Examines Israeli-Palestinian relations, the PLO, Israeli politics, Lebanese factions, news reporting from the Middle East, and other issues of the Middle East.

Includes index. "Updated with a new chapter." Originally published: New York : Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1989. Removed from NDU List of January 2006. Previously on NDU President's List. Reprint. Originally published: New York : Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1989.

A Middle East chronology -- 1. Prelude : from Minneapolis to Beirut -- Beirut. 2. Would you like to eat now or wait for the cease-fire? -- 3. Beirut : city of versions -- 4. Hama rules -- 5. The Teflon guerrilla -- 6. Inside the kaleidoscope : the Israeli invasion of Lebanon -- 7. Poker, Beirut-style -- 8. Betty Crocker in Dante's inferno -- 9. The end of something -- 10. Time to go -- Jerusalem. 11. Crosswinds -- 12. Whose country is this, anyway? -- 13. The fault line -- 14. The earthquake -- 15. Under the spotlight -- 16. Israel and American Jews : who is dreaming about whom? -- Washington. 17. From Beirut to Jerusalem to Washington -- 18. Talking with my grocer -- 19. Buying a ticket -- Acknowledgments -- Index.