Alex Rowell Journalist Profile

Articles

Will Climate Concerns Push Scotland To Change Its Famous Whisky Taste?

Nov 7, 2024 | newlinesmag.com | Alex Rowell

The Edinburgh government is mulling a ban on the sale of peat, a vital carbon store that also puts the signature smoke in Scotch Listen to this storyThe world of whisky has a problem. It is no secret that, for centuries, much of the spirit’s finest production has taken place in Scotland. The very word “whisky” derives from the Scottish Gaelic “uisge beatha” (“water of life”), while the term “Scotch” is widely perceived to denote a prestigious, superior beverage.
Leaving a Life in Lebanon

Oct 18, 2024 | newlinesmag.com | Alex Rowell

My favorite part of our house in the hills of Lebanon was the balcony. Straight ahead and to the left stood a dramatic valley, blanketed in thick green forests of pine and fir, rolling up the steep slopes of Mount Lebanon toward the snow-capped peaks of Sannine, just out of sight. To the right, below us, 6 miles away, Beirut stabbed like an arrowhead into the shimmering silver of the Mediterranean.
We Are Your Soldiers: How Gamal Abdel Nasser Remade the Arab World

Sep 15, 2024 | wrmea.org | Election Year--All Senators |Alex Rowell |W.w. Norton |Matthew Vickers

All books featured in this new section are available from Middle East Books and More, the nation’s preeminent bookstore on the Middle East and U.S. foreign policy. www.MiddleEastBooks.com • (202) 939-6050 ext. 1 Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, October 2024, pp. 86-87 Middle East Books Review By Alex Rowell, W.W. Norton & Company, 2023, hardcover, 416 pp. MEB $30 Former Egyptian President Gamal Abdel Nasser is perhaps the preeminent figure of 20th century Arab politics.
How a Now-Forgotten Assassination Almost Toppled Jordan’s Monarchy

Aug 30, 2024 | newlinesmag.com | Alex Rowell

The morning of Aug. 29, 1960, began as every Monday did for Jordanian Prime Minister Hazzaa al-Majali. In his second-floor office in downtown Amman, the 42-year-old former lawyer held an open court, where anyone from senior officials to ordinary members of the public could show up for an audience, at which he would hear their petitions and try to resolve their problems.
We Are Your Soldiers: How Gamal Abdel Nasser Remade the Arab World

Jun 1, 2024 | literaryreview.co.uk | Alex Rowell

To really appreciate the significance of We Are Your Soldiers, one must have a feel for the historiography. The last time, for instance, I was in Cairo, the National Archives of Egypt was holding an exhibition on President Gamal Abdel Nasser. Included were such relics for veneration as a pair of the former president’s socks, his favourite little mug and a selection of his best briefcases.
We Are Your Soldiers: How Gamal Abdel Nasser Remade the Arab World

Dec 29, 2023 | washingtonindependentreviewofbooks.com | Alex Rowell

One of the most popular — and controversial — Arab rulers in contemporary history gets a critical and engaging reappraisal in We Are Your Soldiers by Lebanon-based journalist Alex Rowell. Gamal Abdel Nasser first seized the reins of power in Egypt in 1952 after leading a group called the “Free Officers” in a coup d’état against King Farouk.
Essay | When Israel’s Great Nemesis Accepted Peace

Nov 22, 2023 | wsj.com | Alex Rowell

By With Israeli and Palestinian forces likely to resume hostilities after the four-day pause starting Thursday, the prospects for a more lasting peace in the Middle East remain dim. Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has vowed to utterly defeat Hamas, the Palestinian militant group that governs the coastal enclave and stunned the world with its killing spree on Oct. 7.
Hamas Attacks on Israel From Lebanon Stoke Fears of a Repeat of History

Nov 3, 2023 | newlinesmag.com | Alex Rowell

In Beirut, on the 54th anniversary of the Cairo Agreement, parallels with the PLO of the late 1960s stir anxiety On Nov. 2, the Palestinian militant group Hamas declared that its fighters had launched 12 rockets at the Israeli border city of Kiryat Shmona from neighboring Lebanon. The strike, which wounded two and set cars ablaze on a commercial street, came four days after a similar attack in which the group said it had fired 16 rockets at northern Israel from southern Lebanon.
A Talk With the Dean of Arab Liberalism

Oct 25, 2023 | newlinesmag.com | Alex Rowell

How Hazem Saghieh shook off the extremism of his youth to become a leading intellectual champion of secular democracy Listen to this storyEditor’s note: Since the Oct. 7 attack on Israel by Hamas, and the subsequent bloodshed in Gaza and elsewhere, the veteran Lebanese intellectual Hazem Saghieh has been a prominent voice offering an independent and critical perspective in numerous articles in the Arabic press, questioning much of the consensus and received wisdom on all sides.
Hoping to Channel Nasser, Egypt’s Sisi Provokes a Backlash

Oct 3, 2023 | newlinesmag.com | Alex Rowell

On Monday, Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi formally confirmed that he would run for a third term in office. The upcoming presidential election, scheduled for December, is widely seen as a foregone conclusion in his favor. Reelection would see the former army general remain president until at least 2030.