Into the hands of the soldiers
Subtitle: freedom and chaos in Egypt and the Middle East
By: David D. Kirkpatrick
Publisher: Viking, an imprint of Penguin Random House LLC
Published: 2018
Language: eng
Number of pages: 370
ISBN-13: 9780735220621
Subjects: Politics and government; Arab Spring, 2010-; History
Other titles: Freedom and chaos in Egypt and the Middle East
Description: A candid narrative of how and why the Arab Spring sparked, then failed, and the truth about America's role in that failure and the subsequent military coup that put Sisi in power--from the Middle East correspondent of the New York Times. In 2011, Egyptians of all sects, ages, and social classes shook off millennia of autocracy, then elected a Muslim Brotherhood president. The 2013 military coup replaced him with a vigorous strongman, Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, who has cracked down on any dissent or opposition with a degree of ferocity Mubarak never dared. What went wrong? Is the Arab world stuck between military and theocratic authoritarianism? And how did Washington manage to be so feckless and reactive? Egypt has for centuries set in motion every major trend in politics and culture across the Arab world, from independence and Arab nationalism to Islamic modernism, political Islam, and the jihadist thought that led to Al Qaeda and ISIS. The Arab Spring revolts of 2011 spread from Cairo, so Americans naturally look to its disastrous democratic experiment with cynical exasperation; but they fail to understand the dynamic of the uprising, the hidden story of its failure, and Washington's part in that tragedy. David D. Kirkpatrick arrived in Egypt less than six months before the uprising broke out. The book juxtaposes his account of Tahrir Square, the elections, and the eventual coup, with new reporting on the conflicts within the Obama administration over how to handle the tumult. It is the story of Kirkpatrick's education in the Arab world, in a time of revolution and violence.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 342-358) and index.
Table of contents: title: Whoever drinks the water; title: City of contradictions : August 14, 2010-January 1, 2011; title: Police day : January 24, 2011-February 11, 2011; title: "We don't do that anymore" : February 12, 2011-September 11, 2011; title: The first lady and the blue bra : March 8, 2011-December 20, 2011; title: The Theban Legion : May 7, 2011-October 9, 2011; title: "How the downfall of a state can happen" : July 23, 2011-November 24, 2011; title: Forefathers : November 27, 2011-January 22, 2012; title: Parliament grows a beard : January 23, 2012-May 23, 2012; title: Thug versus thug : May 23, 2012-June 17, 2012; title: The judges club : June 17, 2012-June 30, 2012; title: The night of power : June 30, 2012-November 19, 2012; title: A day in court : July 4, 2012-September 11, 2012; title: President and Mrs. Morsi : November 19, 2012-November 23, 2012; title: Under the cloak : November 22, 2012-December 3, 2012; title: A rumble at the palace : December 3, 2012-December 7, 2012; title: Murder, rape, Christians, and spies : December 8, 2012-March 9, 2013; title: The view from the west : March 12, 2013-April 24, 2013; title: A new front : April 24, 2013-May 1, 2013; title: A dutiful son : May 1, 2013-June 23, 2013; title: June 30 : May 25, 2013-July 3, 2013; title: Coup d'état : July 4, 2013; title: Killing themselves : July 3, 2013-July 24, 2013; title: A lion : July 24, 2013-August 6, 2013; title: Clearing the square : August 14, 2013-August 15, 2013; title: Jihadis in the White House : August 15, 2013; title: Retribution : August 14, 2013-June 1, 2017; title: Deep state : August 14, 2013-June 1, 2017.