States that the Jewish nation of Israel stands accused in the dock of international justice. Throughout the world, Israel is singled out for condemnation, divestment, boycott, and demonization. This book refutes anti-Zionism in the format of posing 32 questions based on accusations made against Israel (e.g. "Is Israel a racist state?"). For each one, presents the accusation, the accusers, the reality, and the proof of the reality (as opposed to the false accusation). Stresses that Israel is being judged unfairly, by a double standard, and that comparatively and in context Israel is hardly among the worst human rights offenders in the world. Claims that such a subjective view of Israel encourages terrorist attacks by Palestinians and others. Blames the Palestinians for the lack of peace in the Middle East. Ch. 31 (pp. 208-216), "Are Critics of Israel Anti-Semitic?", differentiates between criticism of Israel and singling it out for unique sanctions, which is labelled antisemitism.

"A personal, spirited, and concise chronological timeline spanning from Biblical times to today that explores one of the most fascinating countries in the world--Israel"--

Just over 100 years ago, Theodor Herzl launched the Zionist Movement. They called for a Jewish State in their ancestral land, Palestine. Fifty years later, the State of Israel came into being. Israel was established so that Jews anywhere in the world could have a homeland of their own. After independence, that process began with the in gathering of three quarters of a million Jews from Arab lands. As Communism disintegrated, more than a million Jews emigrated from the Soviet Union. Despite war and terror, Israel has sought peace through both secret and public negotiations. These efforts continue to this day, despite two major Palestinian uprisings.

"In Peter Beinart's view, one story dominates Jewish communal life: that of persecution and victimhood. It is a story that erases much of the nuance of Jewish religious tradition and warps our understanding of Israel and Palestine. After Gaza, where Jewish texts, history and language have been deployed to justify mass slaughter and starvation, Beinart argues, Jews must tell a new story. After this war, whose horror will echo for generations, they must do nothing less than offer a new answer to the question: What does it mean to be a Jew?Beinart imagines an alternate narrative, which would draw on other nations' efforts at moral reconstruction and a different reading of Jewish tradition. A story in which Israeli Jews have the right to equality, not supremacy, and in which Jewish and Palestinian safety are not mutually exclusive but intertwined. One that recognizes the danger of venerating states at the expense of human life." --

A young woman's journey to Palestine in the wake of World War II stands at the center of this compelling novel about the birth of Israel. 25,000 first printing.

This book addresses one of the most timely and urgent topics in archaeology and biblical studies -- the origins of early Israel. For centuries the Western tradition has traced its beginnings back to ancient Israel, but recently some historians and archaeologists have questioned the reality of Israel as it is described in biblical literature. In Who Were the Early Israelites and Where Did They Come From? William Dever explores the continuing controversies regarding the true nature of ancient Israel and presents the archaeological evidence for assessing the accuracy of the well-known Bible stories. Confronting the range of current scholarly interpretations seriously and dispassionately, Dever rejects both the revisionists who characterize biblical literature as "pious propaganda" and the conservatives who are afraid to even question its factuality. Attempting to break through this impasse, Dever draws on thirty years of archaeological fieldwork in the Near East, amassing a wide range of hard evidence for his own compelling view of the development of Israelite history. In his search for the actual circumstances of Israel's emergence in Canaan, Dever reevaluates the Exodus-Conquest traditions in the books of Exodus, Numbers, Joshua, Judges, and 1 & 2 Samuel in the light of well-documented archaeological evidence from the late Bronze Age and early Iron Age. Among this important evidence are some 300 small agricultural villages recently discovered in the heartland of what would later become the biblical nation of Israel. According to Dever, the authentic ancestors of the "Israelite peoples" were most likely Canaanites -- together with some pastoral nomads and small groups of Semitic slaves escaping from Egypt -- who, through the long cultural and socioeconomic struggles recounted in the book of Judges, managed to forge a new agrarian, communitarian, and monotheistic society. Written in an engaging, accessible style and featuring fifty photographs that help bring the archaeological record to life, this book provides an authoritative statement on the origins of ancient Israel and promises to reinvigorate discussion about the historicity of the biblical tradition.

In this book, master Talmudist and scholar of the Greco-Roman world, the late Professor Saul Lieberman, elucidates words, texts, customs, and practices in either rabbinic or classical literature, often by reference to passages in the other. In “Greek in Jewish Palestine”, he demonstrates that “almost every foreign word and phrase have their raison d'etre in rabbinic literature” and that “all Greek phrases in rabbinic literature are quotations.” “Hellenism in Greek Palestine” is “an inquiry into the spirit of many rabbinic observations and investigations of the facts, incidents, opinions, notions and beliefs to which the Rabbis allude in their statements.”

