Tunisia Since the Arab Conquest: The Saga of a Westernized Muslim State

Jacob Abadi. 2013. Tunisia Since the Arab Conquest: The Saga of a Westernized Muslim State. Reading, UK: Ithaca Press and Southern Court. 586 pp.

This book is a general review of the history of Tunisia, which is a tumultuous, rich, and varied history. Tunisia is a country that has managed to forge an identity that distinguishes it from other Arab countries and North Africa. In his introduction, Jacob Abadi discusses Tunisia's bibliographic sources, which contain all the great names in the history of Islam in North Africa and Ifriqiya. These sources are rich and varied. This means that Abadi's study is scientifically based, and can be seen as an accurate window on the history of Tunisia and its Mediterranean environment, an environment that encompasses the northern Mediterranean (Sicily, Sardinia, Spain) and southern Mediterranean, both to the east (Libya, Egypt) and the west (Algeria, Morocco).

Abadi begins his history with the Arab conquest of Ifriqya but fails to discuss that the past of this region, as an autonomous entity, dates back to the Carthaginians, Romans, and Byzantines. Located in the center of the Mediterranean, Ifriqya played a major role in trade. It was a target for...