Be Strong and of Good Courage

 

The Israeli leadership portrayed in Be Strong and of Good Courage by Dennis Ross - career diplomat with long experience in the Middle East and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict - and David Makovsky depends at a very great extent of the historical context of the founding of the state of Israel. David Ben-Gurion, Menachem Begin, Yitzak Rabin, Ariel Sharon are usually considered the founding fathers and do represent a certain generation. It is a generation that had to operate under enormous pressure and against a conundrum of inimities and challenges, both internally and externally.

The book follows the historical thread and presents various leadership styles and encounters. While maintaining the historical and geopolitical frame, it displays a variety of arguments explaining one decision or another. Each of the leaders described in the book do have their individual leadership style, mostly inspired by the underground and military experiences - particularly Rabin and Sharon. Given the extraordinary circumstances, judging them through ´normal´/peacetime criteria does not make justice to their times. Knowing more about the context, including the diplomatic unspoken background Ross was largely familiar with, elucidates it.

At the end of the book, I was almost tempted to share nostalgic feeling while comparing ´them´ with ´they´, but finally I realized that it is a very big mistake and in fact, the ´average´ politicians of nowadays are a good sign that no one needs warriors in politics and times turned into a more quiet mood. I suppose that the truth is somewhere in the middle of all this.

Be Strong and of Good Courage do shares a lot of details that may help explaining the many missed opportunities of the ´peace process´, but also the various coordinates that allowed the ´settler movement´ to become such a strong voice within the Israeli politics. Some of the reasons may be, actually, of a very practical nature. The different takes on the relationship with the US, from the very beginning until nowadays is important in the context of Israel´s own state- and national awareness.

Although I much appreciated the well documented narrative, and the interesting political stories brought to life, I was largely disappointed by the writing style. Writing about politics and the Middle East, although it retrains the creative capacity of the writer due to the very complex issues that do not allow too much imaginative tropes, it does not mean that it should be bland and literarily unattractive. More than once I had the feeling that I was just offered some disparate notes on events and characters, that were nissing the thread of a real story.

Rating: 3 stars

About ´Fate´ by Zeruya Shalev (translated into German by Anne Birkenhauer)

 

Fate (translated into German as Schicksal by Anne Birkenhauer, who translated among others David Grossman or Yehuda Amichai) is from all the books by Zeruya Shalev I´ve read until now, the most Israel-oriented. All of her books are taking place in Israel and do include elements of the everyday life in the country, particularly terorist threats or the religious context, but the main topics mainly have to do with relationship, betrayal, love and pain (the book before, Pain was by far my favorite, for the complexity of the characters and the surgical precision exploring suffering).

Fate - that was completed during the Covid pandemic - has a completely different spin and is partly inspired by Shalev´s own family history, namely her father´s. After the death of her father, a famous brain researcher, Menachem (Mino) Rubin, her daughter, Atara wants to find out the woman her father was married before, Rachel. Atara, an architect specialized in historical monuments, lives in Haifa (like Shalev herself). Rachel, whose son is a Breslev hasid, met Atara´s father during their time in Lechi, an armed group active during the British Mandate whose aim was, among others, to push the Brits out of the country, with any price. 

Most of the book is an exploration of memory, the ways in which we remember. Memory is an emotional business and its authenticity is at a large extent doubtful. The names of the Lehi members killed are repeated in the story as a mantra. Likewise, the story of the doll stucked with explosive who blew up. For many reasons, the history of Lehi in the creation of the state of Israel is rarely mentioned openly - compared to Irgun or Palmach, for instance. In the account include in Fate, they look like promoters of a Jewish-Arab entente and co-existence, with the only enemy being the Brits, which is a too edulcorated and romanticized version for my taste. I would have loved much more a rough version of a Lehi member, maybe confused, violent, idealistic, but more authentic than by being assigned ideas and intentions that just resonate with current political concerns. This distorted voice is a big pity for the overall representation of Lehi, given that they were, in fact, a very interesting movement, to be understood and placed in the equally complex context of the times.

