4 comments about The Jewish War: A Novel (Library of Modern Jewish Literature).

1. This is as provocative and timely a book as it was when it appeared in the middle of the last decade. Achingly funny and profund, it goes far to delineate the psychology and religious doctrine that guides Jewish fundamentalists. It is rare to encounter a book so funny that never diminishes the complexity it aspires to portray. Reich is a magnificient writer and a very sharp thinker.



2. For those who don't know, there are two types of 'ultra'orthodox, those that do not believe in the existence of Israel, and those that believe in the Kingdom of Israel that includes the west bank (Judea and Samaria). Both exist in big helpings in this book. In fact the only sane people are the Israeli Sabras who with everyone, including the Arabs, would shut up and go on with life.
   
   The reason I gave this book three stars is that it has four parts and the first three are great. They are a funny, irreverent, and satiric comment modern day religious extremism. Jerry Goldberg is a messianic orthodox jew who metamorphosis from Bronx social worker and Catskills camp counselor into Yehudi HaGoel, terrorist and polygamous leader of a band of American Jewish zealots who establish a short-lived secessionist Kingdom of Judea and Samaria based at Hebron on Israel's West Bank.
   
   Joining Jerry/Yehudi in this doomed quest are his three wives (a Barnard-educated English literature scholar, a mail-order swindler and a conflicted divorcee); Jerry's trusted comrade, Herbie Levy (Hoshea HaLevi) of Brooklyn; and fellow Uzi-toting fanatics willing to die for their cause. Swinging from broad farce to tragic confrontation. Also along is the Reverand Charles 'Chuck' Buck, fast-talking evangelical preacher who joins forces with Yehudi to further his goal of building a Christian theme park on Jerusalem's Temple Mount.
   
   Buck's sister Pam, has converted to judaism; to swell the ranks of The Messiah-Waiters, an ultraorthodox, anti-Zionist movement, she kidnaps boys. She is pursued by an old Arab sheikh (the spiritual brother of her blessedly passed on husband), Abu Salman, who's obeying a vision to marry her in order to produce a child.
   
   The Jewish War which starts out as a comic vision of how the orthodox spend their summers in the Catskills, to an overly dramatic conclusion in the ancient city of Hebron. As the story advances, early absurdity and comic exhilaration begin to disappear. At the end, we are left with the absurdity alone, which is a poor foundation for a reasonble ending.



3. The other reviewers' notes on this book's humor notwithstanding, do not expect to laugh out loud, IMHO. Although Reich valiantly attempts to convey an important story through humor, her approach ultimately fails to make good on the best outcome of humor: to take us out of our limited perspectives and connect us to deeper meaning. The book does convey the deep emptiness of fundamentalist thinking and its spiritual depletion. Unfortunately, unless you can follow Reich's path closely, the novel itself has that feel by the end, not having created any larger framework of meaning around the profound futility of what is described.



4. As in most of her other works, Tova Reich has much to say about Jewish Messianic movements in The Jewish War; for the most part, she shows the horrible outcome when Jews try to bring about the redemption themselves, revealing her knowledge of Jewish history, with its failed Messiahs like Sabbatai Zevi and Jacob Frank. But she adds more modern concerns about cults and their charismatic leaders, making the mass suicide at the end, with shades of Jonestown, all the more plausible. As readers of Reich's fiction know she also brings in characters from previous works, here particularly from The Master of the Return. And as in all of her works (with the exception of My Holocaust) Reich balances satire and pathos like a woman on a high wire.

5 comments about A Threat from Within: A History of Jewish Opposition to Zionism.

1. This is a groundbreaking book, as an american jew, I strongly resent my religious and cultural heritage being co-opted by zionism. This book precisely lays out what is exactly at stake ---- the very heart of a jewish identity. The typical tribalist zionist is most threatened by such an analysis because this book deals in-depth, with the dirty secret of zionism, its profound antipathy toward the core jewish traditions. I have read many great and not-so-great books on the middle east, but this book is different, it places the whole zionist program in a very different light, only partially discussed in other writings, such as Original Sins: Reflections on the History of Zionism and Israel by Benjamin Beit-Hallahmi. Any too easy dismissal of this truly important book can only be considered fatuous, at best. Perhaps the most important concept to consider is that Rabkin thinks that jews have persisted over time because of values that transcend the state, nations come and go, Israel is a crude attempt to subvert this and to artificially establish a jewish state in a place and way that goes against almost all jewish values. Indeed, Rabkin asks what is the thing now that makes Israel a jewish state? Is it religion, a lifestyle, a history, a culture, etc. He answers in the negative, the thing holding it together as a state is a common place nationalist quest, not unlike any other on the planet, nothing special here and an effort doomed to ultimate failure. The last time something like this was tried, the Jewish presence in Palestine was essentially destroyed by the Romans.
   Do buy this book, religious or not, zionist or not, if you are intellectually open minded, this could be a watershed for you.



