The Making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1947-1951 [Paperback]

Ilan Pappe (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 1850438196 | ISBN-13: 978-1850438199 | Publication Date: August 15, 1994

Arabs and Jews describe the first Arab-Israeli war of 1948 in completely different ways. Among Arabs, and especially Palestinians, the events of that year are known as the "nakba" - the catastrophe, the trauma, the disaster. For Jews, and in particular for Israelis, their victory in the war of 1948 is a veritable miracle in which, against tremendous odds and through heroic military effort, the Jewish community succeeded in thwarting attempts by the Arab states to destroy it.

This book integrates new archival material with the findings of recent scholarship to present the reader with a comprehensive and general history of the origins and consequences of the 1948 war. The author shows, in sharp contrast to the recollections and myths of both sides, that the military events of 1948 were not decisive. The victory of the Zionist organization and the fate of the Palestinians was determined by politicians on both sides - in the discussions and decisions of the United Nations in 1947-8 and in the Arab League - long before a shot had been fired. The author argues that Israel's failure to take advantage of the genuine opportunity for peace with the Arabs at the UN-sponsored Lausanne Conference in 1949 resulted in the prolonged and tragic conflict between Israel and the Arab states still very much alive today.

Product Details

• Paperback: 336 pages
• Publisher: I. B. Tauris (August 15, 1994)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1850438196
• ISBN-13: 978-1850438199
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,200,912 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 36 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Honest Accounting of the Palestinian's Impoverishment, March 5, 2003

By A Customer

This review is from: The Making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1947-1951 (Paperback)

Ilan Pappe is one of the "new historians", a group of Israeli historians who are determined to accurately account for how Israel came to be. It must take courage if you are a Jewish historian and a professor at the University of Haifa, Israel, to give an unvarnished account of how the Jews took the land that comprises Israel. In 1900, the Palestinians owned all 10,000 sq. miles that made up Palestine (now known as Israel, West Bank, and Gaza) - the Palestinians had a well-developed society with villages, civil administration, olive groves, literature, etc... it had been a Muslim society for 1,300 years. But by 2000, the Israelis owned 8,000 sq. miles and occupied the rest. How did this happen? Did the Israelis purchase the land or did they simply take it, driving the Palestinians off their land into refugee camps, poverty, and desperation? Ilan Pappe tells us. It is interesting to me how determined the Israelis are to change the history of Israel and how so few know the real story. It is doubly interesting to see how furious they get when one of their own departs the party line and tells how it really happened. This book is calm and careful with its facts; it is well researched and thoroughly referenced. It will surprise you... the story of Israel is different to what you probably now think. Israelis do not want you to read this book.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Diplomacy's First Go, April 25, 2008

By 

Eric Maroney (Trumansburg, NY) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1947-1951 (Paperback)

The Making of the Arab-Israel Conflict 1947-1951 is mainly a history of the diplomatic efforts to solve the problem of the mixed population of Jews and Arabs in Palestine before the UN Partition of 1947, during the "civil war" among Jews and Palestinians in late 1947 to mid-1948, when the State of Israel was declared and the regular armies of the surrounding Arab states invaded Palestine. Pappe lays out in great detail all the commissions, delegations, Security Council measures, mediation attempts, both before and after the war. He shows their strengths and weaknesses, and in the end, why mediation between Israel and the Arab states (and the Palestinians) failed by 1951. A meticulously researched work, it is abundantly footnoted and fairly presented making admirable use of primary and secondary documents. Perhaps most controversially, he argues against Benny Morris' assertion that Plan Dalet (D) was not primarily an order of expulsion of the Palestinians.

5.0 out of 5 stars The best introduction yet., July 11, 2011

By 

Zachary Rose "Anarcho-communist" (Gulfport, MS) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: The Making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1947-1951 (Paperback)

I've read quite a few books on the first Arab-Israeli conflict and find Pappe's work to be the best yet. If you like this one then you should pick up his other work about the ethnic cleansing of Palestine.