Lawrence of Arabia's War

This radically new perspective on T. E. Lawrence, the Arab Revolt, and WWI in the Middle East provides essential insight into today’s violent conflicts.

Archaeologist and historian Neil Faulkner draws on ten years of field research in the Middle East to offer the first truly multidisciplinary history of the conflicts that raged in Sinai, Arabia, Palestine, and Syria during the First World War. Rarely is a book published that revises our understanding of an entire world region and the history that has defined it. This groundbreaking volume makes just such a contribution.

In Lawrence of Arabia’s War, Faulkner sheds new light on British intelligence officer T. E. Lawrence and his legendary military campaigns. He explores the intersections among the declining Ottoman Empire, the Bedouin tribes, rising Arab nationalism, and Western imperial ambition. Faulkner arrives at a provocative new analysis of Ottoman resilience in the face of modern industrialized warfare. This analysis leads him to reassesses the relative weight of conventional operations in Palestine and irregular warfare in Syria—and thus the historic roots of today’s divided, fractious, war-torn Middle East.