I had access to the book in audiobook format, read by actressed Maria Schrader and Eva Meckbach. 

Rating: 3 stars 

A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth

 

Israeli actress and activist Noa Tishby wrote a book in an effort to explain - in a ´simple guide´ - ´the most misunderstood country on earth´. It couldn´t be a better moment for such a book although I am afraid that most of the people who are vituperating against Israel are doing so as a daily job. In those times of crisis we are living, it´s too risky to get unemployed therefore I am not too optimistic that there will be too many that will change their mind.

However, a good deed is always worth the effort, no matter the result. The book - which I had access to in audio format - is smart and easy and contains a lot of general historical information (a short correction is needed maybe, as Rav Ovadia Yosef, of blessed memory who playsed a tremendous role in the creation of the Mizrahi - oriental Jews - identity was actually born in Iraq, not Egypt, where he was active late in life, as the chief of the religious court, the bet din), but also fragments of family history, as Tishby´s originary from a family which counts among its ranks diplomats - her grandfather was the first Israeli diplomat in Africa - and social activists that left more than an imprint on the country´s history. 

Although I was not very happy with the order of the chapters which outline different arguments and fragmets of history of Israel and Zionism in general - described ´as a verb, a work in process´ -, the book is hilarious, informative and outlines a couple of good arguments which are so simple that sometimes it´s hard to understand how people can ignore them. 

Tishby is an Israeli patriot and a pro-Palestinian voice and it is nothing wrong with this. And as far as I know she is not alone. It´s important that in the recent chaos and media manipulations, voice like hers -the audiobook was narrated by the author therefore I can say that she really has a nice voice - are raised because it makes a huge difference. A difference for being able to display normal people who don´t have to feel guilty or accused for loving their country. Their one and only country they have.

Noa Tishby is not a writer or a historian or a politician. She writes in full honesty having in mind the future. A future where I am sure Palestinians and Jews can live together in a land considered one of the most disputed on the planet. The fact that many good news about co-existence and everyday life in Israel, beyond the black-and-white narrative. For instance, did you know that there is a city build by and for Palestinians in the West Bank, Rawabi? This is a place on my visit list for my text trip to Israel. The multi-cultural aspects of Israel, a country who in a bit over two generation was able to assimilate millions of refugees from all over the world, with different backgrounds and languages, is a lesson for everyone, including through her mistakes and failures. 

For the naives and uninformed supporters and sympathisants of the BDS - Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions - Movement, there are a lot of details to make you think twice before supporting them. As a sidenote, the fierce supporter of boycotting Israel - and its high-ed institutions, Omar Barghouti, is a graduate of Tel Aviv University. Apartheid, indeed. I bet that some of their game is to simply manipulate the non-informed average citizen of a Western country, any country, too far away from the Middle East to really take his or her time to check the facts and figures. Among them, artists that were put under pressure to cancel their concerts in Israel. Thanks Gd that Tishby called Mike (the Jagger) and convinced Rolling Stones to go on with their show. History was written, indeed.  

If it´s one think to learn about Israel from this book is that it´s honest and fair to recognize the mistakes and learn from them how to build a better future. Being able to acknowledge one´s mistake it´s a sign of strength and maturity. 

Israel: A Simple Guide to the Most Misunderstood Country on Earth - indeed, this is exactly the case - is a book for the curious, open minded, the non-Jew and the Jew curious to understand something about a country and its conflicts. 

Rating: 4 stars

Book Review: City of A Thousand Gates by Rebecca Sacks

For a long time I haven´t devoured a book on a Jewish/Israeli topic with such a pleasure and curiosity...

I´ve spent my every single free time this weekend listening to City of Thousand Gates by Rebecca Sacks, narrated by Lameece Issaq. I am reading a lot of literature produced in Israel or on Israeli/Jewish topics (the regular blog posts on my blog are the testimony), but I´ve been rarely impressed either by the topic or the literary depictions. This book succeeded though to deeply impress me. 

