Moscow: Aspect-press Publ., 2014, 207 p.

Much has been written about the events of recent years in the Middle East in Russian journalism and scientific literature. Mostly Russian authors focus on the development of events in one or another Arab country, on the peculiarities of the American and Western reaction to the so-called Arab Awakening. The book by I. D. Zvyagelskaya, one of the leading Russian experts on the Middle East, is characterized by a comprehensive approach. It not only analyzes the transformation processes taking place in the region at a high professional level, but also identifies the peculiarities of Russian Middle East policy in accordance with the author's task. The author emphasizes that the hierarchy of interests of the Russian Federation in this region is dictated by its geopolitical position, Russia's traditional and new ties with the states located here, and the development of local conflicts, although at present the Middle East does not occupy the first places on the scale of foreign policy priorities of the Russian Federation (pp. 8-9).

The given topic also determined the structure of the work, in which a large place is given to a retrospective analysis of Soviet Middle East policy, the cardinal changes that took place in it at the turn of the 1990s. A brilliant knowledge of the history of the Middle East, all the details and turns in the development of the Middle East conflict allowed the author to give a brief but rather complete picture of Soviet policy towards Arab states. I. D. Zvyagelskaya notes that the extremely ideologized Soviet approach to the new nationalist regimes established in the Arab world after the collapse of the colonial system, as a result, negatively affected the positions of the USSR. He restricted "the freedom of maneuver of the USSR in the region, tied Soviet policy to the policy of such allies who, by the very nature of their interests, played the role of spoilers in solving problems that were significant for the Middle East, since the West was involved in their solution" (p.20). The book, unfortunately, does not address the biggest foreign policy defeat of the USSR, which was the reorientation of Egypt to the United States after the death of President G. Putin. A. Nasser with the coming to power of his successor A. Sadat. This vivid episode was a serious warning against the unreasonableness of betting on the so-called revolutionary democrats. Great damage was done to Soviet prestige in the international arena, but no practical conclusions were drawn.

At the same time, I. D. Zvyagelskaya notes, one cannot deny the importance of the economic and educational projects that Moscow implemented in such countries as Syria, South Yemen, and Egypt, which contributed to their modernization. The author believes that the Soviet plans for the settlement of the Arab-Israeli conflict were also pragmatic, taking into account not only the requirements of the Arab side, but also the security interests of Israel. According to I. D. Zvyagelskaya, they were different from the political statements that "went off the scale with hatred of" imperialism and its minions " (p.148). However, we must not forget that in addition to anti-Israeli statements, the practical Soviet policy did not contribute to the development of trust in relations with Israel. The severance of relations with Israel in June 1967 was an unprecedented step in Soviet diplomatic practice, which, among other reasons, was dictated by the following task:

NOSENKO Tatyana Vsevolodovna-Candidate of Historical Sciences, Leading Researcher at the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

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preserving friendship with Arab regimes hostile to Israel-for many years deprived the USSR of the opportunity to act as an" honest intermediary " in the Middle East, to develop normal bilateral relations with the Jewish state.

In addition, as the author of the book rightly points out, in the situation of confrontation between the USSR and the United States, they could not adequately perceive the settlement plans put forward to the rival for fear that their implementation would bring unilateral advantages to the other side. In the 1970s, the USSR was successfully isolated from participation in the Middle East settlement through the "small steps" policy of H. Kissinger. For its part, the Soviet Union categorically rejected the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty and the Camp David accords as separate deals, although from today's positions it is impossible not to recognize their positive role in stabilizing the situation in the region, in consolidating provisions recognizing the national rights of the Palestinians.

Only during the period of Perestroika, when the Soviet Union took a course to reduce confrontation in relations with the United States and with the West as a whole, did tendencies to cooperate on certain conflict situations in the Middle East begin to manifest themselves. I. D. Zvyagelskaya managed to show with rare clarity and clarity for current researchers of Soviet foreign policy the acute confrontation in the Soviet leadership over the revision of relations relations with the West, which arose on the basis of the crisis in the Persian Gulf in 1990-1991. These pages of the book remind us of the close relationship between domestic political processes and foreign policy.

