Last week we posted 10 quotes that shred progressivism from a best-selling British author who left the Left.

The author of those quotes from her book, "Guardian Angel," is Melanie Phillips, not only a best-selling author, but an award winning British journalist, known for her vigorous defense of authentic Liberal values against those attempting to destroy Western society from within. As a journalist, Phillips is best known for a long-running controversial column on political and social issues in the Daily Mail, following lengthy stints at the Guardian, Observer and the Sunday Times. As an author, her titles include among others the best-selling 2006 book, "Londonistan" on the causes and effects of the growing jihadist population in Great Britain and her most recent 2010 book "The World Turned Upside Down: The Global Battle over God, Truth and Power."

Melanie was kind enough to sit down with Blaze Books and discuss some of her favorite books. Below are her three books to understand the Middle East, which serve as supplements to her vital "Londonistan." This is the second in a series of posts resulting from our conversation. If you missed the first post, check out 3 books that will change your philosophy: faith, secularism and the American mind.

1. The Strong Horse: Power, Politics, and the Clash of Arab Civilizations by Lee Smith

Phillips describes this book as “vital to understand the mindset of the Muslim/Arab world which will always go with the strong horse, even if it is against their own interest” and which explains for example why various Middle Eastern countries with no great love for Iran will cozy up to Iran. In Phillips’ view, once President Obama was elected, the “American role was over as far as the Middle East was concerned.”

2. The Mind of Jihad by Laurent Murawiec

Phillips notes that this title looks at Islam in a historical context and shows an enormously strong link between Islamic supremacism and Soviet Communism both from an ideological and tactical perspective.

3. Assassins of the Turquoise Palace by Roya Hakakian

Phillips argues that "Assassins of the Turquoise Palace" is essential to understand Iran and why we cannot possibly hope to negotiate successfully with them. Roya Hakakian's novel is written like a thriller, but is entirely factual as an account of how Iranian opposition in the 1990s murdered a man, and how the investigation then proceeded – illuminating the nature of the Iranian regime authentically.