The volatile Middle East is the site of vast resources, profound passions, frequent crises, and long-standing conflicts, as well as a major source of international tensions and a key site of direct US intervention. Two of the most astute analysts of this part of the world are Noam Chomsky, the preeminent critic of U.S, foreign policy, and Gilbert Achcar, a leading specialist of the Middle East who lived in that region for many years. In their new book, Chomsky and Achcar bring a keen understanding of the internal dynamics of the Middle East and of the role of the United States, taking up all the key questions of interest to concerned citizens, including such topics as terrorism, fundamentalism, conspiracies, oil, democracy, self-determination, anti-Semitism, and anti-Arab racism, as well as the war in Afghanistan, the invasion and occupation of Iraq, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the sources of U.S. foreign policy. This book provides the best readable introduction for all who wish to understand the complex issues related to the Middle East from a perspective dedicated to peace and justice.

Trevor Blake has always known he possessed magical gifts. For instance, he can conjure objects at a distance. But since he was young, he has suppressed his magic lest it draw hostility from the skeptical and ungifted and intolerant. In the small farming community where Trevor lives with his family, the practice of magic is forbidden-sometimes from fear...or jealousy. Most of the gifted, known as Adepts, practice their arts far away in the big cities. In fact, it is in the bustling coastal city of Port-of-Lords that Trevor has heard of a group of the gifted that have banded together in a secret underground community of adepts. Practicing their art among their own and under the cloak of secrecy, they are able to perfect and master their chosen gifts, perhaps reaching levels of art they could never have imagined. Buoyed with letters of introduction from influential relatives, Trevor boldly makes his way to Port-of-Lords, intent on joining the Community. Happily his best friend, Les Simonton, has agreed to join him on the journey. But no sooner have the boys arrived than the trouble begins. The kind of trouble that Trevor -even with his formidable magic-may be powerless to prevent.

Trevor Blake has always known he possessed magical gifts. But in the small farming town where Trevor lives with his family, the practice of magic is forbidden--and those who reveal their gifts are persecuted. So when his uncle tells him about the underground gifted Community in the city of Port-Of-Lords, Trevor and his best friend, Les Simonton, set off to find it. There, they hope to receive training in the use of their powers. As soon as Trevor and Les arrive in Port-of-Lords, the trouble begins. Unwittingly, the boys become embroiled in a power struggle among the Community's members. Not sure of whom to trust or where to turn, Trevor and Les may be forced to call upon the most perilous power of all....

Pervasive violence against hospitals, patients, doctors, and other health workers has become a horrifically common feature of modern war. These relentless attacks destroy lives and the capacity of health systems to tend to those in need. Inaction to stop this violence undermines long-standing values and laws designed to ensure that sick and wounded people receive care. Leonard Rubenstein—a human rights lawyer who has investigated atrocities against health workers around the world—offers a gripping and powerful account of the dangers health workers face during conflict and the legal, political, and moral struggle to protect them. In a dozen case studies, he shares the stories of people who have been attacked while seeking to serve patients under dire circumstances including health workers hiding from soldiers in the forests of eastern Myanmar as they seek to serve oppressed ethnic communities, surgeons in Syria operating as their hospitals are bombed, and Afghan hospital staff attacked by the Taliban as well as government and foreign forces. Rubenstein reveals how political and military leaders evade their legal obligations to protect health care in war, punish doctors and nurses for adhering to their responsibilities to provide care to all in need, and fail to hold perpetrators to account. Bringing together extensive research, firsthand experience, and compelling personal stories, Perilous Medicine also offers a path forward, detailing the lessons the international community needs to learn to protect people already suffering in war and those on the front lines of health care in conflict-ridden places around the world.

Anyone who watches the television news has seen images of firefighters rescuing people from burning buildings and paramedics treating bombing victims. How do these individuals make the split-second decisions that save lives? Most studies of decision making, based on artificial tasks assigned in laboratory settings, view people as biased and unskilled. Gary Klein is one of the developers of the naturalistic decision making approach, which views people as inherently skilled and experienced. It documents human strengths and capabilities that so far have been downplayed or ignored. Since 1985, Klein has conducted fieldwork to find out how people tackle challenges in difficult, nonroutine situations. Sources of Power is based on observations of humans acting under such real-life constraints as time pressure, high stakes, personal responsibility, and shifting conditions. The professionals studied include firefighters, critical care nurses, pilots, nuclear power plant operators, battle planners, and chess masters. Each chapter builds on key incidents and examples to make the description of the methodology and phenomena more vivid. In addition to providing information that can be used by professionals in management, psychology, engineering, and other fields, the book presents an overview of the research approach of naturalistic decision making and expands our knowledge of the strengths people bring to difficult tasks.

In the new edition of this major work, Seyom Brown brings his authoritative account of United States foreign policy completely up-to-date with analyses of the Truman administration to the Clinton administration. Most notably, Brown provides an insightful overview of the last three presidencies, beginning with an expanded treatment of the Reagan years to the first major scholarly assessment of Bush's foreign policies to Clinton's early ambivalence toward grappling with the dilemmas of the post-Cold War world.

Updated with a new preface by Gilbert Achar, covering events since 2007 including the late-2023 renewal of military conflict between Israel and Hamas, this new edition provides readers with an essential critical perspective on the US role in the Middle East. The volatile Middle East is the site of vast resources, profound passions, frequent crises, and long-standing conflicts, as well as a major source of international tensions and a key site of direct US intervention. Two of the most astute analysts of this part of the world are Noam Chomsky, the preeminent critic of U.S. foreign policy, and Gilbert Achcar, a leading specialist of the Middle East who has lived in that region for many years. In this book, Chomsky and Achcar bring a keen understanding of the internal dynamics of the Middle East and of the role of the United States, taking up all the key questions of interest to concerned citizens, including such topics as terrorism, fundamentalism, conspiracies, oil, democracy, self-determination, anti-Semitism, and anti-Arab racism, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and the sources of U.S. foreign policy. This book provides the best readable introduction for all who wish to understand the complex issues related to the Middle East from a perspective dedicated to peace and justice.