Syrian Requiem

A compact, incisive history of one of the defining conflicts of our time
Leaving almost half a million dead and displacing an estimated twelve million people, the Syrian Civil War is a humanitarian catastrophe of unimaginable scale. Syrian Requiem analyses the causes and course of this bitter civil war, from its first spark in a peaceful Arab Spring protest to the tenuous victory of the Assad dictatorship, which has been reduced to a crisis-ridden vassal state with no prospect of political reform, national reconciliation, or economic reconstruction.
Israel's chief negotiator with Syria during the mid-1990s, Itamar Rabinovich brings unmatched expertise and insight to the politics of the Middle East. Drawing on more than two hundred specially conducted interviews with key players, Rabinovich and Carmit Valensi assess the roles of local, regional, and global interests in the war. Local sectarian divisions established the fault lines of the initial conflict,...