The media relations department of Hizbollah wishes you a happy birthday : unexpected encounters in the changing Middle East

The beachhead -- The return -- The good life -- Satellite TV -- Thanksgiving -- Fatwa! -- Talking about Jihad -- Police states -- Above the law -- Tribes -- Working in isolation -- The Muslim brotherhood -- Arrested development -- Epilogue

A New York Times correspondent’s affectionate, irreverent portrait of the Middle East he’s known since childhood—an unexplored place hidden behind the usual headlines

The Barnes & Noble Review

On October 3, 1997, New York Times correspondent Neil MacFarquhar was bicycling down Fifth Avenue and got hit by a bus. This was a bad day for MacFarquhar but, in a strange way, a lucky one for journalism. After a coma and long recovery, MacFarquhar returned to work with lingering frailty and a permanent medical excuse never to cover another war. His Sarajevo and Kabul days over, he moved to Cairo in 2001 and reported on the parts of the Middle East most underserved by foreign journalists, namely the parts that are not war zones.

War zones are in some ways all alike, but countries that simmer in relative peace all simmer in their own ways. Show me a book about Arabia that doesn't feature a casting call of masked gunmen and earnest-but-ignorant American soldiers, and I will show you a book worth reading. MacFarquhar's new book makes stops in war zones (Baghdad, Beirut), but it glances at these stock figures of Middle East reportage only obliquely. Instead it concentrates on the simmering. In a geographically wide-ranging series of portraits, it depicts a region more complicated and more interesting than coverage of its signature conflicts suggests.

Since his boyhood in Qadhafi's Libya, Neil MacFarquhar has developed a counterintuitive sense that the Middle East, despite all the bloodshed in its recent history, is a place of warmth, humanity, and generous eccentricity. In this book, he introduces a cross-section of unsung, dynamic men and women pioneering political and social change. There is the Kuwaiti sex therapist in a leather suit with matching red headscarf, and the Syrian engineer advocating a less political interpretation of the Koran. MacFarquhar interacts with Arabs and Iranians in their every day lives, removed from the violence we see constantly, yet wrestling with the region's future. These are people who realize their region is out of step with the world and are determined to do something about it -- on their own terms. Since His Boyhood In Qadhafi 's Libya, And Later As A Reporter For More Than Thirteen Years In Cities Stretching From Tehran To Marrakesh, Neil Macfarquhar Has Developed A Counterintuitive Sense That The Middle East, Despite All The Bloodshed In Its Contemporary History, Is A Place Of Warmth, Humanity, And Generous Eccentricity. In The Media Relations Department Of Hizbollah Wishes You A Happy Birthday Macfarquhar Shares A Lesser Known Side Of The Region, The Story He Always Wanted To File. Macfarquhar Shows The Daily Lives And Attitudes Of People Frequently Obscured Behind The Curtain Of Violence: The Stories Of Chefs And Sex Therapists, Bloggers And Academics Struggling To Reform On Their Own Terms. The author narrates his encounters with residents of countries throughout the Middle East as they conduct their everyday lives and adjust to the dramatic political and social upheavals that have occurred throughout the region.