With an impressive cast of characters, covering a wide variety of individualities, among both Jews and Arabs in Israel, City of Thousand Gates brings people together and separate them, following the unknown destiny´s ways.

The cast of characters is impressive: from the West Bank anglos to the Palestinian academic, the bio mom from America married with an Israeli to the young religious teenager freshly engaged that want to have a taste of the secular dating game. There is also Vera, a German journalist interested to report about Hebron and Palestinian topics, that used to snort coke with Israeli in Berlin and moved to Israel for almost the same reasons Israeli are - or used to - moving to Berlin (minus the price of Milky). There are also Palestinians applying for Israeli passport, checkpoints and tattooed soccer players, both Jewish and Arabs.

Sacks spent a couple of years in Israel, particularly the West Bank, and through the characters, their interactions - ways of talking - and the descriptions of their locations I´ve felt instantly back in Israel. This includes also the various ´anglo´ slangs as well as those used in Tel Aviv and Jerusalem. There are real people we are talking about, not some dolls-like inanimated golems brought to life for the sake of answering the market requirements when it comes to topics pertinent to Israel. There are all those contradictions, denial - as in living in a place and gently refusing to ignore its realities and hardships - and the humour, the best medicine for the everyday life under those conditions. 

From the literary point of view, the author manages admirably the art of switching POWs and portraying people through their interactions and human reactions. Although the humanity is what makes us all, members of the human race, the specificities of the geography, history - both global and personal - as well as the language make us individuals with special features and particular reactions to life encounters.

Made up of different short stories with characters whose destinies intertwin - after all, it´s a small country - City of Thousand Gates maps the humans of Israel and their everyday existence in a world where history doesn´t let you breath normally. It may turn grotesque sometimes, as in the case of Emily, that shortly after escaping a terrorist attack, makes a selfie at the location of the explosion. But more grotesque is sometimes the view of people from outside, anyone, misreading facts and looking for symbols where there is none.

Rating: 4.5 stars

Understanding the Head of the Mossad

The Middle East realities are, fortunately, more complex than we may read and/or heard about in the media. The Abraham Accords launched last year did not occur overnight, but are the result of long years, if not decades, of rapprochement at different levels between representatives of Israel and various Arab countries. Most, if not all, of those contacts were set through the Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations, the famous - for all its goods and bads - Mossad. 

Reading a book authored by a head of the Mossad may project a lot of expectations. One may think that once one start reading such a book, all the questions and curiosities about the recent history are suddenly answered. Such high expectations may apply to any book written by insiders of the secret world.

In reality thus, the very nature of the intelligence work does not allow too much disclosure. Definitely, there are much praised book offering insights to the general public, but whenm someone as Shabtai Shavit, director of the Mossad between 1989 and 1996, writes a political memoir, most likely the result will be a dairy-like with many blank spaces. Shavit has over 50 years of experience in international security and counterterrorism operations, with three decades of work in the Mossad. His military service was in the elite unit of Sayeret Matkal, where Yonathan Netanyahu and his prime minister brother, Bibi, as well as Ehud Barak, Israel´s 10th prime minister, performed their military duties. He was chosed by Yitzhak Shamir to replace Nahum Admoni, leading Israeli´s foreign intelligence service through very troubled international and internal waters. He was also the first director that do not belong to the generation that led the War of Independence which meant sometimes a different view on political evolutions and the right way to react to changes.

During his long years of service, Shabtai Shavit witnessed tremendous international events that challenged for ever the intelligence environment: the end of the Soviet Union and the reunification of Germany, the first Gulf War, the conclusion of the peace agreement with Jordan or the assassination of Yitzak Rabin. Those changes required a constant adaptation in terms of human resources, budgets and intelligence plans. As Shavit himself acknowledges, the political strategy may create ´strange bedfellows´ and this is available particularly after the end of the Cold War. 

