Mideast Realignment

Great Decisions 2024 | Topic 1

The United States and Middle East are at a crossroads. In spite of a reduced presence in the Middle East, the U.S. still has significant national interests there and the area is a key arena for global power politics. Can the U.S. continue to defend its interests in the Middle East and globally with a lower level of military and political involvement, or should it recommit to a leading role in the region?

Carnegie Endowment for International Peace : Middle East Program

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace provides up-to-date information about various countries within the Middle East and policy decisions affecting these countries.
Brookings
Middle East Institute

This website provides information about the history and demographics of the area, as well as analysis and editorial pieces.
Washington Institute for Near East Policy

Scholarly approach to American policies related to those countries in the Middle East.

Power, Faith, and Fantasy: America in the Middle East: 1776 to the Present

Power, Faith, and Fantasytells the remarkable story of America's 230-year relationship with the Middle East.
Peace to End All Peace

In A Peace to End All Peace, David Fromkin reveals how and why the Allies drew lines on an empty map that remade the geography and politics of the Middle East.
40 maps that explain the Middle East

Maps can be a powerful tool for understanding the world, particularly the Middle East, a place in many ways shaped by changing political borders and demographics. Here are 40 maps crucial for understanding the Middle East — its history, its present, and some of the most important stories in the region today.
Documentary: The 50 Years War Israel and the Arabs
Six Days of War: June 1967 and the Making of the Modern Middle East

Though it lasted for only six tense days in June, the 1967 Arab-Israeli war never really ended. Every crisis that has ripped through this region in the ensuing decades, from the Yom Kippur War of 1973 to the ongoing intifada, is a direct consequence of those six days of fighting.
Master of the Game: Henry Kissinger and the Art of Middle East Diplomacy

A perceptive and provocative history of Henry Kissinger's diplomatic negotiations in the Middle East that illuminates the unique challenges and barriers Kissinger and his successors have faced in their attempts to broker peace between Israel and its Arab neighbors.

Great Decisions 2024 cover image.