The Arabs : a short history / Heinz Halm ; translated by Allison Brown and Thomas Lampert.

Includes bibliographical references (p. 179-180) and index.

Pre-islamic Arabia -- Name and origin -- Ancient south Arabia -- Arabia in the Hellenistic period -- Arabs and Romans -- Arabia between Byzantines and Persians -- Old Arabic language, poetry, and script -- Arabia and Islam -- Arabia on the eve of Islam -- The prophet Muhammad -- The Arab-Islamic conquests -- The caliphate of the Umayyads (661-750) -- The Abbasid caliphate of Baghdad -- Al-'Arabiyya: high Arabic language and literature -- The Arab reception of antiquity -- Arabic numerals and the zero -- Arabization and Islamization -- The Mamluks -- The Arab world from 900 to 1500 A.D. -- Iraq -- Syria/Palestine -- Egypt -- The Maghreb and al-Andalus -- The Arab world from 1500 to 1800 -- The fertile crescent under Ottoman rule -- The Arabian peninsula -- Egypt -- The Maghreb -- The nineteenth century -- The Mashriq -- The Maghreb -- Strategies against European intervention: Europeanization, Islamic renewal, nationalism -- State building and independence in the twentieth century -- The first World War and the Mandatory period -- The Salafiyya and the Muslim brotherhood -- The Palestine question -- The second World War and the establishment of the Arab League -- The founding of Israel and the first Middle East war -- Ba'th party and Nasserism -- The Six-Day War (June 1967) -- The Sadat era (1970-1981): the October War, the Infitah, and the oil crisis -- The Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990) and the Iran-Iraq war (1980-1988) -- The 1990s: the first Intifada and the Gulf War -- The beginning of the twenty-first century -- The second Intifada -- The Iraq War in 2003 -- Bibliography -- Notes on pronunciation -- Index of personal names -- Maps.

Translated from the German.