Shavit writes in a very systematic, bullet-points way, with the coldness and verbal scarcity of someone used to read, accumulate and categorize tons of important information every day. As a ground operative himself, he appreciates and even praises the value of human intelligence as one of the most valuable assets. 

The book is organised in various chapters, with details about various operations and major international or regional events from the point of view of the information and interests of Israel´s intelligence community, such as the intelligence failures of the Yom Kippur war, the First Gulf War, the Iranian file, the Olso Agreements, the second Lebanon War. The specific details of those operations, although sometimes too general, are important for anyone interested in understanding the Middle East as it is, not as some may want to be. 

The points of view are shared from the point of view of the intelligence professional and this is very important to keep this in mind while reading the book. I´ve found the observations related to the freedom of speech too general and unfair even unrealistic for the journalists, but in the end, I understood that this is the way in which people on the other side of the institutional wall see the things. Expecting the journalists to counter and eventually accept what not to disclose to the public, for high state reasons, it´s widely unrealistic and problematic for the journalist whose mission is a bit different, if not completely contradictory to such principles.

Much more interesting and source of long-term food for thought are the observations regarding the possibility of a new Sykes-Picot agreement in the Middle East. How he sees the new power chess game - a well-inspired cover, by the way - is unexpected, for at least one reason: the idea of a ´Sunnistan´, which may border Kurdistan (a new state as well, but this one I´ve heard more than once before) in the North, Iraq in the East, Jordan in the South and Syria in the West. This state may be a solution offered to Sunni populations in the Middle East. I may need a bit of time to digest further this information...

As expected, there are some thoughts about the Palestinian case as well, with an interesting insights about the ´right of return´, a claim which may made any further negotiation with the Israeli impossible. (More about this in a next review of a book dedicated to the issue by Einat Wilf). How everything started and what are the roots of the common conflict is also explained, with candid details from the very beginning of the state of Israel. 

There are also some thoughts about Iran, where the author himself travelled during the Shah years, and it portrays realistically the dilemma of what exactly to expect from a strong country, with a messianic leadership, whose religious leader has the right to use the red button (or whatever colour the nuclear launcher does have in Tehran). How to operate with such an actor - which is not rational, in the way of the actors we were used to operate during the Cold War.

Admirably, the books ends with a collection of eulogies Shavit made for colleagues and other people involved in the intelligence work. It´s a moving tribute which recognize how important every single person working in this field is. 

I have not been impressed by the style - nonfiction can be well, beautifully written as well - but this is not the point of the book. The other details related to the knowledge shared, based by the author´s experiences, were well convened and therefore, makes the book an useful addition to the already vast bibliography of books dedicated to the Middle East.

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Tracing the Terrorist Money

Terror knows no border and fighting it on all fronts requires besides resilience and concentration, creativity too. 

Harpoon, by Nitsana Darshan-Leitner and Samuel M. Katz is an account of the tremendous efforts deployed by the Mossad to track and subsequently block the financial support for terrorism. Initiated by the legendary Meir Dagan, the unit was designed to deter by any means the sources of wealth for various terrorist network, particularly those operating in Israel. 

The initiative was, among others, an answer to the dramatic outburst of terror in the 1990s. A new global paradigm was generated in the region, with powerful state actors willing to support generously the creation and maintaining of entities involved in acts of terror. The mission assigned to the specialists gathered by the Harpoon was to understand those new terror trends and besides the typical operations aimed to eliminate the perpetrators, to stop the flow of money. The philosophy that eventually was replicated after 9/11 by CIA as well (especially through the Terrorist Finance Tracking Program - TFTP), was that once the money will be disrupted, the blood shed would stop. 

Interestingly, the book offers significant insights into the financial aspects of the terror acts, by deconstructing it piece by piece. For instance, ´(...) the suicide bomber was the final link in a long supply chain of men, machines, and infrastructure that cost tens of thousands of dollars´. Drug and cigarettes smuggling operated through networks in South America (Venezuela, for instance) helped to finance terrorist activities within the state of Israel. Undermining those operations and disrupting the daily activities, including through the elimination of their heads of operations, jeopardized the possibility of organising and perpetrating acts of terror. 

