the international "road map" for peace by occupying Arab lands and oppressing the Palestinians. Except for mutually agreeable negotiated modifications, Israel's official pre-1967 borders must be honored. As were all previous administrations since
the founding of Israel, U.S. government leaders must be in the forefront of achieving this long-delayed goal of a just agreement that both sides can honor.

Palestine Peace Not Apartheid is a challenging, provocative, and courageous book.

The Second Palestinian Intifada: A Chronicle of a People's Struggle
by Ramzy Baroud  

 'Masterful prose. ... (A) scathing but heartfelt portrait.' Norman G. Finkelstein

'Few are spared his perceptive eye, and only the morally callous will fail to respond to his pleas to act to remedy the injustice that he exposes to our view, as we surely can.' Noam Chomsky, Professor of linguistics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology '[Baroud] presents a compelling narrative of Palestinian victimization without being defensive, and with no attempt at disguising internal shortcomings. In the same way, Baroud exposes Israeli culpability and international abrogation of responsibility with candor and uncompromising integrity.' Dr. Hanan Ashrawi, Palestinian Legislator for the Jerusalem District

'[Baroud] enables readers to see through the distorted image provided by a biased pro-Israeli Western media of the Middle East as a whole, and of Palestine in particular.' Ilan Pappe Ramzy Baroud is a veteran journalist and former producer for Al-Jazeera TV. This is his comprehensive account of the momentous events of the last five years which shaped the political landscape not only of Palestine and Israel but of the entire Middle East region. Addressing the most controversial issues, including the alarming escalation in suicide bombings, and the construction of the
Separation Wall, he reports on the huge rate of unemployment and hunger in the Occupied Territories -- statistics so critical that NGOs compare their magnitude to African nations such as the Congo. From the brutality of the Israeli army to the ever-compromising nature of the Palestinian Authority, few are spared Baroud's thoughtful critique. The book is clear and concise, with one chapter dedicated to the major events of each year, and includes a comprehensive timeline.

The Road Map to Nowhere: Israel/Palestine Since 2003
by Tanya Reinhart

DAn urgent and searing exposé of the "peace process" by a prominent Israeli thinker.

The Road Map to Nowhere is a devastating and timely book, essential to understanding the current state of the Israel/Palestine crisis and the propaganda that infects its coverage. Based on analysis of information in the mainstream Israeli media, it argues that the current road map has brought no real progress and that, under cover of diplomatic successes, Israel is using the road map to strengthen its grip on the remaining occupied territories.

Exploring the Gaza pullout of 2005, the West Bank wall and the collapse of Israeli democracy, Reinhart examines the gap between myth—the Israeli leadership's public affairs achievement that has led the West to believe that a road map is in fact being implemented—and bitter reality. Not only has nothing fundamentally changed, she argues, but the Palestinians continue to lose more of their land and are pushed into smaller and smaller enclaves, surrounded by the new wall constructed by Sharon.

About the Author Tanya Reinhart is a professor of linguistics and cultural studies at Tel Aviv University and at the University of Utrecht. She has had a regular column in the biggest Israeli daily, Yediot Aharonot, and is the author of Israel/Palestine: How to End the War of 1948..

The Power of Israel in the United States by James Petras

This book is a chapter-by-chapter analysis and documentation of the power of Israel via the Israeli, Jewish or Pro-Zionist Lobby on US Middle East policy. It raises serious questions as to the primary beneficiary of US policy, and its destructive results for the United States. The extraordinary extent of US political, economic, military and diplomatic support for the state of Israel is explored, along with the means whereby such support is generated and consolidated. Contending that Zionist power in America ensured unconditional US backing for Israeli colonization of Palestine and its massive uprooting of Palestinians, it views the interests of Israel rather than those of Big Oil as the primary cause of the disastrous US wars against Iraq and threats of war against Iran and Syria. It demonstrates and condemns US imitation of Israeli practice as it relates to conduct of the war on terrorism and torture. It sheds light on the AIPAC spying scandal and other Israeli espionage against America; the fraudulent and complicit role of America’s academic “terrorist experts” in furthering criminal government policies, and the orchestration of the Danish cartoons to foment antipathy between Muslims and the West. It questions the inability in America to sustain or even formulate a discourse related to the subject of Israeli influence on the United States. It calls for a review of American Mid East policy with a view to reclaiming US independence of action based upon enlightened self-interest and progressive principles.This book is the first and only book so far which tackled the aftermath of 9/11 and how it impacted the lives of millions of people in the US negatively. It tells the untold story to the average reader about the plight of millions of people in the US and even in the West who have been suffering silently after 9/11. The book is an attempt to educate the nation on these issues, as an effort to heal and reconcile our communities. More than eight hundred of the victims of the terrorist attacks on 9/11 happened to be Arab and Muslim Americans. Arab, Muslim and Mid Eastern communities in the United States have been the collateral damage of 9/11.