his monumental and fascinating book, the product of seven years of original research, will forever change the terms of the debate about the conflicting claims of the Arabs and the Jews in the Middle East.The weight of the comprehensive evidence found and brilliantly analyzed by historian and journalist Joan Peters answers many crucial questions, among them: Why are the Arab refugees from Israel seen in a different light from all the other, far more numerous peoples who were displaced after World War II? Why, indeed, are they seen differently from the Jewish refugees who were forced, in 1948 and after, to leave the Arab countries to find a haven in Israel? Who, in fact, are the Arabs who were living within the borders of present-day Israel, and where did they come from?Joan Peters's highly readable and moving development of the answers to these and related questions will appear startling, even to those on both sides of the argument who have considered themselves to be in command of the facts. On the basis of a definitive weight of hitherto unexamined population and other historical data, much of it buried in untouched archives, Peters demonstrates that Jews did not displace Arabs in Palestine-just the reverse: Arabs displaced Jews; that a hidden but major Arab migration and immigration took place into areas settled by Jews in pre-Israel Palestine; that a substantial number of the Arab refugees called Palestinians in reality had foreign roots; that for every Arab refugee who left Israel in 1948, there was a Jewish refugee who fled or was expelled from his Arab birthplace at the same time-today's much discussed Sephardic majority in Israel is in fact composed mainly of these Arab-born Jewish refugees or their offspring; that Britain, the Mandatory power, winked at and even encouraged Arab immigration into Palestine between the two World Wars; that by disguising the Arab immigrants as "indigenous native Palestinian Arabs," the British justified their restrictions on Jewish immigration and settlement, dooming masses of European Jews to destruction in the Nazi camps.Joan Peters also unfolds a historical record to shatter the widely held belief that Arabs and Jews harmoniously coexisted for centuries in the Arab world-the fact is that the Jews, along with other non-Muslims, were second-class citizens, oppressed in the Muslim world for more than a millennium. And this continuing prejudicial tradition of hostility underlies, as well, every Arab action toward the state of Israel.In addition to her pioneering archival researches, Joan Peters has frequently traveled in the Middle East, conducting numerous interviews and gathering the personal observations of the first-rate reporter she is. The result is a book that has already had a major impact on policy discussions of one of the most vital and intractable of the world's problems, shrouded until now in a fog of misinformation and ignorance.

"Israeli writer Shaham explores the beams and pilings of a special mode of Zionist life--that of the kibbutz--and, especially in the first and third novellas here, lays out the psychologies of some of the pioneers with almost case-file (if undramatic) precision. In "S/S Cairo City," a delegate to a 1939 Geneva Zionist convention writes a series of letters to a lover, another delegate, who has left (disastrously) to return to Poland. As Hitler throws shadows which many of the Zionists are not yet ready to accept, they are nevertheless grateful to jam aboard a Palestine-bound Egyptian ship out of Marseilles; on the ship, Shaham probes the skepticisms of men-ideologues being turned into plain victims by what they're fleeing. ("Kuperberg spoke about the congress. He was not at all impressed with certain speeches that I found deeply moving. He said Zionism tends to be like manna. It gives the Western Jew a taste of Yiddishkeit, while to the Eastern Jew it holds forth a promise of Europe.") The last novella--"The Salt of the Earth"--is about an old kibbutznik's first trip to America--and seems like an ironic variation on the opening story; New York literally kills, the old man, hostile to every vision of social life for which he's striven back at home (and knows he's losing there, too). And the central, title novella is where Shaham shows his hand at deeper narrative: a bookish young kibbutz woman becomes erotic guardian over her married neighbor's clandestine love life--as the situation of universal daily sharing builds up such an edifice of public virtue that private weakness becomes downfall, destruction. Like Amos Oz, whose subject matter is similar, Shaham is delicate, historical, unillusioned, undogmatic; Oz's poetry is lacking here, but Shaham may have the edge in social perspicacity."-- Kirkus

These essays by a leading Israeli historian focus on Israeli decisions and the reasons behind the mass Arab exile from Palestine in 1948. Benny Morris addresses the transfer of Majdal's Arabs to Gaza in 1950, the initial absorption of the Palestinian refugees in Arab host countries in 1948-9, and why some Arabs remained in their villages. He then explores attitudes toward the Palestinian Arabs from the 1948 war to the differing perspectives of Israel's two main parties. By examining past and present Israeli historiography, Morris identifies and analyzes the major points of controversy between the "old" official Israeli histories and the "new" histories of the 1980s and beyond.

Christian Zionism is the fastest growing religious movement in Christianity today, with current believers thought to exceed five million in the United States alone. Proposing a literal reading of the bible, it states that a Jewish return to the Holy Land is a requirement for the Second Coming and inevitable Armageddon. Promoting common interests between Israel and the Christian world, and possessing many wealthy and hugely powerful advocates, Christian Zionism has a far-reaching influence today.