2. Rabkin builds up a strawman that he calls "Zionism" in order to justify
   his opposition to Israel. He posits a violently anti-religious movement that sought to rebel against G-d and which all the Rabbis opposed ideologically. Unfortunately, this is a very superficial description of the true historical record. It turns out that in reality, mass aliyah was first proposed by both the Hasidic followers of the Ba'al Shem Tov and the Vilna Gaon in the 18th century. True, there are those who claim, like the Satmar Rav, Rav Yoel Teitelbaum that mass aliyah is forbidden by the "3 oaths" mentioned in the Talmud, Tractate Ketubot, but we see that many, actually most scholars have refuted this. Regarding the supposedly
   anti-religious nature of the Zionism, yes, there is a branch that was and is still militantly anti-religious, but there is on the other hand, a very religious element, too, and it has been there from the beginnings of modern political Zionism in the 19th century. The famous Netziv from Volozhin (one of the top leaders of the traditional Orthodox Jewish community in the late 19th century and head of the famed Volozhin Yeshiva) was a member of Hovevei Zion, a proto-Zionist movement that included non-religious people. A famous photograph of a meeting of the Mizrachi religious Zionist movement in Warsaw around the year 1900 shows rows of bearded, black-coated Rabbis. Thus it is UNTRUE to claim that ALL the traditional Orthodox rabbinical leadership was anti-Zionist. The fact of the matter is that most of this group (which later organized itself as the Agudat Israel movement) had mixed feelings, supporting building the Jewish community in Eretz Israel (the Land of Israel) but worried about
   the anti-religious nature of many of the leaders of the Zionist movement.
   Agudat Israel later agreed, upon the establishment of the State of Israel,
   to sit in its parliament and participate in national and social issues. The large majority of Haredi (Ultra-Orthodox) Jews vote in the elections. This does not mean that they subscribe to all the values of the Zionist movement, there is a great debate going on as to how involved religious Jews of this type should get involved, but the large majority care about Israel, work for its security and support it in the international arena.
   Rabkin claims that "really" these people are anti-Zionists (I would define them as non-Zionists since many don't believe the all Jews are REQUIRED to live in Israel and because they oppose military service for various reasons) but they have been "bought-off" by the Zionist establishment. Well, it has been discovered that the spokesman for a radical religious anti-Zionist movement was on Yasser Arafat's payroll for years, so we can just as easily claim that the anti-Zionists have been
   paid off. In any event, this claim takes away any matter of choice from
   people, claiming that there support for Israel is "really" from base motives, saying that the people really are "stupid". That is why I say to Rabkin and to the current post-Zionist leadership of Israel, that it was the JEWISH PEOPLE who built Israel, not the "Zionist Leadership" of the time, and it belongs to the Jewish people, not one particular political movement. After the Holocaust (which refutes Rabkin's claim that anti-Semitism is due to Israel's policies) the Jewish people voted with their feet that they wanted to return to their ancient homeland, Eretz Israel, and the built it and continue to build it today. Any Jew who goes to synagogue and listens to the weekly Torah portion sees that the Torah is enfused with love of Eretz Israel (e.g. the detailed description of Avraham buying the burial place in the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hevron) so the Jewish people have been absorbing this for millenia, and the desire to return flows from this, not Rabkin's imaginary conspiracy of "anti-religious Zionist rebels". The large majority of Jews in Israel reject Rabkin's claim that "Zionism replaced Judaism with nationalism" and identify themselves as Jews, regardless of their level of religious observance, and the fact is that religious observance of the average Jew in Israel is much higher than those outside of Israel. Knowledge of Hebrew, the language of the Bible and Misha is univesal making these works accessible to everyone, unlike outside Israel and that Jewish religious life and intense Torah study are undergoing their greatest revival in 2000 years, IN SPITE of Rabkin's claim that the Zionist state is suppodedly dedicated to eradicating these things.
   Yes, there is an ongoing debate in the religious world about the nature of the relationship of religious community of Israel to the (not yet religious) state apparatus, but reading this polemic is not going to give an accurate picture of this.



