Best of 2025
I've just returned from a whirlwind trip to Denmark and Norway, where I gave four book talks – a million thanks to the University of Copenhagen and DIIS, Aarhus University, NUPI and the University of Oslo – about America's Middle East: The Ruination of a Region. I also partnered with Morten Valbjørn to run a fantastic POMEPS workshop at Aarhus on rethinking (or at least better specifying) key concepts and assumptions about International Relations in the Middle East. Those papers will be published early next year, so I won't say more about that now.
It was fascinating hearing the responses from so many Danish and Norwegian academics, journalists and (former) diplomats with long experience in the region but outside of the American bubble. As you'd expect, there were a lot of questions about Trump, and particularly about the recent National Security Strategy's declaration of civilizational war against Europe and the baffling escalation in Venezuala. Perhaps the most interesting single question came from a Danish scholar in Cophenhagen, who pointed out how quickly the long and special relationship Danish alliance with the United States turned into Trump's attempt to annex Greenland and break up the European Union – taken seriously enough that last week a Danish intelligence report identified the United States as a threat. Should Denmark's recent experience with Washington, the Danish scholar asked, not make Israel worry that its special relationship with Washington could deteriorate as rapidly, and that it could be treated as badly by its ostensible friend?
Good question. I'm working on a piece for early next year on the impact of a year of Trump and what to expect going forward – look for that after the new year. In the meantime, I want to close out 2025 by reviving an old tradition: Abu Aardvark's Best Books of the Year! Would it be obnoxious to include my own book, which is still on sale as an ebook for less than $15? It would be weird. Everyone else should put it on their lists, though. Wait, what about if I promoted my Cambridge Element What is the Middle East: The Theory and Practice of Regions, a creative and thought-provoking exploration of the stakes and processes by which the Middle East came to be viewed as a region, expressly designed for course adoption? Nah, that would be gauche.
My top non-academic book of the year is Omar El Akkad's One Day Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This. I've recommended this one repeatedly, and it's never been more prescient as we watch a parade of Biden administration officials try and posture like they were always internal critics of his Gaza policy. But, as per tradition, here I want to highlight the academic books which don't get considered for National Book Awards. The following list is books I read in 2025 – I'm sure there are books that came out this year that I haven't read yet (really! it happens!), or books that came out before this year that I just read recently (which don't qualify for this list). These are in alphabetical order, not ranked.
My top (academic) books of the year
Rana Khoury, Civilizing Contention: International Aid in Syria's War (Cornell University Press, 2025). I haven't reviewed this recently released book (yet), but you'll definitely be hearing more about it soon. For now, I'll just say that it's an extremely well-written, thoughtful, and innovative examination of the move by Syrian political activists into humanitarian work. It shows the opportunities and tensions of the humanitarian space for such activists, and the competing imperatives shaping international relief organizations and local aid networks. It's a fascinating contribution to a growing literature which should interest people across mutliple disciplines.
Stephane Lacroix, Twilight of the Saints: The History and Politics of Salafism in Contemporary Egypt (Columbia University Press, 2025). In my review, I called this "a definitive and groundbreaking account of Egyptian salafism which weaves together politics, theology, institutions, and intra-Islamist contention into an authoritative account of a still relatively understudied trend....Lacroix places Egypt's salafi movement fully within the broader context of the country's complex and constantly changing Islamic field, showing how it was shaped by interactions and competition with the Muslim Brotherhood, violent jihadist movements, al-Azhar and the religious establishment, and new forms of televised and online Islamic evangelism... At the same time, he takes salafism seriously as a movement, tracking its institutional dynamics and internal schisms and debates."
Erik Skare, The Road to October 7: A Brief History of Palestinian Islamism (Verso, 2025). In my review, I said: "His nuanced, careful analysis shows not only what those organizations did, but how they thought about their choices and the debates, both internal and public, which shaped those choices. This isn’t one of those sensationalist books or an instant history — it’s a serious work of historical scholarship written in an accessible way that should be of broad interest... Skare show how the demands of governance changed the internal balance of power inside Hamas and between Hamas and its rivals. He traces the divergence between the political leadership based outside Gaza and the military leadership and actual governance institutions inside over the long years of Israel’s blockade. He’s particularly interesting in discussing how Israeli assassinations of political leaders and the failures of political gambits promoted by the “moderate” or outside leadership — such as the revision of the Charter, ceasefire proposals, and especially the Great March of Return (where nonviolent mass marches towards the security perimeter were met with deadly Israeli sniper fire and little positive international response) — strengthened the hand of Yehya Sinwar and the hardline military factions."
Alissa Walter, Contested City: Citizen Advocacy and Survival in Modern Baghdad (Stanford University Press, 2025). In my review, I said "Walter is one of the leading scholars producing innovative scholarship in part through the systematic examination of the Ba’ath Party archives captured in the 2003 war and made available to scholars at the Hoover Institution (she talks about the ethical and practical issues with using that archive in the book and on the podcast). She convincingly describes a surprisingly decentralized form of governance in Saddam-era Baghdad, as neighborhood level officials became the primary point of contact for citizens. By reviewing citizen petitions and demands on these local officials, Walter offers an account of Iraqi politics which accords far more agency and resilience to citizens navigating economic hardship and authoritarian rule. And those times were tough indeed: building on the pathbreaking work by Dina Khoury, Walter shows the individual and social effects of the Iran-Iraq war, the Gulf war, and the post-1991 sanctions regime — and how women, war veterans, families of martyrs and others were able to press their demands on the state. It’s a wonderfully written, deeply researched, and highly original contribution to our understanding of Iraqi politics."
Sean Yom, Jordan: Politics in an Accidental Crucible (Oxford Univerity Press, 2025). This one hasn't been reviewed on the blog (yet) but it is really terrific – the best comprehensive overview of the Jordanian political system since Curtis Ryan's Jordan and the Arab Uprisings nearly a decade ago. Yom brings a savvy, innovative eye to the Jordanian scene, neatly skewering a wide range of traditional assumptions about the Kingdom's politics. I will reserve the rest of my comments for a later time.
Transregional Bonus: Judith Scheele, Shifting Sands: A Human History of the Sahara (Basic Books, 2025). This is a phenomenally interesting, deeply researched, and innovative exploration of lived life across history in the Sahara which has a great deal to say about the relationship between North Africa and the Sahel, racial politics across northern Africa, and the nature of connectivity across these different subregions. Scheele has spent many years living and studying in these communities, and it shows as she brings complex theoretical arguments and historical debates to vivid life. I loved this one, check it out even if it isn't your usual jam.
Top ten albums, in case anyone cares: Best album of the year: Hayley Williams, Ego Death at a Bachelorette Party (Don't like it? Come find me in Whole Foods, bitch, I don't care.) Another nine albums I loved: Lily Allen's West End Girl, Margo Price's Hard Headed Woman, David Byrne's Who is the Sky?, Sudan Archive's THE BPM, Bruce Springsteen's Nebraska '82, Wednesday's Bleeds, Oliva Dean's The Art of Loving, Julien Baker and Torres's Send a Prayer My Way, Clipse's Let God Sort Em Out. (Yep, the new Taylor Swift album didn't make the cut. It sucked.) (Spotify disagrees with me, by the way: according to their year-end wrap, my favorite song is in fact Rockabye Your Bear by The Wiggles. I think I know to blame for that!)
