In The Brief History of the Middle East author Christopher Catherwood attempts to show how our entire world is ultimately shaped by events that have unfolded or have their origin in the Middle East. Catherwood insists that, unless we allow ignorance to blind us—which to a certain extent it already has—the Middle East must not be viewed as "some strange place over there." Three of the world's major organized religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam—all stem from the area, as do defining civilizations from Ancient Egypt to Babylonia. Catherwood examines this storied region through the lens of the present by asking these questions. How did the Palestinian issue arise? Why does Osama bin Laden harp on the glories of Moorish Spain? Why did Islamic extremism come to be a substitute for Arab socialist nationalism for so many? Today's headlines have clear historical explanations, and The Brief History of the Middle East will bring that concept into focus....

Why is religion in the center of today's deadly conflicts? Renowned historian Catherwood recounts a saga of passion & prejudice thousands of years ago that laid the foundation for todays troubled age. Why does God inspire the killing of mankind?...

As Britain’s colonial secretary in the 1920s, Winston Churchill made a mistake with calamitous consequences and unseen repercussions extending into the twenty-first century. Christopher Catherwood, scholar and adviser to Tony Blair’s government, examines Churchill’s creation of the artificial monarchy of Iraq after World War One, forcing together unfriendly peoples—Sunni Muslim Kurds and Arabs, and Shiite Muslims—under a single ruler.

Defying a global wave of nationalistic sentiment and the desire of subjugated peoples to rule themselves, Churchill put together the broken pieces of the Ottoman Empire and unwittingly created a Middle Eastern powder keg. Inducing Arabs under the thumb of the Ottoman Turks to rebel against rule from Constantinople, the British during WWI convinced the Hashemite clan that they would rule over Syria. However, Britain had already promised the territory to the French. To make amends after the Great War, Churchill created the nation called Iraq and made the Hashemite leader, Feisel, king of a land to which he had no connections. Catherwood examines Churchill’s decision, which resulted in a 1958 military coup against the Iraqi Hashemite government and a series of increasingly bloody regimes until the ultimate nightmare of Ba’athist party rule under Saddam Hussein.

Photographs and maps are included....

Christopher Catherwood takes an in-depth comparative look at the three major biblical faiths: Christianity, Islam and Judaism.

A respected authority in religious history, Catherwood objectively and accessibly explains how these three great faiths developed over time and how they have changed today. Respectfully he examines each religion's claim to truth, revealing Christianity's reasonable and meaningful relationship with the one true undivided God....

An intimate, and sure to be controversial, look at the wartime triumphs and failures of Winston Churchill.

Winston Churchill: The Flawed Genius of World War II examines the decisions and policies Churchill made in the vital months between June 1940 and December 1941. While Churchill is rightly credited with recognizing the Nazi threat early on, his myriad decisions hindered the Allied cause more than they helped it. From dispatching British troops to North Africa and Greece and establishing the Special Operations Executive, to insisting on the Mediterranean's importance to victory and ignoring George C. Marshall's plan that could have won the war in 1943, Churchill's directives not only extended the conflict, but destabilized several regions that have remained in chaos even at the dawn of the twenty-first century.

With profound insight into Churchill's early colonial experiences as well as his first tenure as First Lord of the Admiralty, Christopher Catherwood offers an honest appraisal of his strategies in a unique and fascinating perspective that separates the myth from the man....