'pbBabylone, the Mille and Le Nuits, Saladin... History and legends are confused in ancient mesopotamia. This cradle of humanity has experienced a series of violent breaks: Baath dictatorship, war against Iran, brokered in Kuwait in 1990, devastating embargo, a deadly as unpredictable foreign occupation and, more recently, the barbarism of the Islamic State...’/p’pbQui looks at the case of Iraq, from specialists with the best knowledge of mere observers, has the greatest difficulty in understanding the social and political dynamics at work: American military defeat? nascent democracy? return to authoritarianism? jihadist chaos?... '/pb’pbMyriam Benraad, one of Iraq’s best specialists, analyses and elucidates the various facets of Iraq, which are known mainly through images surrounding its history and prism distorting media shortcuts in recent times.