The Arab World and Western Intelligence

Have Western experts fundamentally failed to understand the dynamics, leaders and culture of the Middle East? Dina Rezk analyses 8 case studies, culminating in the assassination of Egyptian President Anwar el Sadat on live television on 6 October 1981, Drawing on declassified documents, interviews and multi-archival research, she explores how the most powerful intelligence agencies in the world have been so notoriously caught off guard in post-WWII Middle East.