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America, Oil, and War in the Middle East. Toby Craig Jones + Author Affiliations Readers may contact Jones at tobycjones@yahoo.com.

America, Oil, and War in the Middle East

Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force. —Jimmy Carter, state of the union address, Jan. 23, 1980 Middle Eastern oil has enchanted global powers and global capital since the early twentieth century. Les femmes, actrices essentielles dans les révolutions arabes. Analyses. De-racialising revolutions. Soon after the brutal crackdown on Iran's post-electoral uprising in June 2009, rumours began circulating in cyberspace and among ardent supporters of the Green Movement that some of the Islamic Republic's security forces, recruited to viciously attack demonstrators, were, in fact, not Iranians at all, but "Arabs".

De-racialising revolutions

Snapshots began circulating with red circles marking darker-skinned, rougher looking members of the security forces, who it was said were members of the Lebanese Hezbollah or Palestinian Hamas. Iranians, like me, who come from the southern climes of our homeland, look like those circled in red and remember a long history of being derogatorily dismissed as "Arabs" by our whiter-looking northern brothers and sisters, were not convinced by the allegations. Cut to almost two years later, when "the mercenaries" who were deployed by the Gaddafi regime to crush the revolutionary uprising engulfing Libya were reported to have been "African". Arab spring: an interactive timeline of Middle East protests.

MENA Region. The US - Central Asia: Why.