Following the War of Independence, US ships, without the protection previously provided by the Royal Navy, were frequently captured by the fiefdoms in North Africa with their crews held for ransom, ransoms which were consuming an increasing proportion of the fledgling country's federal budget. In 1788, then future US presidents Jefferson and Adams asked the Tripoli ambassador in London about the attacks, noting that the USA had (then) never had a quarrel with the Moslem world, the ambassador replied, "because the Koran gives us permission to do so". In response, the US established a navy which, in a series of missions recaptured its merchant ships and freed its enslaved sailors. Thus began American engagement with the middle east.

This very thoroughly researched book chronicles American involvement with this part of the world from its independence until the present, at times benevolent and at other times less so. It covers that various competing objectives of supporting anti-colonial movements, colonising Christian communities that the American perceived as not following the true path, hence American universities in that part of the world, and of furthering American economic interests. For those seeking to understand the long history to American involvement in the Middle East, this is an essential read.

Michael B. Oren's Power, Faith and Fantasy recounts America's long, fraught relationship with the Muslim world, from independence to the Iraq War. Oren (a former Israeli Ambassador to the US) argues that the American-Middle Eastern nexus is nothing new, and has far deeper roots in our history than is often acknowledged. Some of the arguments he makes feel like a stretch, but it's true enough that there's a lot more to untangle here than the familiar of oil and terrorism. American sailors fought the Barbary Pirates in the North Africa, while writers like Herman Melville and Mark Twain explored the Holy Land; American soldiers-of-fortune plied their trade in Egypt and Turkey while missionaries spread the gospel to Palestine and Lebanon. All the while, Oren argues, Americans entertained varying shades of fantasy about the Middle East, as a beautiful but barbaric land overflowing with violence and terrorism, needing to be rescued by their virtuous, muscular Christian Democracy. The book's pace inevitably quickens as the 20th Century nears, with Oren discussing American influences on the Zionist movement, Theodore Roosevelt's saber-rattling in Morocco and Woodrow Wilson's ill-fated peacemaking (America was offered a "mandate" of Turkish lands in Anatolia and Armenia at Versailles) and how America's growing economic and military domination, along with its dependence on oil, caused it to become the region's predominant power. Oren sketches this portrait not only through personalities and political events but by looking at media depictions of the "Orient"; from Melville and Twain's writings to films like The Sheik and Lawrence of Arabia and even popular music, all of which perpetrated stereotypes and projected fantasies rather than affording real understanding. The book becomes less balanced as it nears the present day, with Oren (perhaps not surprisingly) finding much to sympathize with in America's embrace of Israel and little enough to admire in modern Arab states. But he's on point showing how fraught, disputatious and generally harmful the relationship has been to both the United States and its Arab counterparts...and how the combination of Power, Faith and Fantasy outlined in the title has prevented true understanding and cooperation. An excellent work.

Everything we all need to know about our relationship with the Middle East (if you happen to be American). Crucial reading in these times.

Nothing every changes. As radical settlers burn out a Palestinian family and Palestinian lone wolves stab Israelis on the street and an Israeli shoots another Israeli thinking he is a Palestinian, it's pretty much what has been going on there forever. And the US response never really changes all that much. The US is never quite sure which side to back, whether through diplomacy or arms a side should be backed. The only certainty is uncertainty about what to do about and for the Middle East. This book is a wonderful chronicle of all that, from before we had a Constitution. One of the amazing things learned here is that a Middle East problem brought the fledging states together to write a Constitution. US sailors, women and families were being captured by Barbary pirates. A Constitution was written in great part to create a navy that could combat the pirates and save US shipping in the Mediterranean. And before World War I, before our love affair with the Saudis for their oil, before the decision to recognize Israel -- no sure thing even among American Jews then -- US missionaries and the schools they built taught Arabs to think about freedom and democracy. The US was their shining light. The Statute of Liberty, in fact, was first meant to be placed in Egypt, another odd fact. Excellent reading for everyone who thinks they know the solution that fixes everything there or even which side is right in the tribal battles going on there. Maybe the answer is that there is no answer, at least for the US. In that there may be a little comfort.

