A new book by Philip Carl Salzman, professor at McGill University, which has what Dan Pipes says is a “deceptively plain title,” Culture and Conflict in the Middle East, focuses on the two “distinctive,” “key” patterns of rule that historically have dominated the region: tribal autonomy and tyrannical centralism.

In essence, “Middle Easterners living in deserts, mountains, and steppes protect life and limb by relying on their extended families.”