3. I spent most of my life as an active Zionist (but not a religious Jew.) Once I became an observant Jew, I gradually found myself being turned off to zionism, but didn't realize why. Professor Rabkin's book filled in a lot of the "blanks" for me, and made me realize I am not alone.
   
   It angers me that the zionist state claims to speak for all Jews, including me. No one gave them that right, I certainly didn't, and I feel very betrayed and deceived by zionism...especially in light of the zionist collaboration with the Nazis, under whom some of my family members perished. Professor Rabkin goes into this somewhat in his excellent book also. Many things in this book will enrage you about zionist activities, and if you are a Jew with faith in Hashem, you will see just how much of a modern day golden calf zionism really is.
   
   Thank G-d for the Chasidim or I would feel totally isolated in the Jewish community due to my new stance. Thank you, Professor Rabkin, for a much-needed, well written book, which is easily understood by both Jew and Gentile alike.



4. I found the book, reportedly to speak of Judaism and Jews as a whole sorely lacking in major areas. One was the fact that nearly all, if not all, of the voices and commentary contained in the book came from only one part of world Jewry, Ashkenaz.
   The fact is that great rabbis from all over the Sephardic and Edot HaMizrach world view Zionism favourably, these voices seemed to be completely absent from the book. When the author makes arguements in the name of Judaism and selectively quotes from a small part of world Jewry, surely the nature of the book is severely compromised.
   The fact is there has never been a scholar or Rabbi of repute from outside of the Ashkenazi world who has a theological problem with Zionism and the State of Israel. This stands in stark contrast to the author's views on how Judaism views Zionism. Without the views of the "other" Jews, this work shamelessly sounds out important voices to any work on religious responses to Zionism.



5. Sifting through the complexities of the current Middle East situation, one can easily assume all Jews support the state of Israel. Not so: a deep discord has erupted between avowed Zionists advocating Israel and Jews, both secular and religious, who reject the state, albeit for very different reasons. Not everyone is aware of the desperation and suffering of the Palestinians, who now suffer at the hands of Zionists. Not Jews, but Zionists.
   
   After the horrors of the Shoah, natural instinct lead Jewish survivors to seek safety, a land to call their own, the land promised by God. Perfectly just, perfectly reasonable, perfect in all respects.
   
   Except for one critical issue: although Jews and Arabs had lived together in reasonable harmony for centuries there, the influx of massive numbers of Jews, replete with the support of the world (guilt for turning away?) had profound and devastating effects on the native Palestinians. The latter remember all too well the start of the "Nakba", an excruciating travesty that continues today.
   
   But Professor Rabkin's book does not touch upon the current political and legal situation, although his perspective is clear. This book is difficult to categorize: it touches upon history, philosophy, spirituality, ethics and delves into the deepest levels of being Jewish. These are truly eschatological issues, issues that affect the Jewish soul in this realm and the next; beyond the narrower, but highly relevant, dimensions of international law and politics.
   
   Here we see the profound difference between Zionism and Judaism from a historical and ethical aspect: Zionism, a modern offshoot, actually contradicts the essence of what it means to be a good Jew. This new schism is not based on traditional, expected lines such as Ashkenazi and Sephardic, observant and non-observant, religious and secular Jews, etc, but rather, how one regards the state of Israel in relation to oneself and God.
   
   Professor Rabkin speaks from the orthodox perspective - in that God did not give Jews land unconditionally, to take and prosper upon. Indeed, God merely promised such land if - and only if - Jews returned to the ways of God. God, Orthodox thinking held, punished the Jews for sin, and sinning deeply. Pride, arrogance, idolatry - all resulted in exile. The Jews could only return to the land in a state of humility, kindness, peace, justice, and subservience to the laws of God, not man. Observant Jews in exile over the centuries eschewed all forms of violence, including symbolic. In humility, one finds strength; in striving to live whilst accepting one's suffering as God's will, one becomes closer to God. Job is perhaps the greatest illustration of dignified acceptance. Of course, this is rather bewildering to our modern society, which values aggression, force, materialism and pride. The Jews offended God, but will always be welcomed back into God's good graces, provided the effort is made. Jews must live peacefully among all peoples, not in their own land, according to God. God will provide the land when the Jews learn, not before, and Jews are not to take land.
   
