CENTCOM Cultural Awareness Knowledge Center

In this long-awaited work, Samir Khalaf analyzes the history of civil strife and political violence in Lebanon and reveals the inherent contradictions that have plagued that country and made it so vulnerable to both inter-Arab and superpower rivalries. Khalaf argues that historically internal grievances have been magnified or deflected to become the source of international conflict. From the beginning, he shows, foreign interventions have consistently exacerbated internal problems.

From 1975 to 1990, Lebanon endured one of the most protracted and bloody civil wars of the twentieth century. Sune Haugbolle's timely and often poignant book chronicles the battle over ideas that emerged from the wreckage of that war. While the Lebanese state encouraged forgetfulness and political parties created sectarian interpretations of the war through cults of dead leaders, intellectuals and activists - inspired by the example of truth and reconciliation movements in different parts of the world - advanced the idea that confronting and remembering the war was necessary for political and cultural renewal.

Using hundreds of exclusive insider sources, two Israeli journalists examine Israel's 2006 invasion of Lebanon, in a gripping and suspenseful narrative.