The origins of the Arab-Israeli wars

There are few areas of contemporary study where an explanation of the past is more vital to an understanding of the present than the Arab-Israeli wars. Ritchie Ovendale's study of the roots of these conflicts first appeared in 1984 before being reissued as a Second Edition in 1992. The book has been welcomed as a balanced and judicious introduction to this immensely complex and controversial subject. Now updated the study takes account of recently published literature, and new interpretations.

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General Editor: Harry Hearder - Formerly Professor Emeritus, University of Wales

Some reviews of the First Edition:

¿Dr Ovendale does an admirable job of making sense of these diverse currents, and turns the history of the conflict into a coherent, readable narrative.¿
The Economist

¿The volume¿s strengths lie mainly in the author¿s ability to provide a clear account of complex historical events like the Suez crisis of 1956 in only a few pages. For this reason it will certainly make a very good textbook for introductory courses on recent Middle Eastern history.¿

Roger Owen, English Historical Review

¿Although Ritchie Ovendale¿s book is short, it is extremely well documented...If one wants to understand the origins of the Arab-Israeli wars, one must read this brief book.¿

Hatem I. Hussaini, American-Arab Affairs

There are few areas of contemporary study where an explanation of the past is more vital to an understanding of the present than the Arab-Israeli wars. Ritchie Ovendale¿s study of the roots of these conflicts first appeared in 1984 before being reissued as a Second Edition in 1992. Over the years the book has been welcomed by students, scholars and general readers alike. It provided a balanced and judicious introduction to this immensely complex and controversial subject; and the treatment - which weaves the different strands of the story into a single coherent narrative - was approachable and involving.

Now updated for a third time, Professor Ovendale has revised the text to take account of recently published literature, and new interpretations of issues such as the ¿Arab awakening¿, as well as the origins and course of the Suez-Sinai, and the June 1967 and October 1973 wars. The book is also brought up-to-date with a final chapter on the peace process. This covers the American-Israeli ¿special relationship¿, the Madrid conference, the Oslo accords, Arafat¿s return to Gaza, Netanyahu as Israeli Prime Minister, and the Wye Memorandum.

RITCHIE OVENDALE is formerly Professor of International Politics at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth. Among his many publications is his Longman Companion to the Middle East since 1914 (Second Edition, 1998).

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