Myths, Illusions, and Peace: Finding a New Direction for America in the Middle East - Hardcover

Ross, Dennis; Makovsky, David

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0670020893 ISBN 13: 9780670020898

Publisher: Viking Adult, 2009

Synopsis

"A trenchant and often pugnacious demolition of the numerous misconceptions about strategic thinking on the Middle East"
-The New York Times

Now updated with a new chapter on the current climate, Myths, Illusions, and Peace addresses why the United States has consistently failed to achieve its strategic goals in the Middle East. According to Dennis Ross-special advisor to President Obama and senior director at the National Security Council for that region-and policy analyst David Makovsky, it is because we have repeatedly fallen prey to dangerous myths about this part of the world-myths with roots that reach back decades yet persist today. Clearly articulated and accessible, Myths, Illusions, and Peace captures the real­ity of the problems in the Middle East like no book has before. It presents a concise and far-reaching set of principles that will help America set an effective course of action in the region, and in so doing secure a safer future for all Americans.

About this title

About the Author:

Dennis Ross is special advisor to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton for the Gulf and Southwest Asia. He is the author of the bestselling The Missing Peace.

Analyst and former journalist David Makovsky is a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy and the author of Making Peace with the PLO.

From Publishers Weekly:

Ross (The Missing Peace) and Makovsky (Making Peace with the PLO) contend that if the U.S. wants to broker peace in the Middle East, it must cease operating from ideological assumptions and œsee the world as it is. Ross, now an adviser to Hillary Clinton, was chief negotiator for the Clinton administration, and Makovsky is with the Washington Institute for Near East Policy; their call comes with real bona fides. œContext matters, they write—but they, too, fail to consider the entire context in question: Israel is all but denied agency, as the authors fail to address the impact of its occupation of Palestinian lands. What may be the crux of the book is found in a mention of This Much Too Promised Land by Ross's former deputy, Aaron David Miller, which examines American negotiating mistakes, including the efforts of his and Ross's team. Ross and Makovsky's open antagonism to Miller suggest they may be less interested in learning from errors than in explaining why everyone else is wrong. (June)
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About this edition

• Publisher: Viking Adult
• Publication date: 2009
• ISBN 10: 0670020893
• ISBN 13: 9780670020898
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 368