The Israelis: Ordinary People in an Extraordinary Land (Updated in 2008) (Kindle Edition)

by Donna Rosenthal (Author)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Today's headlines leave the impression there's little to know about Israel outside of its conflict with the Palestinians. Using Hedrick Smith's landmark The Russians as a model, journalist Rosenthal, with years of experience in and knowledge of the Middle East, defies that notion, giving an in-depth look at the rich variety of people in the Jewish state. Relying on dozens of interviews, she gives a lively, variegated portrait of all facets of Israeli life. Terrorism and relations with the Palestinians are covered, but so are secular-religious tensions, Ashkenazi-Sephardi divisions, Israeli Arabs and Jewish immigrants from Ethiopia and Russia. Throughout, Rosenthal stresses the contradictions in Israel: a country steeped in historical and religious tradition that is trying to develop a high-tech economic future; a democracy that many see as favoring its Jewish citizens above its Arab ones; a country ruled in some ways by a rigid religious establishment that also maintains thriving gay and lesbian communities. Rosenthal displays prodigious reporting and allows the people themselves-whether Jewish or Arab, men or women, religious or secular-to speak, and their voices are alternately despairing and hopeful, defiant and conciliatory. As a result, she captures an entire country, one full of flux and drama, in as vivid and nuanced a way as possible: a former male model turns Orthodox; an Ethiopian who "had never used electricity... until he was twelve" now designs computers. With the huge interest in Israel among the reading public, this is likely to find a sizable audience.
Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist

Depending upon the source of the report, Israelis are either portrayed to Americans as stalwart but beleaguered allies in the war against terror or frequently brutal colonizers determined to maintain control over justifiably resentful Palestinians. Of^B course, both images can be true, and both can be terrible distortions of reality. Rosenthal, a journalist, television news producer, and lecturer at Hebrew University, has written a broad portrait of a people and of individual Israeli citizens that is interesting, compelling, and often surprising. As revealed by Rosenthal, Israel is a vibrant and amazingly diverse nation. Ultra-Orthodox Jews wait for the Messiah and hunt down and abuse "immodestly" dressed women in Jerusalem streets. Nearby, twenty-first-century entrepreneurs break new ground in high-tech industries. Children of Bedouin families strive to carve a niche for themselves in a relentlessly modernizing society, while other Israeli Arabs struggle to define their identity in a Jewish state. This is a refreshing book that humanizes people and helps to counteract news reports that usually stress acts of savage inhumanity. Jay Freeman
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Format: Kindle Edition
• File Size: 580 KB
• Print Length: 480 pages
• Publisher: Free Press (April 1, 2008)
• Sold by: Amazon Digital Services
• Language: English
• ASIN: B0017XZJI2
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (42 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #74,620 in Kindle Store (See Bestsellers in Kindle Store)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

53 of 55 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars In The Land Of Israel, May 27, 2004

By	The Sanity Inspector (USA) - See all my reviews (TOP 1000 REVIEWER)

This review is from: The Israelis : Ordinary People in an Extraordinary Land (Hardcover)

A light, breezy entertaining bit of pop-ethnology, fit to put on the shelf with such classics as Hedrick Smith's _The Russians_, Dusko Doder's _The Yugoslavs_, and Luigi Barzini's _The Italians_. Rosenthal interviewed an impressive cross-section of Israeli society, from all backgrounds and viewpoints. It's especially affecting to read the interviews with the young people, whether Jewish, Muslim, or Christian, with their too-soon exposure to war's ugliness and their simultaneous brave hopes for the future. Caution: many if not most of the interviewees are pseudonymous.

It's a far-ranging book, with too many interesting foci to list completely: The decline of the collective ethic on Israel's kibbutzes. The insular nature of the ultra-Orthodox communities, and the painfully high human cost of leaving. The presence of ordinary vice and corruption, and how terrorists use the drug trade as a weapon of war. A potted history of Zionism, with many personal reminiscences of the 1948 war. Tours through the minority communities such as the Druze, the Bedouin, the Jews from Arab lands, and subcultures such as Russian prostitutes and gay Israelis.

Welcome inclusions are factual takedowns of widespread lies such as the Jenin "massacre". But polemics are not the meat of the book, the people are. It is very good to finally have some voices to put with the faces of this remarkable people. Let one of the interviewees have the last word:

"We're always in the headlines. _The New York Times_. CNN.
The BBC. We get more coverage than India. Than China. Than the entire continent of Africa. There's so much news about us, you'd think we're also a billion people, not six million. We're all the time on TV and front pages, so people think they know us. Unsmiling soldiers. Screaming settlers. Crying mourners. Bearded guys in black hats. Well, Israelis are much more than those photos. We complain about our teachers. Worry about exams. Flirt at parties. Wonder if we look good in our bathing suits. We curse at traffic jams and cut in line at the movies. We've got normal fears and dreams. Like young people everywhere, we want to find love and be loved. We're just normal people trying to live in this abnormal, tiny, beautiful country."

44 of 45 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A new literay resource for the Israeli society, October 30, 2003

By	"su9as" (Ann Arbor, MI United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Israelis : Ordinary People in an Extraordinary Land (Hardcover)

I teach a course on the middle east at the University. After reading this book, I realized that very few of us so called "experts" actually know abiut the State of Israel in depth. Many of my colleagues including myself really have no advanced knowledge about Israel even though we claim to be "knowledgeable" about the issues. This book opened up eyes and my head to an Israel that you don't hear about in the media. the book goes in depth to describe Israelis of every religon, race, ethnicity, sexual orientation and class. It also describes the lives of the average Israeli, which is absent in all media outlets. I have decided to assign this book as required reading for the class I will be teaching about the Middle East in the coming spring semester.

25 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An excellent book about Israel and the Israelis, November 26, 2004

By	Jill Malter ([e-mail]) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

This review is from: The Israelis : Ordinary People in an Extraordinary Land (Hardcover)

This is a very well written book about Israel. It consists of plenty of anecdotal information about a wide variety of aspects of Israeli life.

We see young adults, the army, and entrepreneurs. We see divisions among Jews into Ashkenazim, Mizrahim, Russians, Africans, Haredim, Orthodox, and Non-Orthodox. And we see the internal and external worries and problems they have. More than that, we see their reaction to "the situation," namely the war of annihilation being fought by extremist Arabs against the Jews of the region.

Perhaps the most interesting part of the book is the description of non-Jewish Israelis: the Muslims, Bedouin, Druze, and Christians. I was amazed by the tolerance shown by the Israeli public for outright disloyalty to Israel in time of war shown by many non-Jews. I can't imagine acting so against a nation I happened to be visiting, let alone one I lived in and might even be a citizen of. These sections convinced me that there won't be any peace in the region for a long time.

One item I can't agree with is the subtitle: ordinary people in an extraordinary land. In fact, while the people are much the same as people everywhere, the land is also much the same as land everywhere. Israel is, after all, a small country that looms much larger than life due to the enormous amount of ink that is spent on it. Still, given some of the more outrageous things we sometimes see written about Israel and Israeli society from Israel's detractors, this book is a very refreshing change indeed.