   And it is with force, power and ferocity that the Israelis claimed the state of Israel - devastating Palestinian land, homes, people, driving out thousands, all in the name of this 'promised land'. It is for these reasons the Orthodox reject the concept of a man-made Israel, constructed on the blood and bones of murdered Palestinians; this is against God's admonition to the Jews. Also, the more taciturn, aggressive and critical Zionists become, the more God is offended. It is interesting to note Stephen Spielberg examined the price of violence in his film "Munich".
   
   Israel, in effect, has become the new "Golden Calf", the new idolatry.
   
   No, Anti-Zionism is not Anti-Semitism; to question and/or reject the existence of Israel is not to be an Anti-Semite or a self-loathing Jew. Indeed, it seems that to oppose the state of Israel as it currently exists is the means by which one can be a better, and wiser, human being.

No comments about Zionism and History: The Rise of a New Jewish Consciousness.

No comments about Collusion Across the Jordan: King Abdullah, the Zionist Movement, and the Partition of Palestine.

1 comments about The Zionist Ideology (Tauber Institute for the Study of European Jewry Series , No 21).

1. In this work the author traces the ideology of Zionism from it's social origins to it's flowering with the re-establishment of the State of Israel.
   The first part of the book is entitled 'The Origins of Zionist Ideology' deals with the reality 'that Jews are a single, distinctive, entity, possessing national and not just religious attributes'.
   In essence the Jewish people emerged millenia ago in the Land of Israel as a nation, and their very essence has been that of a nation, as much as a religion.
   Zionism, can be put in the similar company of nationalisms such as those of the Armenians, the Greeks, the overseas Indians and Chinese, and the African-American nationalism associated with Marcus Garvey.
   The undeniable truth is that Zionism is the national liberation movement of the Jewish people.
   Any objective reading of the history and ideology of Zionism makes it very clear that Zionism has nothing to do with 'settler-colonialism', 'Racism' or 'Facism' as the loathsome critics of Zionism and Israel repulsively charge.
   This section traces the birth of modern Zionism, amidst the pogroms in Russia, the strengthening of the always present Eretz Yisrael-oriented Jewish nationalism, and the disapointment among liberal Jewish intelligentsia that anti-Semitism would always prevent the cultural assimilation these thinkers desired.
   This section deals with the early Zionist pioneer groups like the Bilu and the Hovevei Zion, the early founders of modern Zionism such as Ahad Ha-Am, Rabbi Yehuda Alkilai, Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Kalisher, Max Nordau, Rabbi Leo Pinsker and Theodor Herzl.
   Part 2 deals with the variegations of Zionist ideology, namely General Zionism, including the thoughts of Asher Ginsburg, Max Nordau and Theodor Herzl; National-Religious Zionism and the inspiration of Rabbi Yaakov Reines, Rabbi Yehuda Alkilai, Rabbi Zvi Hirsch Kalisher and the giant of 20th century Jewish religious thought, Rabbi Avraham Yitzhak, Ha-Cohen Kook, as well as tracing the various movements of the Mizrachi (national religious Zionist movement); Labour Zionism and it's great thinkers like Ber Borochov, Nahman Syrkin, Aharon David Gordon, Chaim Arlosoroff, Yosef Haim Brenner, Chaim Weizmann and David Ben-Gurion as well as the evolution of the various Labour and Socialist Zionist movements and Revisionist Zionism, whose great visionary Vladmimir Jabotinsky.
   The last part deals with two fundamental issues, Zionism as a a Secular Jewish identity, and the legitimate Jewish right to the Land: the historical right, the primary religious importance and unbroken link of the Land of Israel to the Jewish people, the right of the Jewish people to their tiny strip of Land, considering the vast land and wealth of the many Arab states, and the basic human rights of the Jewish people of the Levant.
   As Vladimir Jabotinsky said 'Titus exiled the people of Israel from it's land two thousand years ago' and the exiles had never renounced their claim to their land.
   Of great relevance today are the words of Jabotinsky when he pointed out that 'It is not a hardship on any race, any nation, possesing so many National States...One fraction, one branch of that race, and not a big one will have tol ive in someone elses State: well that is the case with all the mightiest nations of the world. I could hardly mention one of the big nations, having their States, mighty and powerful, who had not one branch living in someone elses State. That is only normal and there is no "hardship" attached to that. So when we hear the Arab claim confronted with the Jewish claim; I fully understand that any minority would prefer to be a majority; It is quite understandable that the Arabs of Palestine would also prefer Palestine to be the Arab state No.4 , No.5 No.6- that I quite understand; but when the Arab claim is confronted with our Jewish demmand to be saved; it is like the claim of appetite versus the claims of starvation'.
   
