Customer Reviews

Israel/Palestine (Hot Spots in Global Politics series)

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3 star:		(1)
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This is a truly excellent book on one of the most difficult conflicts in today's world, the dispute between Israelis and Palestinians over what Professor Dowty calls, thoughtfully, "Israel/Palestine". This small volume is as great an introduction to the conflict as I have read in a long time.

The book has many strong points. The most important among them:

1. It is genuinely balanced, giving a fair description, analysis and even prescription to a conflict on which almost anything said is considered biased by one party or the other (and often both!). Dowty achieves a measure of "objectivity" (assuming that true objectivity is beyond reach) by letting each party speak in its own voice. You will not find in this book straw men or cartoonish descriptions of what the conflicting parties allegedly believe. This fairness is as refreshing as it is unusual.

2. The book is very well written, as accessible as poissible, and clearly organized. Other books on the Arab-Israeli conflict run 800-900 pages; Dowty does it in 240 pages. While more details are, of course, possible--this small volume ought to be looked upon as an introduction, an invitation to learn more.

3. Professor Dowty identifies correctly the cause of the conflict as "the claim of 2 peoples to the same piece of land" (p. 4) and demolishes convincingly alternative explanations (myths that tend to perpetuate the conflict).

4. Although this is a brief book, I find it highly sophisticated. For example, the author offers a good, rational discussion of solutions to the conflict (pp. 77-79 and in other places)

5. Despite the space limitations that must have been imposed on the author, he makes good use of maps (without which one cannot understand the analysis) and, in general, his use of sources reflects his expertise.

This is a very useful book for college courses, the attentive public and intelligent readers interested in comprehending this highly complicated dispute. It supplies the historical background without which no fruitful discussion of the contemporary dilemmas can take place. If you are interested in UNDERSTADING the conflict rather than in propaganda (on either side), this volume should be on your shelf.

Alan Dowty's Israel/Palestine is simply the best, most coherent, concise, up to date, and balanced introduction to the tortured relations between Israel and the Palestinians available. It is scrupulously fair and even handed without sacrificing analytical rigor. It provides the historical background and dispels conventional myths; that it is an age-old conflict based on ethnic hatred rooted in religion and insoluble because of endless violence. He accurately and concisely defines the conflict as "the claim of two peoples for the same piece of land" (p.4). Dowty fairly relates both the Jewish and Arab narratives, the emergence of Israel, the "re-emergence" of the Palestinians as active players after the 1967 war up to the first Intifada to contextualize his insightful analysis of the failure of the Oslo peace process and its implications. He devotes a complete chapter to an examination of the core issues; territory and settlements, Jerusalem, security issues, and refugees which he concludes with a general prognosis. I quote just one of Dowty's many profound insights: "The lack of attention to one's own impact on the politics, society, and public attitudes of the other side seems to be a fixed attribute of Middle East conflicts. Perhaps the `winner' in the Arab-Israeli conflicted will be the first party to realize how much power it has to influence the internal dynamics of the other side and to use this power effectively" (200).The concluding chapter, "The Perfect Conflict" examines tragic aspects of the clash of right with right and the mutual sense of victimhood. Dowty critically examines the option of a binational state and rejects it as unpractical and supports the two-state solution as the only practical solution. He analyzes the role of the extremists on both sides and the policy of unilateral disengagement in his concluding analysis. I have used this book as a required text in an advanced undergraduate seminar in political science and my students are very enthusiastic about it. It is so well written without resort to professional jargon that it is appropriate for nonprofessionals interested in the subject. I highly recommend it.
Professor M.J. Aronoff (Rutgers University)

Israel/Palestine is simply a great text.Against the backdrop of the plethora of highly polemic and biased works,which approach the Israeli-Palestinian predicament in a highly-charged and partisan manner,Professor Dowty's book is an immensely valuable contribution.The book is balanced,thoughtful and insightful.It is based upon a most scrupulous and comprehensive research.The author manages to beautifully and compellingly combine facts and analysis into a very coherent whole, and the outcome is an integrative,clear and concise interpretation of the origins and evolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.The book avoids any sweeping generalizations and wholesale accusations of any of the parties.It is nuanced and sophisticated,seeking to elucidate the core and dynamics of the conflict,which originated in certain incompatible ideologies,legacies and cultural experiences rather than in conspiracies or imperialistic schemes.It consistently juxtaposes these perspectives,and the outcome is a most analytical,well-written and powerful text,which is permeated with empathy for both sides and is based upon a most profound understanding of historical processes.It is a must book for anyone interested in the conflict.

