Sinai

The Sinai peninsula holds a unique strategic and political significance for Egypt and its neighbors. Enclosed by the Suez Canal and bordering Gaza and Israel, Egypt's rugged eastern province has been the cornerstone of the Egyptian-Israeli peace accords, yet its internal politics and security have remained largely under media blackout. While the international press descended on the capital Cairo in January 2011, Sinai's armed rebellion was largely ignored. The regime lost control of the peninsula in a matter of days and, since then, unprecedented chaos has reigned. In this crucial analysis, Mohannad Sabry argues that Egypt's shortsighted security approach has continually proven to be a failure. Decades of flawed policies have exacerbated immense social and economic problems, and maintained a superficial stability under which arms trafficking, smuggling tunnels, and militancy could silently thrive-and finally prevail following Mubarak's ouster.Years of reporting from Sinai make Sabry uniquely qualified to tell this story. He has crossed the tunnels into the Gaza Strip, embedded with traffickers, trekked across the peninsula with tribal elders, debated Takfiri ideologies with jihadist militants, and met with politicians and security officials on both sides of the border. Sinai is vital reading for scholars, journalists, and policy makers and for anyone interested in the plunge of one of the Middle East's most critical regions into turmoil and the broader regional fallout.