   In 1946 David Ben-Gurion in his testimony before the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry, he put forward the following paradigm for the Jewsih case:
   "Our case, and I think you have just seen many such cases in Europe, is like that of the Jews who were forcibly expelled from their homes , which were then given to somebody else. Those homes changed hands and then after the Nazi defeat some Jewish owners came back and found their homes ocupied. In many cases they were not allowed to return to their homes. To make it more exact, I shall put it in this way. It is a large building, the building of our family, say fifty rooms. We were expelled from the house, our family was scattered, somebody else took it away and again it changed hands many times, and then we had to come back and we found some five rooms ocuppied by other people, the other rooms destroyed and uninhabitable from neglect. We said to these ocupants "We do not want to remove you, please stay where you are, we are going back into the uninhabitable rooms, we will repair them". And we did repair some of the rooms and resettle them.'
   
   
   The Jewish people returned to their ancient land which was of central importance to their faith and nation. While certain landmarks were of importance to the Christian and Islamic faiths, to only the Jews has Eretz Yisrael in it's entirety been central to their being.The Jews returned with malice to none, and with no intention to 'displace' or 'occupy' anyone, but were confronted with malice by the Arabs and British colonists begrudging the Jews the tiny corner of their ancient land.
   Zionism is the national liberation movement of the Jewish people, and Israel is the home to a very large portion of the Jewish people.
   To oppose Zionism is to oppose a people's basic freedoms and human rights...

2 comments about Lionhearts: Heroes of Israel.

1. One trait is shared by all of the individuals in this book, heroism. From all walks of life, disparate viewpoints, and from remote places around the world they rose up above the self, striving for a greater good. From one-armed Joseph Trumpledor, Russian war hero and Jewish legend, to Mordechai Anielewicz, young leader of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, these shine like beacons of hope and courage in even the darkest moments. Janusz Korczak gave his life to be with Jewish children in Treblinka, marching to the gas chambers even though he had been begged by 'fellow Gentiles' to leave them to their fate. Eli Cohen, the brilliant spy who risked, and lost, his very life in service in Damascus. Yoni Netanyahu, the daring commando leader whose death was the sole fatality suffered by Israeli forces conducting the greatest hostage rescue ever, at Entebbe. Chaim Shturman, proponent of coexistence between Arabs and Jews until the end of his days, though it cost him his life. Hannah Senesh, who, after having escaped the horrors of the Holocaust chose to return to that nightmare, ultimately sacrificing her own life in a mission behind Nazi lines. Orde Wingate, whose brief experience in Israel during the Mandate led him to challenge his fellow British for the sake of a downtrodden people not his own. Abd El-Karim Abd El-Rani, who challenged an enormous terrosist who was stabbing an Israeli girl to death in Jaffa, regardless of his advanced age and the fact that he was fasting for Ramadan and weakened, dying for his heroism by her side. Shula Cohen rescued countless Jews from Syrian torture and death. These are but a sample of the heroes in this book. An inspiring and uplifting book for anyone who believes in something greater than mere self-preservation.



