His father was a Zionist by way of faith. Whether Harvey was going to daily Hebrew classes or attending Zionist picnics, he grew up a staunch supporter of the Jewish state. But soon he found himself questioning the very beliefs and ideals of his parents.In Not the Israel My Parents Promised Me, the final graphic memoir from the man who defined the genre, Pekar explores what it means to be Jewish and what Israel means to the Jews. Over the course of a single day in his hometown of Cleveland, Ohio, Pekar and the illustrator JT Waldman wrestle with the mythologies and realities surrounding the Jewish homeland. Pekar interweaves his increasing disillusionment with the modern state of Israel with a comprehensive history of the Jewish people from biblical times to the present, and the result is a personal and historical odyssey of uncommon power. Plainspoken and empathetic, Pekar had no patience for injustice and prejudice in any form, and though he comes to understand the roots of his parents' unquestioning love for Israel, he arrives at the firm belief that all peoples should be held to the same universal standards of decency, fairness, and democracy.With an epilogue written by Joyce Brabner, Not the Israel My Parents Promised Me is an essential book for fans of Harvey Pekar and anyone interested in the past and future of the Jewish state. It is bound to create important discussions and debates for years to come.

    A former bombardier in WWII, Zinn emerged in the civil rights movement as a powerful voice for justice. Although he's a fierce critic, he gives us reason to hope that by learning from history and engaging politically, we can make a difference in the world.

    One by one the militants crossed the border into Pakistan and settled in its tribal areas, building alliances with locals and terrorizing or bribing their way to power. This place - Pakistan's lawless frontier - is now the epicenter of global terrorism. It is where young American and British jihadists go to be trained, where the kidnapped are stowed away, and where plots are hatched for deadly attacks all over the world. It has become, in President Obama's words, "the most dangerous place" - a hornet's nest of violent extremists, many of whom now target their own state in vicious suicide- bombing campaigns. Imtiaz Gul, who knows the ins and outs of these groups and their leaders, tackles the toughest questions about the current situation: What can be done to bring the Pakistani Taliban under control? Who funds these militants and what are their links to Al Qaeda? Are they still supported by the ISI, Pakistan's all-powerful intelligence agency? Based on dozens of exclusive interviews with high-ranking Pakistani intelligence, government and military officers and extensive first-hand reporting, The Most Dangerous Place is a gripping and definitive exposé of a region that Americans need urgently to understand.

    The beliefs of Founders such as Patrick Henry, John Quincy Adams, John Jay, George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, George Mason, and many others are clearly presented. America's Godly Heritage also provides excerpts from court cases showing that for 160 years under the Constitution, Christian principles were officially and legally inseparable from American public life. This book is an excellent primer for those who want to know more about what was intended for America by the Founders and what can be done to return America to its original guiding philosophy. It's ideal to share with home gatherings, church groups, and Sunday school classes, or to use as a history supplement for children or schools.

    The British and the French, who operated the canal, joined with Israel in a plan to retake it by force. Despite the special relationship between England and America, Dwight Eisenhower intervened to stop the invasion.In Ike’s Gamble, “a disturbing history that clearly reveals the dangerous ‘collective American delusion’ about the Middle East” (Kirkus Reviews), Michael Doran shows how Nasser manipulated the US, invoking America’s opposition to European colonialism to drive a wedge between Eisenhower and two British Prime Ministers, Winston Churchill and Anthony Eden. Meanwhile, Nasser was making weapons deals with the USSR and destabilizing other Arab countries that the US had been courting. The Suez Crisis was his crowning triumph. In time, Eisenhower would conclude that Nasser had duped him, that the Arab countries were too fractious to anchor America’s interests in the Middle East, and that the US should turn instead to Israel.“This is a story that has been told many times, but seldom with the depth and stylistic elegance of Ike’s Gamble. Michael Doran does not just challenge the prevailing historiography, he turns it on its head” (The Weekly Standard). Affording deep insight into Eisenhower and his foreign policy, this fascinating and provocative history provides a rich new understanding of how the US became the power broker in the Middle East.

    In The Ayatollah Begs to Differ, he paints a portrait of a country that is fiercely proud of its Persian heritage, mystified by its outsider status, and scornful of the idea that the United States can dictate how it should interact with the community of nations.With wit, style, and an unusual ability to get past the typical sound bite on Iran, Majd reveals the paradoxes inherent in the Iranian character which have baffled Americans for more than thirty years. Meeting with sartorially challenged government officials in the presidential palace; smoking opium with an addicted cleric, his family, and friends; drinking fine whiskey at parties in fashionable North Tehran; and gingerly self-flagellating in a celebration of Ashura, Majd takes readers on a rare tour of Iran and shares insights shaped by his complex heritage. He considers Iran as a Muslim country, as a Shiite country, and, perhaps above all, as a Persian one. Majd shows that as Shiites marked by an inferiority complex, and Persians marked by a superiority complex, Iranians are fiercely devoted to protecting their rights, a factor that has contributed to their intransigence over their nuclear programs. He points to the importance of the Persian view of privacy, arguing that the stability of the current regime owes much to the freedom Iranians have to behave as they wish behind “Persian walls.” And with wry affection, Majd describes the Persian concept of ta’arouf, an exaggerated form of polite self-deprecation that may explain some of Iranian President Ahmadinejad’s more bizarre public moments. With unforgettable portraits of Iranians, from government figures to women cab drivers to reform-minded Ayatollahs, Majd brings to life a country that is deeply religious yet highly cosmopolitan, authoritarian yet with democratic and reformist traditions—an Iran that is a more nuanced nemesis to the United States than it is typically portrayed to be.

