Benny Morris, considered by many to be the"Dean" of Israeli Middle Eastern historians, is noted for "revisionist" works on the genesis of the Palestinian Arab refugee issue and rewriting of Israeli historical hagiography. This book, a comprehensive history of the dual-phase 1947-1948 war (civil war between Jews and Arabs antedating Partition, followed by invasion by a constellation of Arab professional militaries and various ad hoc militias) reviews the entire enterprise from both a military and political perspective.
The book can be divided into three segments: 1). an introductory section, which places in context the, 2). major middle-section, which exhaustively deals with military affairs and, 3). a summary/conclusion section, which presents the author's perspectives based on presently available evidence. As Arab archives have not been opened to researchers as of the 2008 publication date, this work cannot be considered "definitive", but certainly holds this status as of now.
There is one major shortcoming of this book: the lack of maps. The barrage of detail on virtually every military and paramilitary engagement becomes confusing and frustrating, as the reader cannot readily follow the strategy and tactics elaborated in the text. Further, many of the maps have inadequate legends, rendering the majority of them difficult to understand.
Morris attributes the Israeli military victories to a combination of better planning, better logistics, better preparation, better motivation, better training, fighting along "interior lines", internal cohesion in the form of communality of purpose and international sympathy. Surprisingly (at least for many readers) much of the initial political and military support came from the Soviet Union, later an ardent partisan of the Arab cause and foe of Israel. Czechoslovakian arms, supplementing those bought from international weapons dealers, helped turn the tide, in addition to the above factors. Conversely, lack of purpose, infighting, jockeying for advantage vis-a-vis rival regimes and cynical manipulation of Arab public opinion by Arab political elites did little to fashion a force capable of opposing the Jews. Heated rhetoric, in other words, did not serve as an adequate substitute for assiduous planning and training. Worse, innumerable inflammatory and "eliminationist" statements regarding the Jews tended to provoke, amplify and reinforce pre-existing reciprocal thoughts and statements in their enemies, hardening positions to the point of ossification; thus, the genesis of the current mess. The complexity of the situation is further enhanced by complicity of various Arabs in the acquisition of lands by the Jews. The branding of numerous Arabs as "traitors" by the mercurial Mufti of Jerusalem, Husseini, heightened internecine disputes, often with lethal consequences, not only for the "perpetrators", but also for the cause; this behavior continues to the present day.
As for presenting a "balanced" perspective on the "Middle East Problem", the author makes every effort to be scrupulously objective. Israeli military and paramilitary actions that resulted in war crimes against civilians were frankly acknowledged, as was the policy that underlay them, to wit, generally ad hoc, rather than the result of the product of Macheavellian scheming and malevolence. Whle Morris states that the Israelis committed more atrocities than did the Arabs, he notes that this was an accident of opportunity, rather than evidence of moral superiority of the Arabs and their fighters. His synopsis of the motivations of Zionist, British, Arab and Ottoman participants in the genesis of the modern Middle East is fair and bluntly accurate.
Certainly, one could conclude that the Zionist enterprise was not any more or less "fair" than the "Manifest Destiny" of the white invaders of the Americas (murdering, cheating, displacing and finally segregating the indigenous inhabitants into "reservations", where many continue to reside under rank and disgraceful conditions) or of the British in Australia, to cite but two examples. Similarly, the displacement of Arabs from their land is not much different from the massive population transfers that occurred after WW-II in, for example, the case of the German (civilian) expulsions from Poland and Czechoslovakia. Perhaps a better example would be the displacement/population exchange of millions of Hindus and Muslims during the Partition of India and Pakistan, which occurred around the same time (circa 1947). That division, accompanied by generally involuntary "repatriation" based on ethnic and religious affiliation, was accompanied by considerable violence, property damage/confiscation and left a residue of bitter inter-communal hatred, with intermittent terrorist attacks and threatened international war. These examples are not cited by Morris and are not offered by me as justifications; they merely illustrate a fundemental aspect of human nature.
In summary, this is an excellent history which would benefit from inclusion of more detailed maps to accompany the more important military engagements. It is objectively written, comprehensively referenced and the conclusions drawn by the author are buttressed by data and temperately drawn.
