"If Olaya Street Could Talk" gives Americans a clear and fascinating perspective on Saudi Arabia

(Listen to podcast interview with author, below). Saudi Arabia is the whipping boy of the American public. Any time something goes wrong, blame it on the Arabs and the symbol of the Arabs remains an old, outdated video clip of King Faisal in old black sunglasses with a keffiyeh on his head and wearing long white gowns surrounded by similarly dressed sheikhs. King Faisal was a very dedicated Arab leader who did his best to bring the Arab World into the modern century without losing the cultural uniqueness of being an Arab. It continues today, but Americans only selfishly think of oil and blame their own troubles on everyone else, and Saudi Arabia often takes the beating.

But a new book is out that is perfect for American readers called "If Olaya Street Could Talk." It's written by an American, John Paul Jones, who launched one of the only real Arab American printing houses to focus on badly needed objective books about the Middle East, Taza Press at http://www.tazapress.com/.

Jones offers firsthand insights into the reality of Saudi Arabia and focuses on the Islamic-Western divide which is often exaggerated to achieve political agendas.

Olaya Street is the principle thoroughfare in Riyadh, which Jones notes is the equivalent to New York ity, a street he first saw in 1978 when he first arrived in the country. Back then, he remembers, it had goats grazing along its easements. But today, 60 story office buildings garnish the main arterial road. The cover photos alone show how the street changed from a desert highway with oil rigs and cranes to a bustling cosmopolitan city that Jones guides the reader through, offering a real, firsthand look at the Saudi people, their customs and their religion, Islam, a religion of peace.

Jones does what most other Islamic scholars and activists fail to do, separate the political agendas and their selfish needs from the reality of life, when the Vietnam Veteran returned home to find a possible opportunity working for a company in the desert kingdom.

What he brings back thirty years later is an objectivity and a truth that no one who has covered Saudi Arabia and the Arab and Muslim Worlds has ever managed to give the American public. An unvarnished, accurate look at the reality of life there without worrying about the political agendas that transform lies into truth and truth into propaganda.

"If Olaya Street Could Talk" is a book Americans definitely should invest what little money they have left from their salaries that isn't spent on gasoline and other products exploited by multi-national corporations and balmed on the Arabs.

http://www.tazapress.com/
Author John Paul Jones
Albuqurque, New Mexico
2007, 236 Pages
$25.95


PODCAST INTERVIEW: POINT TO POINT. August 1, 2008: Ray Hanania interviews Author John Paul Jones on his new book "If Olaya Street Could Talk: Saudi Arabia the Heartland of Oil and Islam" published by Taza Press. A detailed look at the Saudi world through the eyes of a typical American. Listen to podcast?

New book challenges Arabs and Muslims to defeat extremism to win a Palestinian State

New book challenges Arabs and Muslims to defeat extremism to win a Palestinian State

Chicago -- Palestinians need to overcome the growing movement of secular and religious extremists in their own community before they can be strong enough to overcome the challenges from Israel and create their own independent Palestinian State, says award winning journalist Ray Hanania in a new book "The Catastrophe: The One-State Solution is the No-State Solution. How Palestinians can stand up to the extremistsand create a Palestinian State."

Hanania, whose writings "define the moderate Arab voice," has been a outspoken critic of extremism in the Arab and Muslim community.

Consistently denouncing violence on both sides, Hanania argues in his book that Israelis and Palestinians each face an uncertain future as the extremist secular left partners with the fanatic religious right to use violence prevent peace based on compromise, to advance the so-called "One-State Solution," and to exploit Palestinian suffering as a means of preventing them from the only viable option for statehood, the creation of a Palestinian State in the context of a Two-State Solution.

"We are watching as Palestine is being erased not just from the maps but from reality as Israel's government exploits the failures of our leadership and the uncontrolled emotions of our people," Hanania argues.

"Palestinians are being held hostage by these extremists and fanatics on the left and the right who reject any compromise and who live in a dream of the past that has become our nightmare. To save our people, we must reject the rejectionists, embrace compromise and recognize the reality of our situation in the hopes of someday rebuilding a dream that is the cornerstone of justice."

In the book, Hanania also argues that Palestinians must regain the principled moral stand and cannot succumb to the emotions of their failures over the past 60 years of Israel's existence, writing:

"Being honest about one's mistakes -- and failures -- and acknowledging the reality of history, rather than its myths, is a crucial step towards lifting oneself out of defeat. You cannot make something "better" if you do not honestly acknowledge that things are "bad" or you attempt to do so from a "bad" position. Only those who are "better" can make a situation better. Improve it. Correct it. Bring it back to the moral center.

"But just being 'better,' as a relative statement, is not good enough. You are either pregnant or you are not pregnant. There is no in-between. The road to pregnancy is pregnancy. The road to peace is peace. Either Palestinians have a state or they don't have a state. You either support peace or you don't support peace. Those who use violence to achieve 'peace' are not seeking peace at all. The use of violence is in and of itself a rejection of peace. Palestinians, Arabs and Muslims must answer this important issue correctly. We must clean our own house first before we can insist on cleaning out the houses of others, our 'enemies.' We cannot demand justice from others when we deny justice to others in our actions, in our arguments in our beliefs. Doing so is to deny justice to ourselves."

The book is available directly from the author through his web site at http://www.hanania.com/.

"The Catastrophe"
238 Pages, softcover 7 x 9 trade
$24.95
Ray Hanania Enterprises
PO Box 2127
Orland Park, IL., 60462

Who Speaks for Islam by authors John L. Esposito and Dalia Mogahed

Who Speaks for Islam by authors John L. Esposito and Dalia Mogahed (Gallup Press, 2008) is Gallup's largest study of Muslim populations worldwide and challenges the conventional wisdoms and the inevitability of a global conflict as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan continue. Gallup's authors argue that the world still does not fully understand Islam and Muslims, arguing that Islam and Muslims are misunderstood. The authors seek to put the Muslim people in perspective.

The book is based on six years of research and more than 50,000 interviews representing 1.3 billion Muslims who reside in more than 35 nations. The authors compiled the polling data in one of the largest polls ever conducted. And no organization better conducts polls than the Gallup Organization.

Gallup Press, www.Gallup.com