The Iraqi Marshlands

This text is for those wishing to develop an understanding of a cultural legacy and lifestyle that survives today only as a fragmented cultural inheritance. The book illustrates how the economy and lives of the Ma'dan (Marsh Arabs) that spans over 5000 years remained similar to the ancient practices of their Sumerian forebears.

The Mesopotamian marshes are important for economic, social, and biodiversity values and have been home to indigenous human communities for millennia. They are regarded as a legendary site. This multi-authored book contains chapters written by world-renowned experts in their field. Both basic and applied information are made available, making the book a must-have for a wide spectrum of users. For example, an understanding of the natural and the social aspects of the marshes, as described here, is an obvious prerequisite for a pest management plan in this area. Scholars interested in wetlands can use this book as a guide to compare different wetlands areas in Asia. The bibliography section contains valuable references to the marsh areas and research in the field. This book serves as an up-to-date comprehensive source of information on different aspects of the southern marshes of Iraq and is aimed at academic scholars, environmentalists, and decision makers.

Contains 17 contributions addressing the many human and environmental dimensions of the assault on the Iraqi marshlands by the government of Saddam Hussein during the 1980s and 1990s. This volume is based on the second and final report on the Marshlands and Marsh Dwellers of Southern Mesopotamia.

The gripping history of the devastation and resurrection of the Marshes of Iraq, an environmental treasure of the Middle East, now a protected site The Mesopotamian Marshes in southern Iraq, once the largest wetland system on the planet, have been inhabited for thousands of years by the Ma‘dan, or Marsh Arabs, but they remain remote, isolated, and virtually unknown. In the early 1990s, the Saddam Hussein regime drained the Marshes and set out to destroy not only a critical ecosystem but a unique way of life as well. It stands as one of the greatest environmental and humanitarian disasters of the twentieth century. In the wake of the 2003 US invasion of Iraq, local residents destroyed the earthen dams built to divert water from the wetlands and the Marshes were reflooded. Their future, however, is in peril. The Ghosts of Iraq’s Marshes tells the history of the creation, destruction, and revitalization of the Marshes and their inhabitants against the backdrop of the dramatic events that have convulsed Iraq in the past fifty years. It follows the life of Jassim al-Asadi, an irrigation engineer who was jailed and tortured under Saddam Hussein and who subsequently dedicated his life to the reflooding and restoration of the Marshes. He eventually contributed to the Marshes being declared a UNESCO World Heritage site. Jassim is eminently relatable, and the stories of his life and other marsh dwellers are infused with pathos, tragedy, humor, and passion.

It was the legendary traveller Wilfred Thesiger who first introduced Gavin Young to the Marshes of Iraq. Since then Young has been entranced by both the beauty of the Marshes and by the Marsh Arabs who inhabit them, a people whose lifestyle is almost unchanged from that of their predecessors, the Ancient Sumerians. On his return to the Marshes some years later Gavin Young found that the twentieth-century had rudely intruded on this lifestyle and that war was threatening to make the Marsh Arabs existence extinct. Return to the Marshes, first published in 1977, is at once a moving tribute to a unique way of life as well as a love story to a place and its people. 'A superbly written essay which combines warmth of personal tone, a good deal of easy historical scholarship and a talent for vivid description rarely found outside good fiction.' Jonathan Raban, Sunday Times

With a penchant for wine and women, Tyler is not the kind of man to let the law stand in his way. Rich, arrogant and spoiled, when his love of wine and cognac leads to the death of a young couple walking along a country lane, he'll do anything to avoid the consequences - including driving his car to his property in Mallorca so the English police can't examine it. When Superior Chief Salas orders all inspectors on the island to determine whether Tyler is in their area, laid-back Inspector Enrique Alvarez regards it, like all work, as an unwanted interruption to his lifestyle. He soon discovers, however, that this routine inquiry has far-reaching consequences he could never have foreseen.

The Wetland Book is a comprehensive resource aimed at supporting the trans- and multidisciplinary research and practice which is inherent to this field. Aware both that wetlands research is on the rise and that researchers and students are often working or learning across several disciplines, The Wetland Book is a readily accessible online and print reference which will be the first port of call on key concepts in wetlands science and management. This easy-to-follow reference will allow multidisciplinary teams and transdisciplinary individuals to look up terms, access further details, read overviews on key issues and navigate to key articles selected by experts.

This edited volume is based on the best papers accepted for presentation during the 1st Springer Conference of the Arabian Journal of Geosciences (CAJG-1), Tunisia 2018. The book compiles a wide range of topics addressing various issues by experienced researchers mainly from research institutes in the Mediterranean, MENA region, North America and Asia. Remote sensing observations can close gaps in information scarcity by complementing ground-based sparse data. Spatial, spectral, temporal and radiometric characteristics of satellites sensors are most suitable for features identification. The local to global nature and broad spatial scale of remote sensing with the wide range of spectral coverage are essential characteristics, which make satellites an ideal platform for mapping, observation, monitoring, assessing and providing necessary mitigation measures and control for different related Earth's systems processes. Main topics in this book include: Geo-informatics Applications, Land Use / Land Cover Mapping and Change Detection, Emerging Remote Sensing Applications, Rock Formations / Soil Lithology Mapping, Vegetation Mapping Impact and Assessment, Natural Hazards Mapping and Assessment, Ground Water Mapping and Assessment, Coastal Management of Marine Environment and Atmospheric Sensing.

The past two decades have witnessed the emergence of a large body of research examining the linkage between environmental scarcity, violent conflict, and cooperation. However, this environmental security polemic is still trying to deliver a well-defined approach to achieving peace. Studies are being undertaken to find the precise pathways by which cooperative actions are expected not only to pre-empt or moderate resource conflicts but also to help diffuse cooperative behaviour to other disputed issues. The recognition that environmental resources can contribute to violent conflict accentuates their potential significance as pathways for cooperation and the consolidation of peace in post-conflict societies. Conceived as a single and reliable reference source which will be a vital resource for students, researchers, and policy makers alike, the Routledge Handbook of Environmental Conflict and Peacebuilding presents a wide range of chapters written by key thinkers in the field, organised into four key parts: Part I: Review of the concept and theories; Part II: Review of thematic approaches (resources, scarcity, intervention, adaptation, and peacebuilding); Part III: Case studies (Middle East, Iraq, Jordan, Liberia, Nepal, Colombia, Philippines); Part IV: Analytical challenges and future-oriented perspectives. Enabling the reader to find a concise expert review on topics that are most likely to arise in the course of conducting research or policy making, this volume presents a truly global overview of the key issues and debates in environmental conflict and peacebuilding.