    In this dramatic first-person narrative, Greg Mortenson picks up where Three Cups of Tea left off in 2003, recounting his relentless, ongoing efforts to establish schools for girls in Afghanistan; his extensive work in Azad Kashmir and Pakistan after a massive earthquake hit the region in 2005; and the unique ways he has built relationships with Islamic clerics, militia commanders, and tribal leaders. He shares for the first time his broader vision to promote peace through education and literacy, as well as touching on military matters, Islam, and women-all woven together with the many rich personal stories of the people who have been involved in this remarkable two-decade humanitarian effort. Since the 2006 publication of Three Cups of Tea, Mortenson has traveled across the U.S. and the world to share his vision with hundreds of thousands of people. He has met with heads of state, top military officials, and leading politicians who all seek his advice and insight. The continued phenomenal success of Three Cups of Tea proves that there is an eager and committed audience for Mortenson's work and message.

    Bacevich provides a searing reassessment of U.S. military policy in the Middle East over the past four decades. From the end of World War II until 1980, virtually no American soldiers were killed in action while serving in the Greater Middle East. Since 1990, virtually no American soldiers have been killed in action anywhere else. What caused this shift? Andrew J. Bacevich, one of the country’s most respected voices on foreign affairs, offers an incisive critical history of this ongoing military enterprise—now more than thirty years old and with no end in sight. During the 1980s, Bacevich argues, a great transition occurred. As the Cold War wound down, the United States initiated a new conflict—a War for the Greater Middle East—that continues to the present day. The long twilight struggle with the Soviet Union had involved only occasional and sporadic fighting. But as this new war unfolded, hostilities became persistent. From the Balkans and East Africa to the Persian Gulf and Central Asia, U.S. forces embarked upon a seemingly endless series of campaigns across the Islamic world. Few achieved anything remotely like conclusive success. Instead, actions undertaken with expectations of promoting peace and stability produced just the opposite. As a consequence, phrases like “permanent war” and “open-ended war” have become part of everyday discourse. Connecting the dots in a way no other historian has done before, Bacevich weaves a compelling narrative out of episodes as varied as the Beirut bombing of 1983, the Mogadishu firefight of 1993, the invasion of Iraq in 2003, and the rise of ISIS in the present decade. Understanding what America’s costly military exertions have wrought requires seeing these seemingly discrete events as parts of a single war. It also requires identifying the errors of judgment made by political leaders in both parties and by senior military officers who share responsibility for what has become a monumental march to folly. This Bacevich unflinchingly does. A twenty-year army veteran who served in Vietnam, Andrew J. Bacevich brings the full weight of his expertise to this vitally important subject. America’s War for the Greater Middle East is a bracing after-action report from the front lines of history. It will fundamentally change the way we view America’s engagement in the world’s most volatile region.Advance praise for America’s War for the Greater Middle East“In one arresting book after another, Bacevich has relentlessly laid bare the failings of American foreign policy since the Cold War. This one is his sad crowning achievement: the story of our long and growing military entanglement in the region of the most tragic, bitter, and intractable of conflicts.”—Richard K. Betts, director, Saltzman Institute of War and Peace Studies, Columbia University “An unparalleled historical tour de force certain to affect the formation of future U.S. foreign policy . . . Every citizen aspiring to high office needs not only to read but to study and learn from this important book. This is one of the most serious and essential books I have read in more than half a century of public service.”—Lieutenant General Paul K. Van Riper, U.S. Marine Corps (Ret.) “Bacevich asks and answers a provocative, inconvenient question: In a multigenerational war in the Middle East, ‘Why has the world’s mightiest military achieved so little?’ ”—Graham Allison, director, Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, and Douglas Dillon Professor of Government at Harvard’s John F. Kennedy School of GovernmentFrom the Hardcover edition.

    It speaks for the millions of people all over the world who have lived suspended between their old and new countries, fitting into neither. An account not of the physical hardship and abuse suffered by many refugees, but rather an exploration of the subtler privations of psychological displacement and loss of identity.

    Written in Michener's trademark intimate style--so loved by readers in his bestselling memoir The World Is My Home--this book is a must for all Americans in this election year.

    Waugh lived and worked in the Gaza Strip from December 2007 to April 2009. Her other works include Hearing Birds Fly: A Nomadic Year in Mongolia, which won the 2004 inaugural Royal Society of Literature Ondaatje Prize, and Selling Olga: Stories of Human Trafficking and Resistance.

