Includes bibliographical references (pages 203-207) and index.

Many believe that a final peace between the Arabs and Israel will bring an end to all problems in the Middle East. Maybe that is due to the fact that the Arab-Israeli conflict has dominated much of the discussion about the region over the past fifty years. Consequently, insufficient attention has been devoted to other important elements of instability and conflict faced by Middle Eastern countries, including the autocratic nature of the regimes and the struggle for power, interstate ideological divides, military antagonism and race, ambitions and structures of armed forces, sectarian minorities and religious rivalry, ethnic heterogeneity and minorities, border disputes, disparity in economic development, social impacts of economic constraints, divergence in petroleum policies, struggles over water, demographic explosion, disparity in population growth, and troubles caused by foreign labour migration, internal flight and flows of refugees. These factors of instability and sources of conflict remain the greatest threats to the security of petroleum supplies from the Middle East.

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