The Revolutionists: The Story of the Extremists Who Hijacked the 1970s
A timely, engaging chronicle of the escalating violence that plagued the Middle East from the late 1960s through the early ’80s ... Burke conducted dozens of interviews over more than a decade, talking to hijackers, former Mossad officials and spies. Working in 12 languages, he also sifted through declassified government documents and thousands of media stories.He immerses readers in the era through short, telling biographical sketches, ranging from the founders of the murderous Baader-Meinhof gang in West Germany to Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the leader of Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution ... Ultimately, the violence detailed in The Revolutionists stunted the aims of its perpetrators ... The struggle continues to evolve, but the profound sense of dislocation and disenfranchisement that so many in the Middle East feel seems never to be addressed.
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A timely history ... Displays an ambition far exceeding its subtitle and features a huge cast of characters ... The Revolutionists is likely to stand for some time as the most absorbing history of the P.F.L.P. and its multifarious allies.
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In The Revolutionists, Jason Burke takes us back to the frightening times when airport security was lax and live television made all the world a terrorist’s stage ... It is a well-researched, anecdote-rich narrative, sometimes hard to follow but always hard to put down.