An ingenious way that lead to the financial distress of the supporters of terror was the legal action against states and entities on behalf of the victims of terror attacks. Especially American citizens in Israel targeted by terrorist attacks in Israel and abroad were helped to get court decisions leading to blocking of bank accounts and financial assets of terror supporters. 

The insider perspectives brought by this book are very interesting for better understanding the practical aspects of the fight against terrorism those days. In a complex world, it requires sophistication and creativity to counter evildoers. Harpoon is such an example of good and smart practice. 

Personal Histories in Comic Strips

There is no other graphic way to express the tragi-comic historical drama than through strongly visual appealing images. Bring it the broken bodies with blood and enormous hearts taken out of the body, multi-dimensional realities and psychotic thoughts.

The Realist, by Asaf Hanuka - which I've read in the German translation - is an autobiographical comic book about an illustrator living in Tel Aviv. Although some of of the interpretations might be considered as breathing a dramatic pessimism, it is not a wrong-placed feeling. It makes sense to be like this when you feel that life and its masters are faster than you. But I don't think that one should read this book with a sad twist. That's the realism, the title refers to that is the best way to describe this life: you are sinking into debts for reaching a minimum life standards, you work a lot and still unable to make your family happy, you feel under threat of various military attacks, you dream - realistically - that the protests for the unbearable costs of the living are the beginning of a better life (it was just a dream). Besides the personal story, there are other information intertwinned in the story, such as stories of Iraqi Jews coming to Israel or even about some long forgotten bands from the 70s.

I've followed the multi-awarded Asaf Hanuka for too long to remember when and how I actually discovered his works. His illustrations were published in Forbes, Politico and Wall Street Journal, among many others, and he was a contributor to Waltz with Bashir. His twin brother Tomer, is also an illustrator. 

It is fascinating how he succeeds to create through colours and multi-dimensional illustrations fantastic emotional stories. The images are not only alive, but able to transmit feelings - raw, some of them - and strong impressions. There is a strength of the images that leads you into the story without asking. You are becoming part of the story told. For me, it is the perfect way to make comic strips reliable mediums for story telling, regardless what kind of stories do you want to tell. 

Explaining Israeli Judaism

Explaining to Jews from Diaspora as well as to non-Jewish audience, what does it mean to be Israeli and particularly the Israeli interpretation on Judaism is not easy. Sometimes is not easy to understand either. Part of the discussions are often getting stuck on particulars which endangeres the outline of the bigger picture.

#IsraeliJudaism. Portrait of a Cultural Revolution by Shmuel Rosner and Camil Fuchs is one of the best books about this new cultural phenomenon: being Israeli. Shmuel Rosner is senior fellow at the Jerusalem-based Jewish People Policy Institute and Camil Fuchs is a Tel Aviv University professor of statistics and pollster whose opinions are often read in the Israeli media - especially those days in the electoral context. 

With a focus on the big picture and the main cultural trends, based on various opinion polls made among both Jews living in Israel and diaspora, it explains at a great extent the dramatic differences that are often reclaimed and hardly accommodated between Israeli and other Jews. Such a cultural conflict takes place not only from afar, but manifests tragically when Jews born in diaspora are trying to make a living in Israel. 

Defined by the authors as 'a start-up enterprise in the service of the Jewish people' Israel evolved as a 'one big field experiment for Jewish culture'. The identity is not settled and has its specific dynamism whose specificities and cultural markers are clearly outlined by the authors. It follows the chore identity values of the predominant groups within Israel: Haredi, national-religious and secular. From a group to another, those values are in conflict and each and every one of the group appears to rather prefer to set clear borders instead of interacting with each other. Personally, I might think that members of the national religious group, inspired by the writings of Rav Kook who outlined a certain openness towards all the Jews are by far the most open to other influences and interactions with secular and Haredi publics. However, as the latest elections demonstrate, the national religious block is going through a serious crisis therefore too much focus on specificities will hijack the main focus of the research anyway.

