Additional information
by Ali Shihabi (Author)
This work of fiction analyzes the two most dangerous political fault lines running across the Middle East: the Arabian/Israeli-Iranian conflict and the Palestinian-Israeli struggle. In Arabian War Games, the author proposes, through the use of fiction, a scenario where these issues all come to a head in a perfect storm. It is the year 20XX, and the regime in Iran, by then nearly choking to death under sanctions, attempts to cut the noose around its neck by invading Arabia in collusion with its ally Iraq. At the same time, Israeli elites, increasingly obsessed with preserving their Jewish majority and visualizing the Jewish state as slowly drowning in a sea of Arabs, conclude that the time has come to forcibly expel their rapidly growing Palestinian minority into Jordan. The United States, fatigued by Middle East wars, confused by Iraq's collusion with Iran, overwhelmed by the resultant collapse of global financial markets, and impotent in front of a determined Israel, helplessly watches events play out. Eschewing the tendency of professional predictors to avoid forecasting the outlandish, Shihabi explores these potential scenarios in a granular fashion, paying particular attention to the mind-set and thinking of the ruling elites who are driving these events. Far from mere sensationalism, Arabian War Games is a careful analysis of the stress points currently at play in the region. Not only does Shihabi dissect these fault lines and their possible outcomes with incisiveness, but he also proposes alternative, creative solutions in the hopes that such scenarios can be avoided.
Author Biography
Ali is an author and commentator on Middle Eastern politics and economics with a particular focus on Saudi Arabia. After a career in banking based out of Riyadh and Dubai, he retired from finance to write. Ali has also authored The Saudi Kingdom: Between the Jihadi Hammer and the Iranian Anvil, published as part of the Princeton University Series on the Middle East. He is widely published in elite media, including the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Atlantic, and Foreign Policy, among other publications. Ali is a graduate of Princeton University with a BA in politics and of the Harvard Business School with an MBA.
