Avi Shlaim was born in Baghdad in 1945 and grew up in Israel where he did national service from 1964 to 66. He is now a Professor of International Relations at St Antony's College, Oxford.
His previous books include Collusion across the Jordan (winner of the 1988 Political Studies Association's W. J. M. Mackenzie Prize); The Politics of Partition (1990 and 1998); War and Peace in the Middle East: A Concise History (1995) and The Cold War and the Middle East (co-editor, 1997).
Avi Shlaim is a frequent contributor to the newspapers and a commentator on radio and television on Middle East affairs.