2. This is the title of the final chapter written by former Prime Minister, Benyamin Netanyahu about a young Israeli special forces member named Nir Poraz who, in Yoni Netanyahu style, tried to rescue a captive Israeli Defense Force (IDF) soldier, Nachshon Waxman, held by Palestinian terrorists. He led the way of the Israeli forces and was killed along with Waxman in the operation on October 14, 1994. There are 52 similar chapters about Israeli's who did similar or just simply patriotic, brave acts on behalf of their nation written not only by Israeli statesmen but also citizens who had firsthand knowledge of their personages and travails. The book starts with Joseph Trumpeldor's story and death. He was an ardent, young Zionist born in Russia who fought in WWI and who died when militant arabs invaded Kibbutz Tel Hai in Upper Galilee.
   
   This book was written to coincide with the 50th anniversary of the creation of the modern state of Israel in 1998. It is divided into 7 chronological sections; each section summarizes the crises facing the nation during those time periods and gives a brief history of them. I couldn't make it through the introduction without a few shed tears, so be forewarned. Not all of the stories are so tragic, though most are. I felt many times like I was reading a chapter of Judges or Joshua except that I was transported 3000 plus years ahead. I always wondered what were the names of the 300 men that Gideon chose as fighters because their names are not given anywhere in scripture. To my mind also came the words from the faith chapter, chapter 11, in the book of Hebrews, in the christian bible. 'These all died in faith' and about Moses 'he refused to be called the son of Pharoah's daughter, choosing rather to share ill-treatment with the people of G-d than to enjoy the fleeting pleasures of sin'. I'm sure there are many other brave souls whose stories are not told herein. For those unsung heroes, Isaiah inspired by G-d wrote 'Behold, I have indelibly imprinted you on the palm of each of My hands; O Zion, your walls are continually before Me' (49:16). I particularly enjoyed reading about Moshe Dayan, although he does not have an entire chapter written about him, but he is mentioned many times as in the chapter about his friend "Amos Yarkoni" who was a palestinian IDF fighter. You finish this book, you'll have to agree that Israel is also a 'land of the brave'.

5 comments about Lone Wolf: A Biography of Vladimir (Ze'Ev) Jabotinsky Two Volume Set.

1. An unapologetic biography of a controversial figure in Jewish/Israeli history. Mr. Katz's book is painstakingly well documented. It is more than the history of a single person; it provides a detailed look at competing Jewish ideologies and their role in the formation of Israel. Though biased, it is on the whole, well balanced.



2. Zeev (meaning wolf, in hebrew) Jabotinsky was one of the greatest leaders ever, and the greatest liberal Zionist leader. His works can not be denied. Because of his many deeds, he was admired by many - and hated by the rest. And he is the subject of this book, like many other books and articles. But this one is special - the auther spent 7 years of his life reserching and writing it, and those seven years have beared fruit. The writing is of a very high quality, and the contence is extensive. Itws like no other book about Jabotinsky I know. After reading, you will enrich not only your mind - but also your spirit, by knowing this great man. Highly recomended, for all people - Zionists, students, and anyone seeking pure knolage and feeding.



3. This book is a real eye opener. It completly changed my perspective on the history of the Middle East and how the British, who so often have come accross as the "white knight" was in fact the dirty thief.

   The book is a monster in size and in the amount of information it presents. It documented and footnoted to a degree that one would expect from a work of this nature.

   I highly suggest it to anyone who wants to find out about the history of modern Israel and how the wolrd powers did what they do best, exploit. I truly learned much!




4. Reading this book is a great intelectual adventure. There are a lot of information and the author has a very clear and envolving writing, always creating expectative over what's coming next. The author also mixes narrative with a lot of opinions and analysis about the facts. There are, as well, many quottings from other works about Jobotinsky, along with several transcriptions of classified official documents that shed light into controversial facts. The author is not afraid of polemics and gives new perspectives over matters treated as tabu, like Ben Gurion, Weizman, The Zionist Organization and the Histadrut. Much enfasis is given to Jabotinsky's unstopabble fight for the jewish rights in palestine and abroad, as well as his unfearing steadfastness against anyone who denied the goal of creating a jewish state. The book will give a complete understanding of the Revisionist movement, the British Rule in Israel, the internal Zionist Organization politics and its blunders, the arab behavior, among others. By reading this book you will also be able to better understand contemporary israeli politics and the relationship with the arab countries. The book, although very pleasant, takes quite a bit to be read, but it is a must for anyone who wants to know one of the greatest zionist and jewish leaders ever and get into the politics of the pre-state period.



