A History of the Middle East

A History of the Middle East by Peter Mansfield
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

The developed countries in this world are the ones that had the time to develop by themselves, through trial and error, trying out things and establishing what is good for them.

Unfortunately, these developed countries are now spending a lot of time not letting other people develop.

The history of the Middle East, presented in this book with loads of accuracy and objectivity is showing us what happens when for various reasons areas are not allowed to develop by themselves. At first it was the Christianity vs Islam aspect, then there was the Israel aspect, then there was the oil aspect.

For various reasons and for the sake of the interests of countries far away from the Middle East, the Middle East is now the mess that it is. It is a mess of the making of the "Great Powers" (first the British, then the Americans).

Yes, there's nothing that we can do about what's done. But it would be great if we at some point started learning from this. Rather than doing that, we keep on insisting on not letting them be and then we wonder why organizations like ISIS manage to recruit so many people. Well, if someone came and bombed me and sabotaged me at any turn for the sake of interests that are not mine, I may join military resistance myself.

It would be great if some of the leaders of today were aware of that.

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