Saqi Books is an independent UK publisher co-founded in 1984 by author and feminist Mai Ghoussoub to "print quality academic and general interest books on the Middle East". It now claims to be "the UK's largest publisher of Middle Eastern and Arabic titles". Its titles include cookery and travel books.

On its 21st Anniversary in 2004, The Independent praised it for 'issuing titles that stimulate and challenge - books with "editorial audacity"'

It has bookshops in London and Beirut and in 2008 held its 25th anniversity celebration at Kensington Town Hall featuring musician Brian Eno, Turkish author Moris Farhi and British author Maggie Gee.

The Syrian uprising is an ongoing, violent internal conflict in Syria. It is part of the wider Arab Spring, a wave of upheaval throughout the Arab world. Public demonstrations across Syria began on 26 January 2011 and developed into a nationwide uprising. Protesters demanded the resignation of President Bashar al-Assad, the overthrow of his government, and an end to nearly five decades of Ba’ath Party rule.

Since spring 2011, the Syrian government has deployed the Syrian Army to quell the uprising. Several cities have been besieged, but nevertheless the unrest continues. According to witnesses, soldiers who refused to open fire on civilians were summarily executed by the Syrian Army. The Syrian government denied reports of defections, and blamed "armed gangs" for causing trouble. Since early autumn 2011, civilians and army defectors began forming fighting units, which began an insurgency campaign against the Syrian Army. The insurgents unified under the banner of the Free Syrian Army and fought in an increasingly organized fashion; however, the civilian component of the armed opposition lacks an organized leadership.

Gilbert Achcar (born 1951 in Senegal) is a Lebanese academic, writer, socialist and antiwar activist. He lived in Lebanon until moving to France in 1983. He taught politics and international relations at the University of Paris VIII until 2003, when he took up a position at the Marc Bloch Centre in Berlin. Since August 2007, Achcar has been Professor of Development Studies and International Relations at the School of Oriental and African Studies of the University of London.

He is a frequent contributor to Le Monde Diplomatique, ZNet, and International Viewpoint.

Gilbert Achcar is a Fellow at the International Institute for Research and Education.

In March 2011, he wrote an article for ZNet that provoked a wide debate within the international left on the position towards the coalition intervention in Libya for humanitarian reasons. [1]