The book · Forthcoming July 2026
Mosul Eye: A Scholar’s Clandestine War Against ISIS — by Omar Mohammed, with a foreword by Pope Francis. Forthcoming from Skyhorse Publishing on 21 July 2026.
The first three years of the Mosul Eye archive — from the morning of 17 June 2014, when the city fell to the so-called Islamic State, through the years of occupation, to the city’s liberation in 2017 — drawn together by their author into a book.
Foreword by Pope Francis
His Holiness Pope Francis contributed the foreword to Mosul Eye: A Scholar’s Clandestine War Against ISIS. In it he writes of the historian’s witness — of the value, in a world that grows used to looking away, of someone who chose to stay and to write. The foreword was completed during his pontificate; it appears in full in the book’s opening pages.
For the broader record of Pope Francis’s engagement with Mosul — including his 2021 visit to the city, the prayers said in the ruins of the Old City, and the meanings the visit carried for Mosulis themselves — see the Mosul Eye archive entry In Memoriam: Pope Francis — A Light That Reached the Ruins of Mosul.
What the book is
The book is a memoir of a historian who chose his city over his safety, and an archive made book. It is composed of the dispatches Omar Mohammed wrote anonymously between June 2014 and July 2017, the personal narrative of how those dispatches were kept under occupation, and the longer historical reflection on what Mosul lost and what it might yet recover.
It is published by Skyhorse Publishing, edited and prepared for general readers, and will be carried by independent and academic booksellers around the world from July 2026.
Praise for the book
Advance praise from public figures, scholars, journalists, jurists, and voices from inside Iraq itself.
“What Mosul Eye produced matched the quality of the finest intelligence reporting — yet it came from a single individual, operating alone. He is my hero.”
— General David H. Petraeus, Former Director of the CIA
“A meticulous and unflinching work of witness — by a young historian who refused to let his city be destroyed in silence.”
— Hillary Rodham Clinton, 67th U.S. Secretary of State
“Omar Mohammed has been tested under fire. He is not only a scholar but also a hero.”
— Karim A. A. Khan KC, Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court · Founding UN Special Adviser & Head of UNITAD (2018–2021)
“Through his blog, a sentinel in the night, he transmitted to the world fragments of truth torn from the darkness.”
— Audrey Azoulay, Former Director-General of UNESCO (2017–2025)
“Omar Mohammed is the bravest and most admirable man I have met — and this is a book fully worthy of him. It is at once a thriller and a meditation; a warning and a reassurance; a story that is both as dark as the darkest night and radiant with the light of hope.”
— Tom Holland, historian and broadcaster · Author of Dominion
The full record of praise — thirty endorsements drawn from statecraft, intelligence, the United Nations, justice, journalism, scholarship, the voices of Mosul itself, and the wider region — is collected at Praise for Mosul Eye.
The companion site
A dedicated companion website for the book is published at book.mosul-eye.org. It carries the full press wall, the praise wall, the photographs, links to all booksellers and translations, and the longer biographical material on the author. Pre-orders are linked from the book site as they become available.
For booksellers, librarians, and journalists
- Booksellers and librarians. The book is published by Skyhorse Publishing, with distribution through Simon & Schuster (US trade) and standard academic-wholesale channels. ISBN: 9781510785670. Release date: 21 July 2026.
- Journalists and reviewers. Advance review copies, high-resolution author portraits, cover images, and excerpts will be available through the publisher closer to release; for project-side enquiries please write to info@mosul-eye.org.
- Educators. The book is suitable for courses in modern Middle Eastern history, the history of cultural heritage, conflict studies, and the practice of contemporary documentary work. Translation rights enquiries to Skyhorse rights department.
The book draws on the first three years of the Mosul Eye archive (2014–2017). The archive itself continues. To follow the work as it is published, subscribe and support the archive; to read the historian’s longer essay on heritage and visual memory in Mosul, see Space, Time and People.