This book provided a fascinating overview of the US involvement in the Middle East, from the Barbary pirates to the current war in Iraq. It's a useful backdrop for evaluating current US policy. I mean who really remembers the US struggle with the Barbary pirates from what little was covered in US high school history, especially given just how long ago it was that some of us (well, maybe just me) actually took the class. And, if you think that the notions of power faith and fantasy are principles that only recently frame the story of US relations with the Middle East, then this book will set you right. Eschatological thinking has been around for some time and its influence in foreign policy has a long history. This is not an obscure academic reference book. It's written in plain English in an engaging way. Should be on anyone's list if you want to understand generally the historical context of present day US - Middle Eastern relations.

Perhaps it was problematic that I often read this book just before going to bed, but I found that I had a hard time engaging with it. I learned a HECK of a lot, which is why I gave it 4 stars. I enjoy history and this covered a lot of episodes in American history which are glossed over at best (such as the Barbary Wars--I didn't realize that the problem with the pirates was such a driving force behind the federalization of the states, or that the U.S. paid obscene amounts of ransom to these 18th century terrorists).

This was definitely a history book. I wish that it came with a better (or perhaps graphical) timeline of significant events. I particularly had trouble with the bouncing around, back and forth in time, as Oren tried to address the three perspectives of Power, Faith and Fantasy. I timeline that plotted these three perspectives in parallel would have helped my overall comprehension.

In any case, it was well worth the read. I think I'll look for other similar histories, perhaps chunked into smaller tomes.

Good for an impressionistic and one sided (Western) view of the Middle East. You'll get a rough idea of what's going on but if you inspect too close you'll not come up with much. I ran across a number of inaccuracies which definitely sullied my enjoyment, what with now having to check historical accuracy in what is supposed to be a history book. I.e. Mistaking the Laconia for the Lusitania, Custer graduating first in his class instead of last in his class, attributing actions to people which had been dead at the proposed time. Disappointing, but I still learned a bit. Chiefly, we are paying for and persisting in the sins of our fathers as far as this book is concerned.

من أسوأ الكتب علي الاطلاق لانه لم يكتب بحيادية بل تظهر فيه مدي الكره وعدم الموضوعية لبلدان الشرق الأوسط عامة ومصر خاصة.
لا مانع لدي ولا غضاضة في أن اقرا علي سلبيات وطني ولكن عندما ينتقد سياسي إسرائيلي بارز معاملة المصريين للمرأة ويصفها بالعبودية وفي نفس الوقت يصور أمريكا بأنها بلد الحريات وذلك في الوقت التي كان ينص دستورها علي معاملة العبد كالماشية فهذا دليل واضح علي توجه صريح لديه

4.0 / 5.0

Easy read. Quick survey captures historical themes. Only over reaches a few times. Ends in 2011 but foreshadows tumult since.

A brilliant book that even well-versed students of US-ME history will find interesting and new. I thought this book might be a brief overview of relations up to WWII and then a more in-depth look at the well-treaded post-WWII history, but it was actually the opposite. Oren shows a rich and deep set of entanglements that have had unexpected influences on both sides' histories. The first half of the book gets you to about 1900, and it's full of fascinating themes and subjects: missionaries, American schools in the Middle East, explorers, antiquarians, restorationism (an early form of Christian Zionism), trade, the Barbary pirate episodes, the growth of Egyptian cotton during the US Civil War, American cultural fascination with this area, tension with the Ottoman Empire, support for Jewish or Christian minorities in Muslim lands, etc.

To make sense of all this, Oren helpfully divides up US motivations in seeing and acting in the ME into three categories. 1. Power: the US has involved itself in the ME for reasons of power politics and economics. The earliest version of this was the decades-long campaign to open the Mediterranean to trade free of pirate interference. Oren's discussion of this crisis as a foundational moment of America identity (and the federal state) is fascinating. Power, however, was largely a latecomer to US connections to the ME. Early contacts with the region were far more likely to come from faith and fantasy. American missionaries are in many ways the heroes of this book: they journeyed to the region and met with almost no success in conversion but eventually became agents of spreading American culture and education, especially through the many missionary schools set up throughout the region. The Middle East always remained salient in American thinking because of its religious importance, and the US often found itself interfering in Ottoman affairs to protest the treatment of religious minorities.

