Newish book by Jonathan Cook. His articles on Israel are very clear-headed and always contain revelations, and he keeps that up here. In a concise 149 pages, he explains his theory that it is US/Israel policy to dominate the Middle East by destabilising it; that the old colonial methods of installing friendly strongmen and propping up amenable repressive regimes have given way to a chaotic and even bloodier divide-and-conquer strategy, where encouraging small factions to fight each other is seen as the best way to ensure Israel's military dominance of the region, aid its expansion and secure the Middle East's oil for the US. The recent incursions into Iraq, Lebanon and the forthcoming one in Iran are all, Cook says, part of this overall plan. Along the way he discusses how the Iraq invasion came about, in a superb opening chapter that digests a number of other journalists' work into a handy primer (eg he condenses Greg Palast's investigations into the struggle between Big Oil and the US State Dept over how to shape Iraq post-Saddam into two or three pages). He discusses Israel's influence over US policy - is Israel an obedient client state, or does it call the shots because the US thinks what is in Israel's interest must also be in America's? Or is it a mixture of the two? The US's strange relationship with Saudi Arabia also has light thrown on it.

It's a tremendous little book. In the foreword he explains why he avoids emotive language and, while this takes some getting used to - Cook's motive for writing probably is his disgust at the human cost of US/Israeli strategic manouevring, but you wouldn't know from the text - it allows him to stick intently to the facts, or at least well-bolstered speculation, which is what takes up a lot of the book, and which makes it thought-provoking as well as informative. Recommended.

Wouldn't mind reading this, though €19 looks a bit steep for a 150-pager. I might see if there's a copy floating around the features department in work.

It's only $16 in the US, I'll get it, thanks for the tip Horse.

QUOTE:
his theory that it is US/Israel policy to dominate the Middle East by destabilising it; that the old colonial methods of installing friendly strongmen and propping up amenable repressive regimes have given way to a chaotic and even bloodier divide-and-conquer strategy, where encouraging small factions to fight each other is seen as the best way to ensure Israel's military dominance of the region

Cook has hit the bull's eye.