As Prof. Yeshayahu Leibowitz, quoted in the book mentioned, the Jewish religious law was not written for a Jewish state. What happened in the last 70 years was a permanent adaptation of traditions - as diverse as those brought up by the Jews from Ethiopia, Romania or China - to the challenges of modernity while maintaining a permanent religious background checking and in some cases pressure too. Public transportation is not working on Shabbat and there are no civil marriages in Israel, but there are restaurants open in Tel Aviv on Shabbat and many secular persons would do the bar mitzva of their sons although that's the only way they will go in a synagogue in years. When you are living in Israel, you feel Jewish. In Diaspora you struggle to keep your identity, including under the permanent anti-Semitic pressures. There are sometimes two different realities that are often coming in conflict.

This book helps a lot to understand the root of the conflict while accepting that identity is not given, but a dynamic process. Being 'Jewsraeli' might have a completely meaning in a decade time. Electoral cycles and old and new elites might outline a direction or another. The elections about to hapen tomorrow might contribute to such a change too.

Rating: 5 stars

Book Review: Promised Land by Martin Fletcher

Set in the post-Shoah Israel and featuring the intertwined dramatic stories of two brothers born in Germany, separated by the War and reunited in Israel after, Promised Land grasped very much of the spirit and historical challenges of the young country and its people. 

Peter and Arie Nesher reunited themselves in Israel, each of them carrying the burden of their family that was murdered in concentration camps. Another drama will unite them for ever: their shared love for the Egyptian-born Tamara, a young ola hadasha from a now destitute academic family struggling hard to adjust to the harsh realities of the land of Israel.

Arie is becoming rich, taking the smart advantage of being the first to start or grasp a business opportunity, while Peter will dedicate his life and intelligence to defending the promised land on the secret front of information. The ways in which the personal histories are connected to the mainstream historical and social challenges were described with a highly literary skillfull art. The creative story is developing while taking into account the specific realities, without turning into a history lesson. The facts and characters have a determined, historically-defined context, without limiting the story and this makes the book an enjoyable reading experience for anyone who loves books sets in Israel or interested in historical novels about Israel. 

The story has many interesting turns and keeps you awake and curious until the very end, with a deeply human and balanced perspective on things and people, some of them painful, like the fact of dealing with Germany and Germans and German money after the war. 

What I personally did not fancy at all, whas the coming and going of the story of the brothers in love with the same sister. Was is because of the indecision, the soap-opera touch ? Regardless of the answer, it was not my piece of literary cake.  I also noticed a small mistake, as the brother of Tamara, Ido, was given once the same family name with her husband, although it was not clear they were changed all of them the names.

Promised Land by Martin Fletcher is a passionate reading that brilliantly covers the first 2 decades from the life of the state of Israel. Recommended to anyone that loves contemporary historical novels and a good Jewish story.

Rating: 4 stars

The 'Lone Wolf in Jerusalem'

Drama, adventure, romance and WWII traumatic memories. The popular novel in Israel, Lone Wolf in Jerusalem, by the decorated IDF colonel Ehud Diskin, wisely uses the troubled political and security landscape in Israel during the British Mandate to recreate vivid stories of the Jewish resistance in the Holy Land. 

The main character is David Gabinsky, a former member of the resistance against the Germans in Belarus, shortly landed in the 'home of the Jewish people' and faced with the harsh survival realities. The different ideological orientations and strategical mindsets of the many resistance groups and different approach of Zionism - explained sometimes but the author in a bit too school-like, pedagogical way - are a good indicator of the current political mainstreams in Israel. Diskin projects also a different image of the Jewish communities in Europe, with insights about the armed resistance against the Germans, a reality not enough approached either in purely historical or literary works placed in that period of time. 