Arab Voices Speak to American Hearts
By Samar Dahmash-jarrah

Howard Zinn Wrote:
"It is an important book, because Americans do not really know what people in the Middle East are thinking, and these voices are heartfelt and cannot fail to move any reader. I hope the book gets wide distribution."

Paul Findley, Member of Congress from Illinois for 22 Years, and author of Silent No More confronting America's false images of Islam And They Dare To Speak Out People and Institutions Confront Israel's Lobby, Wrote: "This book should stimulate a powerful movement down the road to a just peace.

It is a must read, especially for the Americans who have no Arab ancestry. Through fascinating personal interviews with Arabs in private life in the Middle East, this book identifies shocking made-in-America Ground Zero that Arabs resent deeply. In remarkable candor, the interviews explain the critical steps the U.S. government must take before America will once again be revered throughout the region.

The Great War for Civilisation
The Conquest of the Middle East
Robert Fisk

U'One of the outstanding reporters of his generation.
As a war correspondent he is unrivalled'.
Financial Times

Rarely have first-hand reporting and history been so powerfully combined as they are in Robert Fisk's epic story of tragedy and betrayal in the Middle East. As his narrative of bloodshed and cruelty unfolds in Iraq, Afghanistan, Algeria, Iran, Palestine and other battlefields, the carnage of 11 September 2001 and the overthrow of Saddam Hussein's brutal regime take on a new and frightening meaning.

Fisk, who has met Osama bin Laden three times, has been on the battlefront of the Middle East's conflicts for 28 years, and his devastating accounts of human suffering are now read around the world. In the tradition of all foreign correspondents, his eyewitness testimony of the horrors of modern warfare - like that of the great reporters of World War II - is laced with
both suspicion and anger.

This is no chronology of Middle East history but, rather, a passionate outcry against the lies and deceit that have sent soldiers to their deaths and killed tens of thousands of men and women - Arab, Christian and Jew -
over the past century. It is also a chronicle of journalists at war, of the rage, humour and frustration of the correspondents who spend their lives reporting the first draft of history, of their occasional courage - and,
sometimes, their deaths. It is also a deeply personal memoir which moves from Fisk's own presence on the front line in the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s to the experience of his father, 2nd Lt Bill Fisk, in the trenches of the Somme in 1918. In the months that followed World War I, the victors drew the borders of Northern Ireland, Yugoslavia and much of the Middle East; Robert Fisk has spent his entire career watching people within these borders die.

The Great War for Civilisation - the legend on the back of Fisk's father's 1914-1918 campaign medal - is a masterpiece of adventure and tragedy, softened with both humour and compassion. It is the story of the violent world that is shaping our lives - and our future.

Understanding Arabs A Guide for Modern Times (Paperback)
by Margaret K. Nydell

Understanding Arabs is a handbook, intended to be read easily and quickly, by people who are not specialists. Written by highly-esteemed Arabist and academic Margaret Nydell, Understanding Arabs will bring about understanding about modern-day Arabs for foreigners—especially Westerners in America and Europe—without pushing a political agenda.

Updated to reflect the complex events that are playing out on the world stage, new chapters include: Islamic Fundamentalism—This political and social issue is not a part of the mainstream Islamic religion. The efforts to follow and understand evolving Islamic social/religious thought have been completely overwhelmed by the notorious emergence of fundamentalism.

Anti-Americanism—It needs to be made clear that Middle Eastern Muslims and Arabs do not “hate” America. Nor do they hate American people. But they are very angry at America’s government and a perceived unfairness with the American foreign policy. Between 1980 and 2001, the United States engaged in fifteen direct military operations in the Middle East, all of them directed at Muslims.

There were an equal number of non-military actions such as imposing punitive embargoes, threats through military build-up, policies in support of some regional states against others, support of selected opposition groups, and providing weapons (sometimes secretly). What matters here is not the diplomatic issue of who we supported or why, the result has been that these actions are seen by local people as American interference in their region, and resentment has continued to build.

Sharon and My Mother-in-Law
By Suad Amiry

Translated in more than a dozen languages, and just published in the United States and Great Britain, Sharon and My Mother-in-Law is already a bestseller in France. In August, Dr. Amiry was awarded the Viareggio Literature Prize for International Writing in Italy.

Irreverent, darkly funny, unexpected, and very unlike any other writing on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, Sharon and My Mother-in-Law describes Palestinian architect Suad Amiry's experience of living in the Occupied Territories. Based on diaries and e-mail correspondence that Amiry kept to maintain her sanity from 1981 to 2004, the book evokes, through a series of vignettes, the frustrations, cabin fever, and downright misery of daily life in the West Bank town of Ramallah, with its curfews, roadblocks, house-to-house searches, and violence.
 