Until now, in the modern Russian historical and political science literature, the prevailing opinion is that the idealistic ideas about international relations of the then leader of the country, Mikhail Gorbachev, and his entourage led to unprecedented concessions to the West and catastrophically weakened the position of the USSR. Using the Kuwait crisis of 1990-1991 as an example, I. D. Zvyagelskaya argues in her book that cooperation between the USSR and the United States on a bilateral basis and at the UN level was just evidence of a pragmatic approach to foreign policy. Soviet-American cooperation, which was not without controversy, for the first time opened up the possibility of moving away from the practice of using conflicts to compete with great powers in the framework of the "zero-sum game", and marked the end of the Cold war. The position of the USSR "made it possible, in exchange for concessions, to maintain dynamism in Soviet-American relations and opened up the possibility of joint activities with the United States, including the convening of a peace conference on the Middle East settlement in Madrid under the co-chairmanship of both powers" (p.45).

But the international conference under the auspices of the United Nations, as shown in the book, has always been considered in Moscow as the most effective mechanism for resolving the Middle East conflict. Although the idea of a regional conference promoted by the Americans was different from the Soviet concept of an international conference, Soviet diplomacy actively joined the American efforts, believing that such a position would best contribute to the Middle East settlement and ensure the Soviet Union's own interests. The Madrid Conference, held in the fall of 1991, created a number of mechanisms for regional cooperation, prompted not very effective bilateral negotiations, and testified to the viability of the Soviet concept of a comprehensive settlement of the Middle East conflict. It is no coincidence that many years after the Madrid Conference, in 2015, at a new historical stage, both the Israeli and Palestinian sides are once again talking about the need to find a settlement with access to the regional level, with the involvement of all regional forces that can contribute to the search for a solution to the conflict.

The topic of the relationship between foreign and domestic policy reappears on the pages of the book in the section devoted to Russia's position on the events of recent years in the Arab East, which at first were optimistically called the "Arab Spring". The initial stage of unrest in the Arab world coincided in time (late 2011-early 2012) with the growing momentum in the Arab world. The movement for fair elections and the democratization of the political system in Russia. I. D. Zvyagelskaya accurately reveals the reasons why the Arab events began to be used by Russian "guardians" as an example of the destabilization of the situation by irresponsible internal players and, as a result, a conspiracy of external forces (pp. 74-83). From her point of view, the widespread perception that any political protest was incited from outside allowed the Russian leadership, faced with internal difficulties, to ensure the cohesion of the population in the face of advertised external threats. At the same time, the goal was achieved

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discrediting the opposition as a hostile and anti-patriotic phenomenon. The author notes that the theories of external conspiracies, which explain any anti-government actions, are easily assimilated by the Russian mass consciousness. The author sees the reasons for this both in the historically formed Russian anti-Westernism and in the negative experience of interaction with the West in the last two decades. Many Russians see the actions of the West as a desire to undermine Russia's position in the international arena, to deprive it of its status as a power that has a decisive voice in international affairs. In addition, for the interpreters of the Arab unrest from the standpoint of a conspiracy of the world's backstage, its anti-Russian essence consisted in attempts by the United States to establish control over Middle Eastern oil and thereby infringe on Russia's interests.

As a result, as the book points out, the changes taking place in the Arab world were presented in the context of the logic of the "cold war", they were considered exclusively as the result of manipulation, as the application of technologies developed for other societies to the Arab world (p.79). It should be noted that such simplistic behavior is not safe. It is in tune with the foreign policy attitudes that prevailed during the Soviet era to fight imperialism as the culprit of all conflict situations within and between countries. This perception of events often distorted the real picture and led to erroneous and sometimes tragic foreign policy decisions.

Choosing as an epigraph to one of the chapters on the " Arab awakening "the statement of the famous Russian philosopher N. A. Berdyaev, who argued that" the revolution always says that those in power have not fulfilled their purpose", I. D. Zvyagelskaya immediately outlined her position on the causes and nature of uprisings in the Arab world. She emphasizes that all of them had "common denominators - the desire to get rid of discredited regimes, corrupt elites who do not enjoy the trust of the population, ignore the challenges of our time and are concerned with their own preservation at any cost" (p. 61). The incomplete process of creating national states, fragmented society, in which the identity of its members is built more on the basis of the Ethnic, confessional, regional, and clan loyalties, rather than national interests and values, have become important factors in events in the Arab East.

At the same time, the author points out the need for a differentiated approach to uprisings in different Arab countries. After analyzing the regime changes in Tunisia and Egypt, she concludes that there is no reason to blame any external forces for the coups. However, the military operation in Libya, which led to the overthrow of Gaddafi and his destruction, as well as the support of anti-government protests in Syria by regional and some global powers can already be considered as direct interference in the internal affairs of Middle Eastern states. I. D. Zvyagelskaya proves that the interventionist policy in the Middle East directly affected Russia's security interests (p. 83).