5. Shmuel Katz has managed to collect so much useful, important and fascinating information in this biography of Ze'ev Jabotinsky that it could stand on its own as a first class historical review of early 20th century Zionist and Palestinian history. Through obsessive documentation of his topic, Katz demolishes a number of historical myths surrounding both the roots of Zionism and the founding of the state of Israel. He does this all in a highly compelling and readable style, which is certainly helpful, given its 1800-page size. It is an extraordinary read and essential to fully understanding the origins of Israel and its conflict vis a vis the Arabs, as well as the life of this unique and gifted individual.

5 comments about The Jewish State.

1. Herzl's book is a must-read for anyone who wants to get a sense of the Zionist movement and the passion of its most famous leader. It's a short book, easy to read, but provocative-- situating the reader in a period when Jews had both become emancipated from the ghetto and begun to attain some social and economic power. No surprise that anti-Semitism was an almost immediate result. I recommend it for Jews and non-Jews alike.



2. Not the best book to read on the subject, lacked a lot of information and found it to be not very interesting. Have read better ones on this subject.



3. This book is the basis of how the state Israel should be created according to the end of the 19th century "Wiener" Theodor Herzl.
   In fact many of his considerings were used to create the zionist state Israel, except his idealistic and visionary view where Palestinians (Filistines originally from the Greek island Philistos) were given "a piece of the cake": jews and Palestinians were considered in his opinion to live peacefully and happy together in this "altneuland" or"aviv".



4. In this review I refer to this edition,from Filiquarian Publishing,only. Without question this document has extreme historical and philosophical importance. Everyone who has an interest in the history of Zionism, Israel, Jewish migration and development, or even just a general interest in sociology or economics should have a copy in their library. But not this edition! It is so rife with typographical errors, misspellings, dropped words and such that it is often unreadable. An hour or two's work by a copy editor would have made a world of difference.



5. First published in 1896, this book gave rise to modern Zionism. Given the impact of the Middle East situation on the planet, this book should be read by everyone to better understand the world we live in today.
   
   For me, two things stand out from the book. Firstly, the "internalisation" of anti-semitism (see "Causes of Anti-Semitism" on page 23) whereby Herzl himself accepts (in my view quite wrongly) that European anti-semitism is inevitable due to certain characteristics of the Jews. Secondly, although leaving the question open of whether to emigrate to Argentina or Palestine to create the Jewish state, in either case Herzl just ignores the fact that both countries were inhabited, with people who might not want incomers creating a new state for themselves in their midst.

No comments about Ha-Rikud: The Jewish Dance.

1 comments about If I Am Not For Myself: Journey of an Anti-Zionist Jew.

1. As any anti-Zionist knows, raising opposition to Israel and Zionism immediately draws accusations of anti-Semitism, or if the dissenter is Jewish, accusations of self-hatred.
   
   It is precisely these attempts by Zionism to squash all criticism of Israel -- especially criticism by Jews -- that Mike Marqusee takes head on in his latest book, If I Am Not For Myself: Journey of an Anti-Zionist Jew. Starting with the papers of his late grandfather and Marqusee's own personal experiences being raised as a Jew in post-war America, the book beautifully weaves together a broad, yet intimately personal, history of anti-Zionism and radicalism in Judaism. Equal parts biography, autobiography, history, and commentary, Marqusee powerfully strips Zionism of its fundamental claim to represent and speak for all of world Jewry.
   
   Central to Marqusee's task is the re-appropriation of Jewish, anti-Zionist, and leftist history -- a history that is consciously buried by the Zionist establishment. In this process, he shows the strong connections between history, how we understand the present, and the frameworks we can utilize in determining the future.
   
   Marqusee weighs in on an impressively diverse and rich array of subjects including (but far from limited to) the Jewish workers' Bund, Jewish Enlightenment philosophy, political struggles within the New Deal coalition, the parallels between Zionism and right-wing Hindu nationalism, "left-wing anti-Semitism," discussions with Muslims about Zionism, Jews in the Middle East, and the parallels between anti-Semitism and Islamophobia.
   
   These discussions and explorations all radiate out from Marqusee's narrative center: the life of his maternal grandfather -- Edward V. Morand (aka EVM) -- a Jewish leftist active in New York politics in the 1930s and 1940s.
   