Besides the historical contexts and constructions, the story flows beautifully and there is enough action and romantic touch to inspire and captivate the readership. The love between David and Shoshana is dramatic and moving, with a dynamic written on hearbreaking historical canvass. 

The historical research is well done, which allows the writer to play with the imagination and create unique stories, without diminishing the reality of facts. It is an easy-to-read novel, with a touch of mystery, thriller and historical - also military - dramatism, recommended to history novels readers, especially those passionate about the Middle East, particularly Jewish history.  

Rating: 4 stars

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

A Land Without Borders, by Nir Baram

When it comes to the political situation in Israel, particularly in regard with the Palestinian population, most of the books are either black or white, up to the ideological affiliation of the writers. If unsure a book is worth, or not, your time and your money, you only have to Google the author and you can easily figure out which orientation he or she has and the main thesis and assumptions are almost crystal clear. 

It is a pityful pathetic intellectual situation, but this is how things are. After all, it is not bad to take sides, but the ideological sides are very narrow and obstruct the real view, particularly when it comes to Israel. Although I have my own view - narrow also - about the 'situation', I realized that I need more understanding and insights from the 'other side' therefore when offered the chance to get an ARC from Nir Baram book, I decided to take the challenge and offer myself the opportunity of a different lecture.

I think that one of the mistakes done in this case, either you are right or ('wrong') left is that we are tempted to ignore arguments and look only for the over-validation of our points of view. But if you are curious by nature, this is not enough, and things may change as people can change too. 

In the tradition of Amos Oz and David Grossman, Nir Baram is visiting Palestinian villages and inquires about what future stays ahead for the relations between Israel and the Palestinians. Unfortunately he doesn't look necessarily to answer his questions with new questions, but there are interesting facts revealed that may help to do your own further research. Like, for instance, how happened that in Betlehem the percentage of Chrisian Arabs decreased, a fact noticed by the author but not worth the effort of a serious journalistic research. The book is less ideological than expected though therefore, especially if you are curious to gather arguments and even get a sociological overview of the profile of the Palestinian leaders and their background there are some good information to take from it, although parsimoniously.

As for the future, is very unclear after so many chances were missed or peace plans were drawn without taking into consideration the local dynamic. Personally, I keep my assumption that in order to build a state you need elites and if there is any serious research that will show me the potential of a Palestinian elite able to take over the state bureaucracy and lead it to the creation of a modern - not terror-based state - I am more than happy to take the challenge. Otherwise, we are not taking about a dream but a scary nightmare.

Disclaimer: Book offered by the publisher in exchange for an honest review

Catch the Jew!

I was familiar with Tuvia Tenenbom from a previous book where he investigated in a very cynical-humorous way the state-of-the arts of the anti-Semitism in Germany, as well as from his public appearances in the German media. His writing is provocative, clowneresque at the limit, but he suceeds to reveal the ridiculous and the many layers hiding the truth.

Catch the Jew - with the German version Allein unter Juden - is taking over the topic of Israel and presents it on a plate with many mezzes, as any well respected Israeli breakfast should be. Tuvia Tenenbom is the follower of the trustworthy and small sect of the journalists that don't give up asking questions, regardless the circumstances. He needs to know and understand and when people are getting angry because of the boldness of the questions it means that he is a real 'tzaddik', because this is how real journalists used to behave. 

Although many of his trips in Israel have to do with the leftist and pro-Palestinian causes, he is also once in a while also visiting some wonder rabbi or paying his comical respects to some out-of-order strange custom. 

If you want to read a different story about Israel, which doesn't necessarily take any side but that of the inquisitive journalist, I recommend this book. Maybe you will not learn too much new things about this region, but at least will raise some questions about honesty, facts vehiculated in the media and the political realm. A very useful challenge to take once in a while.

New offer of books from Gefen Publishing House

An amazing selection of new books published recently by Gefen Publishing House. 

Hard to say which one I would NOT like to buy and read right now. 

I included most books on my shopping priority list and getting ready to work more to earn more and invest even more in books.