Beyond Chutzpah : On the Misuse of Anti-Semitism and the Abuse of History
by Norman G. Finkelstein (Hardcover)

In this long-awaited sequel to his international bestseller The Holocaust Industry, Norman G. Finkelstein moves from an iconoclastic interrogation of the new anti-Semitism to a meticulously researched expose of the corruption of scholarship on the Israel-Palestine conflict.
Bringing to bear the latest findings on the conflict and recasting the scholarly debate, Finkelstein points to a consensus among historians and human rights organizations on the factual record. Why, then, does so much controversy swirl around the conflict? Finkelstein's answer, copiously documented, is that apologists for Israel contrive controversy. Whenever Israel comes under international pressure, another media campaign alleging a global outbreak of anti-Semitism is mounted.
Finkelstein also scrutinizes the proliferation of distortion masquerading as history. Recalling Joan Peters' book From Time Immemorial, published to great fanfare in 1984 but subsequently exposed as an academic hoax, he asks deeply troubling questions here about the periodic reappearance of spurious scholarship and the uncritical acclaim it receives. The most recent addition to this mendacious genre, Finkelstein argues, is Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz's bestseller, The Case for Israel.
The core analysis of Beyond Chutzpah sets Dershowitz's assertions on Israel's human rights record against the findings of the mainstream human rights community. Sifting through thousands of pages of reports from organizations such as Amnesty International, B'Tselem, and Human Rights Watch, Finkelstein demonstrates that Dershowitz has systematically misrepresented the facts.
Thoroughly researched and tightly argued, Beyond Chutzpah lifts the veil of contrived controversy shrouding the Israel-Palestine conflict, enabling readers in search of a just and lasting peace to act on the basis of truth.

The Question of Zion (Hardcover)
by Jacqueline Rose

Zionism was inspired as a movement-one driven by the search for a homeland for the stateless and persecuted Jewish people. Yet it trampled the rights of the Arabs in Palestine. Today it has become so controversial that it defies understanding and trumps reasoned public debate. So argues prominent British writer Jacqueline Rose, who uses her political and psychoanalytic skills in this book to take an unprecedented look at Zionism-one of the most powerful ideologies of modern times.

Rose enters the inner world of the movement and asks a new set of questions. How did Zionism take shape as an identity? And why does it seem so immutable? Analyzing the messianic fervor of Zionism, she argues that it colors Israel's most profound self-image to this day. Rose also explores the message of dissidents, who, while believing themselves the true Zionists, warned at the outset against the dangers of statehood for the Jewish people. She suggests that these dissidents were prescient in their recognition of the legitimate claims of the Palestinian Arabs. In fact, she writes, their thinking holds the knowledge the Jewish state needs today in order to transform itself.

In perhaps the most provocative part of her analysis, Rose proposes that the link between the Holocaust and the founding of the Jewish state, so often used to justify Israel's policies, needs to be rethought in terms of the shame felt by the first leaders of the nation toward their own European history.

Sharing the Land of Canaan: Human Rights and the Israeli-Palestinian Struggle   
by Mazin B. Qumsiyeh (Paperback ) $16.07 click on title to buy

There is no more compelling and dramatic unfolding story, with more profound international ramifications, than the conflict in the Middle East. 
Sharing the Land of Canaan is a critical examination of the core issues of the conflict that dares to put forward a radical but logical solution: that a shared state is the best way to achieve justice and peace for Israelis and Palestinians. 
Mazin B. Qumsiyeh, a human rights activist based at Yale University, offers an overview of the issues at stake, and outlines his vision for a lasting peace based on upholding the principles of human rights for all. Tackling taboo subjects, myths and obstacles, he argues convincingly that apartheid in the form of a two-state solution is no longer a feasible way to achieve enduring peace. 
At this critical t ime, when the 'road map' to peace looks more uncertain than ever, this book provides a refreshing counterpoint to the failed strategies of the past. It is a direct and accessible account of the history - and mythology - of the fabled 'Land of Canaan', which lays out hopeful ideas for the future of this truly multiethnic and multicultural region.

The Intelligence Files: Today's Secrets, Tomorrow's Scandals
by Olivier Schmidt Price: $10.17 Click on title to buy

This collection of the decade's "best-of" from the online journal, Intelligence, offers a shocking glimpse into the frequently illicit and routinely immoral undertakings of states, whose harm to individuals, groups and countries is seldom recognized or understood by the public at large.

Fifteen thoroughly researched and documented chapters probe the clandestine workings of the world's intelligence services . . . from the CIA and the FBI in the US, MI5 and MI6 in Britain, the DGSE and DST in France, the Sûreté d'Etat in Belgium, all the way to the DINA in Chile and its ties with both the CIA and with the international "Black Orchestra" and its neo-Fascist assassins in Italy and Portugal.