The Middle East has long been a region of rival religions, ideologies, nationalisms, and ambitions, whose conflicts are largely rooted in the region's political inheritance: the arrangements, unities, and divisions imposed by the Allies after the First World War. Focusing on the formative years of 1914 to 1922, this book reveals how and why the Allies drew lines on an empty map the remade the geography and politics of the Middle East.--From back cover....

Each day after school, Mohammed El-Kurd's grandmother welcomed him at the door of his home with a bouquet of jasmine. Her name was Rifqa -- she was older than Israel itself and an icon of Palestinian resilience. With razor-sharp wit and glistening moral clarity, El-Kurd lays bare the brutality of Israeli settler colonialism. His poems trace Rifqa's exile from Haifa to his family's current dispossession in Sheikh Jarrah, Jerusalem, exposing the cyclical...

"It has been the home to priests and prostitutes, poets and spies. It has been the stage for an improbable flirtation between an Israeli girl and a Palestinian boy living on opposite sides of the barbed wire that separated enemy nations. It has even been the scene of an unsolved international murder. This one-time shepherd's path between Jerusalem and Bethlehem has been a dividing line for decades. Arab families called it "al Mantiqa Haram." Jewish...

"A sweeping history of Jerusalem and the pivotal role that archaeology has played--both in its invention as a modern holy city and as the match that lit a geopolitical fire beneath it. In 1863, a French politician and adventurer heard a rumor of biblical treasures beneath Jerusalem. At the time, Jerusalem was a venerable backwater, not the thriving religious center we think of today. Archaeology itself was in its infancy--more a pastime for treasure-hunting...

"This unique, absorbing biography of the city brings to light its overlooked histories and diverse contemporary voices. In Jerusalem, what you see and what is true are two different things. The Old City has never had "four quarters" as its maps proclaim. And beyond the crush and frenzy of its major religious sites, many of its quarters are little known to visitors, its people ignored and their stories untold. Nine Quarters of Jerusalem lets the communities...

Ruled by Rome and manipulated by selfish religious rulers, the people of Jerusalem wonder if their Saviour will ever come. Now a healer walks the streets of Jerusalem, but is he the true Messiah, or just another imposter like so many before him?

Join structural engineer Steve Burrows and his team of laser-scanning experts as they set out to explore the epic building legacy of Jerusalem. Their focus is on two of the most impressive engineering creations of the ancients: the Temple Mount, a holy icon larger than 20 football fields, and the man-made mountain of Herodium, an opulent palace built on top of millions of tons of hand carved rock.

"A fresh and highly accessible history of the Holy Lands during the Middle Ages, revealing a rich and diverse culture and the fight to save Jerusalem from the Crusaders"-- "Jerusalem sits at the crossroads of three continents and has been continuously invaded for millennia. Yet, in the middle of one of the region's most violent eras, the Crusades, an amazing multicultural world was forming. Templar knights, Muslim peasants, Turkish caliphs, Jewish...

Kingdom of Heaven: Orlando Bloom stars as Balian, a young Frenchman in Medieval Jerusalem during the Crusades, who, having lost everything, finds redemption in a heroic fight against overwhelming forces to save his people and fulfill his destiny as a knight. Orlando Bloom stars as Balian, a young Frenchman in Medieval Jerusalem during the Crusades, who, having lost everything, finds redemption in a heroic fight against overwhelming forces to save...