Lastly, fantasy motivated these contacts from the beginning. The "Orient" always held an aura of mystery, sexual energy, adventure, even barbarism that attracted explorers, writers, traders, and even statesmen. It was funny how consistency let down these travelers were; they found the region to be dirty and backwards, its cities small and squalid, the holy sites underwhelming, and the governments petty and tyrannical. This dialectic of expectation and disappointment deeply shaped American interaction with the region. For the last half century, however, Americans have probably held a more negative, less fantasized (although not necessarily more accurate) view of the ME than their ancestors did.

This book is pretty darn long, but if you want a readable, entertaining look at cultural, political, and religious contacts between us and the ME, this is the best book I have found. Sometimes the stories of travelers and missionaries start to get a little repetitive, but he shows how they really mattered in the broader scheme of US history in the ME. Oren concludes that the balance sheet of US relations with the region is actually positive and that it is still possible to build on that legacy. For example, the US was central to dismantling post WWII European imperialism in the ME, helping Iran, Syria, Egypt, and Algeria escape the imperialist yoke. I also want to commend Oren for having an awesome vocabulary and teaching me at least 30 new words.

Not as good as Oren's other book I just read (Six Days of War), but very interesting nonetheless. Conceptually dividing the history of America's relationship with the greater Middle East into categories of power, faith, and fantasy, Oren tells how these three interrelated factors shaped America's presence in--and attitude(s) toward--the region. Although Oren covers much of this multifaceted history, including the relatively unknown aspects of American interests in the Middle East before WWI, he seemingly hurries through the post-WWI period in the last 200 pages (while devoting 400+ to the admittedly less eventful pre-WWI period). Furthermore, in the post-WWI sections of the book Oren tends to emphasive the Jewish/Israeli aspects of America's relations with the Middle East much more than the Arab. While this doesn't skew one's overall perspective on the topic (Oren's simply too good and objective a historian for such biases), it would nonetheless be nice to have more space devoted to issues such as the Sadat-Carter relationship, the Iran-Iraq war, and America's involvement in the Arabian peninsula. Overall, this book is definitely worth reading, especially for its portrayal of America and the Middle East between 1776 and 1914.

بعد ثلاثين عاما من هيمنة الولايات المتحدة على الشرق
الأوسط ، كان بإمكان الأمريكيين الإشارة إلى بعض
الإنجازات التي تدعو إلى الفخر ، وأيضا إلى بعض
النكسات المؤلمة .. فقد كونوا تحالفا وثيقا مع إسرائيل ،
تفاوضوا على اتفاقية سلام بين القاهرة وتل أبيب ،
وحجموا التأثير السوفييتي على العالم العربي ،
تزعموا المناداة بحقوق الإنسان ، مع ذلك فقد ظلت
الولايات المتحدة في عيون كثير من شعوب المنطقة
مناصرة لحكومات استبدادية قمعية ، راعية لإستيطان
الإسرائيليين في الضفة الغربية وغزة ، مروجة للتبذير
القائم على الثروات التي يدرها النفط في دول الخليج
العربي ، أدت السياسات الأمريكية في الشرق الأوسط
إلى حصولها على عدد من جوائز نوبل ، وأيضا قائمة
متزايدة من الهجمات الإرهابية .....


ملاحظة مهمة : المترجمة المبدعة سمت العاصمة الفلسطينية القدس كطرف بإتفاقية السلام مع مصر
وقد كتبتها كما تنطق بوسائل الإعلام العربية تل أبيب
هناك مسعى أمريكي توافقي مع إسرائيل لنقل السفارة
الأمريكية للقدس الفلسطينية وفرض الأمر الواقع على
الدول العربية والمجتمع الدولي بجعلها عاصمة لإسرائيل
ورمي الإدعاء الفلسطيني بأنها لهم أبدية حتى التحرير
من ربقة الصهاينة لذا وجب التنويه ......