Name: Black Wave
ISBN: 9781472271105

Kim Ghattas

The bestselling author of The Secretary tells the gripping story of the real roots of the Sunni-Shia conflict in Middle East in the 1979 Iran Revolution that changed the region forever.

Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Forty-Year Rivalry That Unraveled Culture, Religion, and Collective Memory in the Middle East

Black Wave

The bestselling author of The Secretary: A Journey with Hillary Clinton from Beirut to the Heart of American Power tells the gripping story of the real roots of the Middle East Sunni-Shia conflict in the 1979 Iran Revolution that changed the region forever. Black Wave is a paradigm-shifting recasting of the modern history of the Middle East, telling the largely unexplored story of the rivalry between Sunni Saudi Arabia and Shia Iran—a rivalry born out of the sparks of the 1979 Iranian revolution—that has dramatically transformed the culture, identity, and collective memory of millions of Muslims over four decades. Like George Packer did in The Unwinding, Kim Ghattas follows everyday citizens whose lives have been affected by the geopolitical drama, making her account both immediate and intimate. Most Americans assume that extremism, Sunni-Shia antagonism, and anti-Americanism have always existed in the Middle East, but prior to 1979, Saudi Arabia and Iran were working allies. It was only after that year—a remarkable turning point—that Shia Iran and Sunni Saudi Arabia began to use religion as a tool in their competition for dominance in the region, igniting the culture wars that led to the 1991 American invasion of Iraq, the September 11th terrorist attacks, and the rise of ISIS. Ghattas shows how Saudi Arabia and Iran went from allies against the threat of communism from Russia, with major roles in the US anti-Soviet strategy, to mortal enemies that use religious conservatism to incite division and unrest from Egypt to Pakistan. Black Wave will significantly influence both perception of and conversation about the modern history of the Middle East.

kim ghattas presents the history of the last 50 odd years as driven by two primary entities — iran and saudi arabia. every other act and event is downstream of that.  it does not shy away from criticising the US interventionist pitfalls but the agency afforded to the middle east and its live players was refreshing.

the book points to 1979 as the year where the middle east went mad: 1. the iranian islamic revolution 2. the siege of mecca by wahhabi extremists 3. and the invasion of afghanistan by the soviets. not to say that the region was already in a mess, this round, the mess was wholly Theirs. the dynamics shifted to that of two regional hegemons, saudi arabia and iran, as they engaged in a death spiral to prove their own holiness while grappling with modernity

in sum, themes i drew were: the geopolitics of sunnism vs shiism; the contradictions of petrocapitalist islam; the ossifying nature of extremism; the dangers of modernising too quickly; foreign policy differences between clinton, bush, obama, trump, and biden; the state’s capacity and dizzying use of religion to achieve power; nationalism’s abuse of religion; why we should compromise; the dialectical and incestuous relationship that religion has with the state; theories of social change; the tyranny of the minority; how modern islam mediates The Symbolic with The Real; the birth of Hezbollah; ideology’s role and stubbornness; the paranoia of dictatorship; extremism and self-parody; iran’s state-sponsored shia islam and its weaponisation to destroy and kill (eg salman rushdie, countless women, etc) (and everything downstream of that!); how client militant groups like Hezbollah (explicit iran beneficiary) ISIS (ignored saudi son) came to be

something i thought was interesting was the theory of social change — specifically, that it is material. hezbollah’s strategy was used in lebanon and syria: setting up proselytisers, offering public services, caring for families. egypt’s muslim revolution, was eventually crushed, and this was despite efforts from a female cleric who deployed tupperware MLM-style prayer sessions

above all, ghattas shows the depths of depravity that people will go to grasp on to power — be it syria’s assad, iraq’s saddam, saudi arabia’s mohammed bin salman, iran’s khomeini, egypt’s sisi and zia. 

but a better future is possible. despite the horror of it all she highlights the small pockets of progress and liberation that exiles push for. she ends the book with a kierkegaard quote that history is seen backward while life is lived forward.

Ghee

kim ghattas presents the history of the last 50 odd years as driven by two primary entities — iran and saudi arabia. every other act and event is downstream of that.  it does not shy away from criticising the US interventionist pitfalls but the agency afforded to the middle east and its live players was refreshing.

the book points to 1979 as the year where the middle east went mad: 1. the iranian islamic revolution 2. the siege of mecca by wahhabi extremists 3. and the invasion of afghanistan by the soviets. not to say that the region was already in a mess, this round, the mess was wholly Theirs. the dynamics shifted to that of two regional hegemons, saudi arabia and iran, as they engaged in a death spiral to prove their own holiness while grappling with modernity

in sum, themes i drew were: the geopolitics of sunnism vs shiism; the contradictions of petrocapitalist islam; the ossifying nature of extremism; the dangers of modernising too quickly; foreign policy differences between clinton, bush, obama, trump, and biden; the state’s capacity and dizzying use of religion to achieve power; nationalism’s abuse of religion; why we should compromise; the dialectical and incestuous relationship that religion has with the state; theories of social change; the tyranny of the minority; how modern islam mediates The Symbolic with The Real; the birth of Hezbollah; ideology’s role and stubbornness; the paranoia of dictatorship; extremism and self-parody; iran’s state-sponsored shia islam and its weaponisation to destroy and kill (eg salman rushdie, countless women, etc) (and everything downstream of that!); how client militant groups like Hezbollah (explicit iran beneficiary) ISIS (ignored saudi son) came to be

something i thought was interesting was the theory of social change — specifically, that it is material. hezbollah’s strategy was used in lebanon and syria: setting up proselytisers, offering public services, caring for families. egypt’s muslim revolution, was eventually crushed, and this was despite efforts from a female cleric who deployed tupperware MLM-style prayer sessions

above all, ghattas shows the depths of depravity that people will go to grasp on to power — be it syria’s assad, iraq’s saddam, saudi arabia’s mohammed bin salman, iran’s khomeini, egypt’s sisi and zia. 

but a better future is possible. despite the horror of it all she highlights the small pockets of progress and liberation that exiles push for. she ends the book with a kierkegaard quote that history is seen backward while life is lived forward.

Maurice FitzGerald

What with all the anti-vaxxers i am beginning to think a huge majority of people are dangerously uneducated and gullible. The black wave happens among those people. Trump gets elected by those people. We have yet to find an answer for this and that is pretty fucking terrifying.

Black Wave Saudi Arabia, Iran, and the Forty-Year Rivalry That Unraveled Culture, Religion, and Collective Memory in the Middle East

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