I. D. Zvyagelskaya's book is interesting because it not only provides a professional and in-depth analysis of the history and events of recent years in the Middle East, but also examines a number of problems of modern international relations that pose new foreign policy challenges for Russia. Since 2003. The United States conducted a military intervention in Iraq, the goal and result of which was the overthrow of the regime of Saddam Hussein, the question of the permissibility of external armed intervention in the internal affairs of sovereign states is in the focus of attention of politicians and international experts around the world. As the author notes, for Russia, especially in the light of the negative Libyan experience in 2011, the main threat is "the transformation of military intervention into a universal tool for combating undesirable regimes" (p. 92). This view has also largely determined Russia's policy towards Syria: deterring military intervention against the Assad regime, rejecting bets on the victory of the opposition through external pressure, and disagreeing with asymmetric approaches to the government and the opposition.

The author nevertheless acknowledges that the norms of international law and international practice do not exclude external intervention in cases where political violence on the part of the State poses a threat to its own citizens. Then the principle of non-interference gives way to the principle of protecting the population. External intervention takes on the character of humanitarian intervention.

However, in the modern world, where there are no uniform criteria for assessing threats to the population, each of the "defenders" interprets them in accordance with their own political interests, in accordance with

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with their own ideas about the nature of the conflict and the price that will have to be paid for intervention. Therefore, the population of some countries is often more worthy of external protection than the population of other countries. Such selectivity is costly for the international community. In Syria, for example, at the initial stage of the confrontation between government forces and the opposition, an opportunity was missed to jointly prevent the chaos of a civil war. Today, this conflict, which has created a humanitarian catastrophe, spills over into the territories of Middle Eastern and European countries with hundreds of thousands of refugees. It is parasitized by all sorts of Islamic extremists, and above all the group calling itself the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), which forges personnel of suicide bombers. Its envoys are killing civilians in European countries, putting the lives of people in European cities under martial law. Major world powers are having a hard time finding ways to cooperate on the Syrian issue.

Recent events in the Middle East have highlighted the problem of radicalization of the Russian Muslim population in a new way. Opening this topic, the author emphasizes that while in Europe Muslims are mainly represented by migrants, in Russia they are an autochthonous population and have learned to "preserve their identity while remaining a minority" (p. 103). Indeed, unlike European countries, Russian Muslims are fully integrated into social structures, have no problems with overcoming the rungs of the social ladder, and are quite successful in the economic sphere. However, it should be taken into account that the Muslim population in Russia is also represented by huge immigration flows from neighboring countries of the former Soviet republics. Already today, the number of Muslim migrants in the Russian Federation is estimated at millions. Some of them settle in Russia, and there is reason to fear that their existence in Russian society may follow the European scenario. Not only socio-economic factors will play a role - lack of prospects for improving living standards, difficulties in obtaining a good education, etc.d. The strengthening of nationalist tendencies in the self-consciousness of Russians and the activities of right-wing nationalist groups will contribute to the development of alienation and protest moods among migrants, which, as is well known, entail the spread of radical ideology and the resort to violence. Apparently, from this point of view, both the positive and negative aspects of the European experience are very important for Russia.

The author, being a well-informed expert on the post-Soviet history of Central Asian countries, refers to the processes taking place not only among Russian Muslims, but also in the predominantly Muslim societies of the former Soviet Asian republics. I. D. Zvyagelskaya notes a number of similar internal reasons for the emergence of radical Islamist organizations resorting to terror in Russia and Central Asia. At the same time, she believes that external forces in the form of radical organizations, including those associated with Al-Qaeda, also have their influence. It concludes that revolutions and coups in the Arab world will not have a direct impact on the situation in Russia and Central Asia. However, its analysis shows that "the new political situation can create an additional breeding ground for nurturing and supporting Islamic radicals in areas that are part of Russia or are of vital importance to it" (p. 108).

Indeed, the recent experience demonstrates completely new challenges to Russian security that arise as a result of the expansion of the Middle East area controlled by Islamists, and as a result of their purposeful propaganda activities, carried out, in particular, through electronic social networks. Recruiting young people in the vast expanses of Russia and Central Asian countries, training them in special camps in the Middle East, and then returning them as killers and live explosive devices to their countries of origin are new ways of waging war, adopted by the builders of the"world caliphate". This is the first time that not only Russia, but all of humanity is facing a terrorist threat of this magnitude. This requires the development of equally new and unconventional means to combat it and a high level of solidarity among all members of the international community in confronting new challenges.