If you are looking for a concise overview of the entire Arab-Israeli conflict, this is the book. If you are looking for a book that identifies the essential information needed to understand the conflict, this is the book. And if you are looking for a book that gives both sides of the conflict equal time, this is the book. Professor Alan Dowty has done an amazing job explaining this complicated conflict and helping the reader understand the most likely solutions to the complex issues of the conflict.

Alan Dowty really tries to be objective in this book. But I think that to be objective, one needs to be honest rather than "balanced." When one tells the truth, there will indeed be ugly facts about everyone. But that is all right. The problem comes in trying to achieve "balance" by inserting a few popular but malicious lies. These lies then can serve as a litmus test for some readers, who then consider you and your work to be discredited.

In this book, there is one question I wish the author would have asked more often when considering the Arab position. Namely, had the Jews done nothing offensive in any respect, what would the Arabs have done about it? In some cases, Dowty does admit that Arab "responses" would have been the same had there been no "provocation" at all.

The author begins with five points, none of which I entirely agree with:

1) This is not an age-old conflict.

Although the present violence seems to have started only in the past 130 years, the battle against Jewish rights in the Middle East has lasted for many centuries.

2) This conflict is not caused by ethnic hatreds.

To me, Arabic-speakers and Hebrew-speakers seem to be of different ethnicities.

3) This conflict is not rooted in a clash of religions.

Maybe so, but Islam is often invoked in the battle against Jewish rights.

4) This conflict is solvable.

Obviously it is solvable, but I'm not so sure it can be solved by giving land to land-rich Arabs and by making arbitrary rules against Jewish rights in the region.

5) The core of this conflict is two claims to the same land.

I doubt this. After all, even if the Arabs got every single inch of Israel and the West Bank, I suspect that few of them would be satisfied were Israel merely to move to Jordan or the Sinai (or, worse, Kuwait). I think the core of this conflict is whether Jews ought to have human rights.

To his credit, Dowty does note that the early Modern Zionists saw no problem with the fact that Arabs and others (including Jews) lived in the Levant. After all, the Zionists wanted human rights and justice for everyone. And he shows that one reason why Jews were a minority in the Levant (although they were a majority in Jerusalem by 1880) was that the Ottoman Empire had laws against them moving there, buying land, and building on land. I think those who look on these laws proudly and then claim the land for the Arabs on the grounds that Jews didn't move there are being dishonest, not just hypocritical.

The author does discuss the issue of whether there was a Levantine Arab people 100 years ago. But I think this issue is bogus: the Arabs have fought Jewish rights as Arabs, not as Levantine Arabs. And there is an argument that Arabs ought not allow Jews to "steal" any of their land. But that is bogus too: it would make the whole world off-limits to legitimate purchase of any land by minorities.

There is a mention of Deir Yassin. The Arabs did not like the Jewish victory at Deir Yassin. What is not said is that the Jewish attack on Deir Yassin was close to the very first attack on any town, anywhere, by Jews, as Jews, in well over 900 years. I think many Arabs would have screamed bloody murder about it even had no Arab been scratched, let alone seriously wounded or killed. For this reason, I tend to be somewhat suspicious of Arab claims of great Jewish wrongdoing here. I see the Jewish victory here as part of a triumph over tyranny, much like the Allied victory in 1942 at Stalingrad, albeit on a smaller scale.

The description of the 1967 Six-Day War is reasonable. But it fails to put Arab claims of merely defending themselves in perspective. One could equally well call the German invasion of Poland in 1939 "defensive."

Dowty says that in 1988, Arafat "renounced terrorism." That's untrue. At most, he pretended to say he renounced it. Dowty does point out that the Oslo Declaration of Principles, in 1993, was completely ambiguous. I agree with his implication that this was not very clever and was in fact a fatal flaw in them. The author mentions the 1996 Arab riots over the opening of a door to the Herodian tunnel, but fails to expose these as totally unprovoked by Israel. And while he does admit that the Arabs were the aggressors against Israel in 2000, he gives too much credence to their ridiculous claims that they merely wanted justice!

The author discusses the "demographic problem" in the region as if 5 million Jews are simply too few to dominate 8000 square miles (let alone 11,000) in peacetime. I think that in peacetime, the Jews and Levantine Arabs would each buy at least twice this much land.

The author concludes by asking if this conflict is a tragedy of Right against Right. This leaves me aghast. Would he say that the conflict between the Blacks and the Ku Klux Klan is one of Right against Right? Jewish rights do not preclude Arab rights, and Arab rights do not preclude Jewish rights. In my opinion, if the Arabs are willing to abide Jewish rights, the conflict will be over. There may indeed eventually be more (or other) Arab states. There may even be more than one Jewish state. But I see no need for any of this, and no need at all for a state whose only purpose is to terrorize some other state.

This is an interesting book, but it has some serious flaws.