    . . dead. You won’t hear that from the politicians who endlessly pay lip service to the Constitution. It’s the dirty little secret that bestselling authors Thomas E. Woods Jr. and Kevin R. C. Gutzman expose in this provocative new book. The fact is that government officials—Democrats and Republicans, presidents, judges, and congresses alike—long ago rejected the idea that the Constitution possesses a fixed meaning limiting the U.S. government’s power. In case you’ve forgotten, this idea was not a minor aspect of the Constitution; it was the document’s very purpose. Woods and Gutzman round up the suspects responsible for the death of the government the Founding Fathers designed. Going right to the scenes of the crimes, they dissect twelve of the most egregious assaults on the Constitution—some virtually unknown. In chronicling this “dirty dozen,” the authors show that the attacks began long before presidents declared preemptive wars, congresses built pork-barrel bridges to nowhere, and Supreme Court justices began to behave as our supreme legislators. In Who Killed the Constitution? Woods and Gutzman• REVEAL the federal government’s “great gold robbery”—the flagrant assault on the Constitution you never heard about in history class• DESTROY the phony case for presidential war power• EXPOSE how the federal government has actively discriminated to end . . . discrimination• TEAR DOWN the “wall of separation” between church and state—an invention that completely contradicts what the Constitution says• DARE to touch the “third rail of American jurisprudence,” Brown v. Board of Education—showing why a government decision that seems “right” isn’t necessarily constitutionalNever shying away from controversy, Woods and Gutzman reveal an unsettling but unavoidable truth: now that the federal government has broken free of the Constitution’s chains, government officials are restrained by little more than their sense of what they can get away with.Who Killed the Constitution? is a rallying cry for Americans outraged by government run amok and a warning to take heed before we lose the liberties we are truly entitled to.

    He was there during the Operation 'Cast Lead' and so his daily dispatches came directly from the killing fields of Gaza, and are therefore free of any media distortion or manipulation."—Ilan Pappé, professor of history, University of ExeterAn authoritative and deeply moving eyewitness account of the terrible twenty-two-day Israeli offensive against the Gaza Strip in December 2008 and January 2009. These daily dispatches were written in precarious conditions, between bombing raids and intermittent Internet access. Vittorio Arrigoni ends his dispatches with the plea "stay human," which became the motto of the peace protests in his native Italy. This English translation is updated with new entries reflecting on life in Gaza after the offensive and also features an introduction by famous Israeli historian Ilan Pappé.Vittorio Arrigoni was an internationally renowned human rights activist who served as a volunteer with the pacifist International Solidarity Movement and worked closely with fishermen and farmers in Gaza. During the Israeli offensive against the Gaza Strip in 2008-9, Arrigoni acted as a human shield while working with the Palestinian Red Crescent ambulances. Working as a freelance journalist for the Italian daily Il Manifesto, Arrigoni’s daily dispatches, written between bombing raids and patchy internet access, ended with the plea, "stay human," which became the motto of the anti-Israeli peace protests in his native Italy. His authoritative and deeply moving eyewitness account was later published in 2010 in Italian, French, German, and English, which the historian Ilan Pappé described as the "account of an everyman and a true humanist." On April 14, 2011, Arrigoni was kidnapped and brutally murdered by militants in Gaza, which caused an international outcry and was unanimously condemned by Hamas and the Palestinian National Authority.

    In this groundbreaking and controversial book he examines ten of the most contested ideas concerning the origins and identity of the contemporary state of Israel. Once and for all he explodes the myths that justify the rights of the Israeli state, asking, - Was Palestine an empty land at the time of the Balfour Declaration? - Were the Jews a people without a land? - Is there no difference between Zionism and Judaism? - Is Zionism not a colonial project of occupation? - Did the Palestinians leave their homeland voluntarily in 1948? - Was the June 1967 War a war of -no choice-? - Is Israel the only democracy in the Middle East? - Were the failed Oslo negotiations of 1992 the PLO's fault? - Was it a question of national security to bomb Gaza? - Is the Two States Solution still achievable? Written for the general reader, this book will prompt a huge, and necessary, debate.

    Army. Defying all known accepted military practice -- and indeed, the laws of physics -- they believed that a soldier could adopt a cloak of invisibility, pass cleanly through walls, and, perhaps most chillingly, kill goats just by staring at them. Entrusted with defending America from all known adversaries, they were the First Earth Battalion. And they really weren't joking. What's more, they're back and fighting the War on Terror. With firsthand access to the leading players in the story, Ronson traces the evolution of these bizarre activities over the past three decades and shows how they are alive today within the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and in postwar Iraq. Why are they blasting Iraqi prisoners of war with the theme tune to Barney the Purple Dinosaur? Why have 100 debleated goats been secretly placed inside the Special Forces Command Center at Fort Bragg, North Carolina? How was the U.S. military associated with the mysterious mass suicide of a strange cult from San Diego? The Men Who Stare at Goats answers these and many more questions.