A large section of the book is devoted to Russia's relations with Israel. This is quite justified, since it reflects, as the author points out, the process of reformatting Russia's Middle East policy in recent decades. I. D. Zvyagelskaya managed to accurately analyze the specifics of Russia's relations with Israel. It is determined to a large extent by the fact that emigrants from Russia make up about 20% of the Israeli population, and some of them

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they retain Russian citizenship, which imposes special obligations on the Russian Federation. For its part, Russian-speaking immigration, moving into power, uses its connections and opportunities in Russia to develop contacts and cooperation between the two countries, sometimes, however, instilling in the Russian leadership overestimated ideas about the prospects of this interaction. Israel remains a predominantly Western-oriented country, especially the United States. A number of important projects in the military sphere, for example, were hindered not only by the Russian government's policy on the development of the defense industry, as described in the book, but also by US opposition. Almost all plans for cooperation in the energy sector, which is important for Russia, in connection with the discovery of new hydrocarbon deposits in Israel remain on paper.

The author rightly points out that the development of normal interstate relations does not exclude the emergence of friction, the discrepancy between the positions of Russia and Israel in the conflict context of the Middle East. Too different interests of the two countries lead to disagreements on issues such as the Iranian nuclear program, the nature and prospects of a political settlement in Syria. The Israelis are very averse to Russia's contacts with Hezbollah and Hamas, due to Moscow's attempts to take on the role of a mediator within the Quartet to resolve the conflict. This reveals fundamental differences in the Russian and Israeli assessments of an organization such as Hamas.

In her work, I. D. Zvyagelskaya emphasizes that Hamas members are perceived by the Palestinians as "their own people, for whom the problems of creating a socially just society are at the forefront." She says that a number of researchers consider Hamas "an Islamist, national and social movement that organically combines all three areas of activity" (pp. 181-182). A different view prevails in the Israeli expert community, and in Israeli society as a whole, according to which the charitable and social components of Hamas ' activities cannot be separated from its true terrorist nature. This argument is used by the Israeli leadership to deny the possibility of conducting any negotiations with representatives of Hamas. However, as it is also mentioned in the book, such closed contacts exist, and it was thanks to them that it was possible, in particular, to resolve the issue of the release of Israeli Corporal G. Shalit from captivity in 2011.

Russia's desire to reach a new level of participation as a mediator in resolving Middle East problems seems to have prospects. Comparing the current state of affairs with the situation in the 1990s, I. D. Zvyagelskaya points out that even at that time, the Russian side received non-trivial and interesting proposals in the field of settlement, primarily when the Foreign Ministry was headed by E. M. Primakov. However, at that time, neither the US side showed proper attention to expanding cooperation with Russia in this area, nor the top Russian leadership considered the Middle East settlement a priority. But Russia's participation, as the author writes, "could help soften, or rather rationalize, the position" of its allies (pp. 167-170). In today's difficult circumstances in the Middle East, such an assessment of Russia's role and capabilities is becoming very relevant.

In the section of the book devoted to the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the author managed to present this complex problem of international relations in a balanced way, relying on the latest research in this area by Russian, Israeli, and American experts. Much attention is paid to the plans and ideas for resolving the conflict, among which a special place is occupied by direct Palestinian-Israeli negotiations that unfolded in the 1990s and became known as the Oslo process. The book's analysis of the complex circumstances of the conflict itself and the reasons for the political process slowing down in both societies actually refutes the widespread perception that the wave of violence and the increase in terrorist activity on the part of the Palestinians were the result of the Oslo process. The author emphasizes the historical significance of this model of negotiations, which for the first time Israelis conducted directly with the leaders of the Palestinian resistance. Given the protracted nature of the conflict with numerous mutual claims against each other regarding past grievances and injustices, it was especially important for the parties to agree not to argue about the history of their relations. Although the negotiations ended in failure, I. D. Zvyagelskaya argues that the Oslo process was not "wasted time" (p. 179). Through negotiations and direct contacts, the idea of creating a Palestinian State, which for decades was rejected by the Israeli political establishment, was recognized, albeit with many reservations, as a necessary goal of settlement.

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I. D. Zvyagelskaya concludes that the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, with its pronounced tendency to stagnate in the settlement process, currently poses less of a challenge to Russia's security and interests in general than political instability and strategic uncertainty in the Arab world. The events of autumn 2015 and the beginning of the Russian military operation in Syria confirm Russia's concern about developments in the Arab East and its desire to achieve stabilization of the situation and further political settlement of conflict situations.

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