The Arabs: A History

Eugene Rogan begins not with the rise of Islam but in 1516, when the Ottoman sultan Selim defeated the Mamluks and brought the Arab lands under Turkish rule — a choice that frames Arab history as a modern story of engagement with empire rather than an eternal one. Across five centuries he follows the Arab world through Ottoman reform and decline, European colonial partition, the independence struggles of the twentieth century, the Arab–Israeli conflict, the oil era, and the Islamist resurgence, drawing throughout on Arabic sources — chronicles, memoirs, letters, and newspapers — that put Arab actors at the center of their own history. Palestine runs through the book as a central thread, from the Balfour Declaration and the 1948 war to the intifadas and the failed peace process. Later revised editions extend the narrative through the Iraq War and the Arab Spring. Widely acclaimed on publication, it remains the standard one-volume history of the modern Arab world.

About the author

Eugene Rogan is Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History at the University of Oxford and a Fellow of St Antony’s College, where he directed the Middle East Centre. He is also the author of The Fall of the Ottomans and The Damascus Events.

Details

• Published by Basic Books, New York, 2009
• Revised editions update the narrative through the Arab Spring
• ISBN 9780465071005