"Why has the Arab world failed to achieve the political freedom, social stability, and economic improvement experienced in much of the rest of the world since the end of the cold war? In Brutal Truths, Fragile Myths, veteran journalist Mark Huband has answers. Few of the region's leaders, he argues, are capable of initiating the deep political changes necessary to address the challenges they confront. Because of this, ruling regimes will continue to depend upon repression to stay in power. Such a situation entrenches problems instead of solutions, fostering future crises." "In this climate, Western adventurism, as expressed by America's 2003 invasion of Iraq and its refusal to criticize even the worst excesses of Israeli colonialism, sets off dangerous sparks in perhaps the world's most volatile region." "With over a decade of experience as an on-the-ground correspondent in the Middle East and North Africa, Huband probes the political cauldron of monarchy and military rule, Arab nationalism, and the challenge presented by Islamist radicals." "Brutal Truths, Fragile Myths provides an in-depth portrait of a region at once resistant to change and in dire need of reform."--Jacket.