Sinai: Egypt's Linchpin, Gaza's Lifeline, Israel's Nightmare.

• Author: Bozkurt, Abdulgani

Sinai: Egypt's Linchpin, Gaza's Lifeline, Israel's Nightmare

By Mohannad Sabry

Cairo: American University in Cairo Press, 2015, 294 pages, $28,00, ISBN: 9789774167287

The Sinai Peninsula has for years witnessed intense political and military clashes, and rebellions and even politically minor developments have attracted great attention among the countries neighboring the peninsula including Egypt, Israel, Gaza, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. The recent developments in Egypt, as part of the Arab revolutions, have further increased the significance of the region and the volatility it brings, not only to Egypt per se but to the entire Middle East. Considering the concentrated strategic importance attributed to the peninsula by the above countries, elaborating the formation and the sustenance of its prominence and the strategies the countries follow to tip the scales in their favor becomes an ever-significant and necessary scholarly endeavor. Mohannad Sabry's book, Sinai: Egypt's Linchpin, Gaza's Lifeline, Israel's Nightmare, is one of those studies. It offers a comprehensive account of the recent history of the peninsula, more precisely the period between 2011 and 2014, and elaborates the dynamics of the conflicts in the region during the revolution in Egypt. The narrative is enriched by occasional references to distant historical developments as determinants of recent events.

The book is a political history of the revolution as experienced in the Sinai region and follows a chronological order in narration. It is composed of ten chapters. The first chapter elaborates the reasons why rebellion first broke out in Sinai, as the revolution started earlier in Sinai than in other cities. The second and third chapters examine the underlying causes of certain attacks emanating from Sinai and targeting, for instance, pipelines or Israeli soil. The third chapter explains why and how Egyptian authorities allowed the arms flow to Gaza from Sinai; the fourth chapter furthers this discussion and examines the process of the building of tunnels to Gaza. The following chapter turns its focus to law and order in the peninsula and the role of tribal and sharia courts within it. The sixth chapter draws attention to the rise of Islamic militants in the region and their close ties with the Muslim Brotherhood; the following section, in parallel with the events set forth in the previous two chapters, explains the policies pursued by the Morsi-led government in the face of...