At the dawn of World War I, the United States was only a rising power. Our reputation was relatively benign among Middle Easterners, who saw no imperial ambitions in our presence and were grateful for the educational and philanthropic services Americans provided. Yet by September 11, 2001, everything had changed. The United States had now become the unquestioned target of those bent on attacking the West for its perceived offenses against Islam. How and why did this transformation come about? And how did each of the factors that make the Middle East so complex contribute to this transformation?

This series of 24 lectures by an award-winning scholar is a narrative history of U.S. political involvement in the Middle East from World War I to the present day. Presented from a historian's balanced perspective, it will strengthen your ability to place today's headlines into historical context, evaluate what is most likely to happen next, and understand those oncoming events when they occur.

Step by step, with attention to the viewpoints and motivations of each nation and leader involved, the lectures explore

• growing American involvement in the Middle East;
• the ongoing quest for political independence and self-mastery by Middle Easterners;
• the difficulty the United States has experienced in weighing diverse and conflicting objectives in the region, especially as the cold war against the Soviet Union intensified; and
• the increasing antagonism between Americans and Middle Easterners that came to such a shocking culmination on September 11, 2001.