   Despite being involved in virtually every left-wing cause of his time, EVM increasingly became an ardent Zionist -- forcing him to unconsciously sacrifice many of his radical principles. Marqusee is particularly horrified by EVM's political positions in 1948 -- the year of Israeli "independence", or al-Nakba (the catastrophe), as it's known to Palestinians. Marqusee writes: "In the midst of [Israel's] one-way process of destruction, displacement and plunder, EVM's constant cry is 'no retreat.' He seems to have entirely lost his former distaste for war and militarism...In this war, there seems to be only one kind of victim, Jewish."
   
   Marqusee attributes EVM's political twists and turns, in part, to "[a] failure to imagine the people on the receiving end of your dreams. It's a failure rooted in Western and white supremacy, a network of unexamined assumptions that has proved much more ineradicable and insidious than anti-semitism. EVM's writings of 1948 resound with it, and offer inadvertent testimony to the racist character of the Nakba and Nakba denial."
   
   These political contradictions and hypocrisies are exactly what led Marqusee himself out of the Zionist trap.
   
   In a very candid section, Marqusee relates an experience that is no doubt familiar to many Jewish anti-Zionists: the first time he was accused of self-hatred. He describes hearing an Israeli soldier speak to his Sunday school class just after the 1967 Israeli war that began the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza. The soldier was going on about how "the Arabs are better off now, under Israeli rule. You have to understand these are ignorant people. They go to the toilet in the street." Marqusee responds: "Now something akin to this I had heard before. I had heard it from the white Southerners I'd been taught to look down upon. I had heard it from people my parents and my teachers described as prejudiced and bigoted. So I raised my hand and when called upon I expressed my opinion, as I'd been taught to do. It seemed to me that what our visitor had said was, well, racist." The young Marqusee was immediately denounced. Angrily, he went home to share this experience with his normally supportive parents. At the dinner table, he added to the story, putting forward his opinion, heavily influenced by the anti-Vietnam War movement, that, "'It was wrong for one country to take over another, or part of another, by military force'...Suddenly [my dad] barked, 'Enough already!'...Like my Sunday school teacher, he made me feel that I'd said something obscene...'I think you need to look at why you're saying what you're saying,' he said...'There's some Jewish self-hatred there.'"
   
   In the end, Marqusee answers the question set out by the title, "'If I am not for myself...', then others will claim to be 'for me'...[I]n defining myself as an anti-Zionist Jew, I am for myself, and at the same time and without contradiction for others...I find in anti-Zionism emancipation both as a Jew and as a human being...Jews today can no more escape the question of Zionism than they could the question of anti-semitism in earlier eras. The problem today isn't that Jews are in denial of their Jewishness or of the threat of anti-semitism, but that Jews are in denial about Israel, Zionism, the Nakba, the occupation, the wall...The people who call us self-haters want to steal our selves from us -- appropriate our selves for their cause -- and speaking as a self, I'm damned if I'm going to let them get away with it."
   
   The task of anti-Zionists is to explain the role that Zionism serves in the US imperial project while also breaking the notion that Zionism has anything to do with Jewishness. As Marqusee puts it: "[T]he Zionist dominance of the diaspora, and especially the diaspora in America, is a mutable, historical phenomenon -- not the inevitable expression of 'Jewish self-interest' -- and the continuation of that dominance is by no means guaranteed."
   
   Easier said than done, right? In addition to reclaiming history, we have to understand that Israeli war crimes and the logic of Zionism itself can shake even the most veteran of Zionists. Just look at Marqusee's dad's own development -- the same dad that first called him a self-hater: "[I]n the end, the Zionists tested his humanity beyond endurance. After the news broke about the Sabra and Shatila massacre in 1982, he phoned me from New York. 'Ok,' he said, 'you were right. They're bastards.' He started to make contributions to Palestinian causes and to raise the issue among his friends."
   
   The struggle against Zionism's dominance over Jews and Palestinians won't be easy, but Marqusee has made an important and captivating contribution to that fight. If you've ever had trouble arguing that anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism or if you just want to get a sense of the rich diversity of Jewish history and its relationship to radicalism, then you should pick up this book. I just bought a copy for my dad -- the first person to call me a self-hater. If Marqusee can convince his dad, then I guess I'll hold out hope for mine as well.