This autobiography of William G. Dever is unabashedly his story that offers not only candid reflections on his life, but also on the remarkable generation of giants in archaeology in Israel and the evolving history of the fields of biblical and Israeli archaeology. Chapters cover the ups and downs in both his life and career with brutally honesty. His memoir concludes with a postscript on the likely future of biblical archaeology, and an annotated bibliography provides a guide for serious readers who wish to explore some of the scholarly literature to flesh out Dever's narrative--

Throughout the past three decades, Nadav Na'aman has repeatedly proved that he is one of the most careful historians of ancient Canaan and Israel. With broad expertise, he has brought together archaeology, text, and the inscriptional material from all of the ancient Near East to bear on the history of ancient Israel and the land of Canaan during the second and first millenniums B.C.E. Many of his studies have been published as journal articles or notes and yet, together, they constitute one of the most important bodies of literature on the subject in recent years, particularly because of the careful attention to methodology that Na'aman always has brought to his work. Collected here are 23 essays on the Hurrians, the Egyptians and their presence in the Levant during the second millennium B.C.E., Canaanite city-states, the Amarna Letters, and the neighbors of Canaan in the north, such as Alalakh and Damascus. The essays range over such topics as scribes and language, archaeology, cultural influences, and the interrelations of the great powers during this period. The volume includes indexes of ancient personal names, place-names, and biblical references.

This is the dramatic story of the rescue of Jews from Europe after World War II by North American Jewish volunteers who smashed through the British blockade and brought thousands of refugees to safe haven in Palestine through the illegal Aliyah Bet. Film director Alan Rosenthal was inspired by this book to create his documentary film Waves of Freedom, released in 2008. Packed with photos, and enhanced by the eminent historian Sir Martin Gilbert's introduction, this meticulously researched book is the definitive word on a little-known chapter of Jewish history. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Murray S. Greenfield was one of the volunteer sailors in the Aliyah Bet operations. He has served as executive director of the Association of Americans and Canadians in Israel (AACI) and as volunteer director of the American Association for Ethiopian Jewry (AAEJ). He lives in Israel with his wife Hana.

Abraham Mapu (1808-1867) was one of the first, & finest, of the novelists to write in Hebrew. Heavily influenced by a wide range of sources, the Bible, the Romantic Novelists, & renewed pride in ancient Jewish history, his works recall the finest works of writers such as Flaubert & other great romantic novelists.

A remarkable insight into Jewish history in Britain, 'My Mother's House' is a poignant story of belonging, nationhood and identity set in Wales, England and Palestine. The first novel from the acclaimed author of Eunice Fleet - a poignant story of belonging, nationhood and identity set in Wales, England and Palestine. First novel from the acclaimed author of EUNICE FLEET a poignant story of belonging, nationhood and identity set in Wales, England and Palestine Simon is a troubled young manborn in Wales, of Jewish heritage, and in love with Englishness and an English heiress. He determines to reject his Jewish and Welsh identity and the industrial valleys he grew up in and seeks to fulfil his ambition to rise in the Civil Service. His experiences in love and his professional life see him reject Edith on discovering that she is not what he believed her to be, and taking up arms in the fight against Englands enemies in the Great War. Ultimately, he must embrace his family and his heritage before he can experience a sense of wholeness. Simons experience raises questions of belonging, language, nationhood and identity that are as relevant now as they were in 1931 when the novel was first published. Lily Tobiass sensitive individual and communal portraits illuminate some of the most topical personal, social and political issues of the twenty-first century.

Does Tommy know you're Jewish? Tommy knows I'm Irish. At 12:37pm on 22 July 1946, the King David Hotel in Jerusalem was bombed. 91 people were killed, 46 wounded. The bombing was carried out by right-wing Zionists, targeting the headquarters of the British in Palestine. Two Irish Jewish brothers, Paul and Cecil Green, journey from their Dublin birthplace to battle antisemitism on the streets of East London. Their Irish nationalism propels them towards Jewish nationalism as they struggle against British Imperialism to form a Jewish nation state. As violence between British soldiers and Jewish terrorists erupts, Paul and Cecil become involved in an act of terrorism that changes both their lives. 12:37 raises complex and controversial questions around Jewish violence, homeland and national identity in a stunning new play that is both a hard-hitting historical epic and an intimate family drama. This edition was published to coincide with the world premiere at the Finborough Theatre, London, in November 2022.

"Benjamin Isaac is one of the most distinguished historians of the ancient world, with a number of landmark monographs to his name. This volume collects most of Benjamin Isaac's published articles and book chapters of the last two decades, many of which are not easy to access, and republishes them for the first time along with some brand new chapters. The focus is on Roman concepts of state and empire and mechanisms of control and integration. Isaac also discusses ethnic and cultural relationships in the Roman Empire and the limits of tolerance and integration, as well as attitudes to foreigners and minorities, including Jews. The book will appeal to scholars and students of ancient, imperial, and military history, as well as to those interested in the ancient history of problems which still resonate in today's societies."--

"The struggle over Israel/Palestine is not just another contest by competing nationalisms or an instance of geopolitical competition. It is also about control of sacred territory that involves local Jews, Muslims, and Christians as well as worldwide faith communities, each with their own interests and stake in what transpires. This balanced introduction to a complex subject presents the multiple positions within the great monotheistic traditions. It demonstrates that the secular discourses in the public square concerning ownership privileges, historical precedence, political rights, and justice that have allegedly replaced religious claims actually coexist with, and often complement, the theological. It explores the century-long tangle of secular and theological debates about Israel's legitimacy. Whether readers support a Jewish state or are resolutely opposed, the serious and substantial scholarship of this well-reasoned and innovative book will contribute to a nuanced and better-informed understanding of this persistent issue that has entered its second century on the international agenda."--