The Conscience of Lebanon: A Political Biography of Etienne Sakr (Abu-Arz)

This work is a combination of an account of a most captivating Lebanese personality with a penetrating analysis of the historical and religious contours of Lebanon. His life is part of the national epic with elements of Christian faith and Maronite sophistication, inter-confessional modes of partnership, and violence tearing apart the fabric of social and economic life. Integral to the narrative and incisively unconventional interpretation is the complex politics of Lebanon intermixed with the war that errupted in 1975. Etienne Sakr embodies the destiny of Lebanon and its defiant struggle for national existence in the Middle East. He was the first to understand the threats to Lebanon and the decay in its elite circles, and he may be the last exile to return home. Personal testimonies from Lebanese residents and conversations with others outside of Lebanon who knew Abu-Arz, in addition to interviews with Israelis aquainted with him, provide the authenticity to the portrait of this remarkable man.

Mordechai Nisan earned his doctorate in Political Science at McGill University in Montreal, where he was born, and has been teaching Middle East Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, especially in the Rothberg International School, since 1976. He has written extensively on Arab-Israeli, Islamic, and Middle Eastern subjects, publishing in both English and Hebrew. Dr Nisan has specialized in ethnic minorities and small peoples in the Middle East, and for im Lebanon is a neighbor and not a perennial enemy of Israel. In addition to addressing academic, army and immigrant forums in Israel, he has also lectured abroad to American and Canadian audiences. Nisan serves on the editorial board of the Hebrew-language Nativ journal and is research consultant for the Jerusalem Institute for Western Defence, both in Israel. He is also on the expanded editorial board of the Middle East Intelligence Bulletin in New York