Customer Reviews

Right to Exist: A Moral Defense of Israel's Wars

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This absorbing, well written, impassioned study by a historian and director of Israel's Holocaust museum, is extremely well presented, providing what could be called a "moral evaluation" of the facts surrounding the historical context pertaining to the ongoing situation in the Middle East. A study which exposes how the present, "flawed" perception of the Arab-Israeli conflict permeating the International community is shown to have fanned the flames of an ever increasing hatred of the Jewish people and their nation.

The book is quite powerful and transports the reader into the experience & world of the Jew with the sense of frustration being almost palpable from the text. A study that will hold the reader's attention throughout .

The title of this work ("Right To Exist") speaks volumes in itself and is described as a damning indictment upon much of modern day society where many intellectuals & public figures (including University professors, media distorters, anti-Semites and alleged "peace activists") are said to have used their positions as platforms from which to unjustly vilify the State of Israel. The implications of their actions are discussed at various places in the text.

The book in no way objects to criticism of the Jewish State as long as that analysis of Israel is "comparative, contextual, and fair". However the book contends strongly that the Jewish nation is the only one criticized for faults that are far worse among other nations and that this criticism crosses the line from being acceptable to blatantly anti-Semitic.

The source of this work describes himself as a "lifelong liberal, peace activist and a seeker of justice", critical of some Israeli Government policies, but someone whose attitude changed following the increase of Palestinian terrorism etc. and who eventually found himself voting for the "hardline" Israeli leader Ariel Sharon.

The book begins with a description of how many innocent Jewish civilians including women, children and the elderly are murdered by Palestinian terrorists whilst the Arab World responds with more cries of "death to the Jews" whilst the rest of the World simultaneously looks away or pretends not to hear. The resounding silence being described as endorsement and support for the killers of these Jews to continue with their murderous policies.

The study proceeds to argue that there is no "cycle of violence" in the Middle East in which each side is morally culpable and moves to destroy what are described as numerous lies and myths about the history as well as the ongoing Arab-Israeli issue.

The reader is provided with quite a detailed context surrounding the beginning of the "second intifada" in relation to the offers made by Israel at the Clinton/Barak/Arafat summit and also what are called the true facts surrounding the beginning of the ensuing violence.

Another matter addressed is what is cited as the "impossible task" of appeasing the Palestinian populace. Reference provided as to how lightening restrictions upon Palestinian movement for security purposes has always been accompanied by a sharp rise in Palestinian attacks on Israeli civilians. The effects of all these issues on the writer are also presented together with some advice for those who consider that "peace" will result from Israel giving to the Arab world (Palestinians) the territories of the ancient Jewish homeland re-captured in 1967.

The book traces the long struggle to establish and defend the Jewish State in the face of Arab resistance and International hostility arguing that it is impossible to understand the conflict in the Middle East without accepting the reality that from the very beginning the overt strategy of the Arab leadership has been to eliminate the existence of any Jewish state and to destroy the Jewish population.

The text mirrors this International hatred with reference to the vast number of Arab/Muslim sponsored UN Resolutions against the Jewish State described as being out of all proportion to other nations and issues etc. and which has seen Israel uniquely singled out for censure, divestment and boycott . By way of comparison the reader is shown from the text that there existed a blatant disregard for any UN Resolutions within the Arab world whilst it pursued the genocide of the Jewish people from their midst during the Arab-Israeli wars which the writer proceeds to analyse in some depth throughout a large part of this study.

The reader is shown how nations are often called upon to defend their policies, and sometimes even their history, but few if any need to actually justify their existence. A process which the book cites Israel as having been mired in through the past 55 years of Palestinian terrorism and Arab rejection with nearly all of the Arab world still refusing to recognise the mere right of Israel to even exist.

As an evangelical Christian my own personal perspective in relation to the Jewish people and their Land differ somewhat from that described in this work . However, I have not allowed this to prejudice my review on this book which indeed contains a wealth of material bearing an enormous amount of merit which is worthy of reading irrespective of the individual's stance on the subjects covered. Thank you.

I am not a Jew myself, nor a particularly religious person. I come from an Iranian Muslim family. This fact, in and of itself, would ordinarily be irrelevant were it not for the depressing reality that Muslim attitudes toward Israel are drearily predictable in their mendacity and barbarically ignorant racism. Having already absorbed more than a few helpings of Islamofascist and radical leftist sewage on the subject of Israel, I found this book an immensely refreshing contrast. Lozowick is not a "right wing" Israeli of the kind committed to the settlements (though even if he were, that in and of itself would not make him a bad person, especially given that even the most militant Jewish settlers still seem quite civilized when compared to the Palestinian thugs who would like nothing better than to "finish the job Hitler started.") He is often critical of Israeli policies, and is willing to acknowledge the basic justice of the Palestinians' desire for political independence. That being said, he does a wonderful job of exposing the truly grotesque hypocrisy inherent in the way pompous and self-righteous leftists, especially in Europe, present the Israeli-Palestinian struggle (and I will bet good money that every "one-star" reviewer of this book is either a neo-Nazi, an Islamic fascist, or a leftist, the differences between these groups being largely cosmetic). These sycophantically pro-Palestinian Western leftists must rank with the most disgustingly absurd people on the planet. But for the fact that their mouths are eternally open in vitriolic condemnation of Israel, one might think their lips had been surgically attached to the rear ends of Hezbollah representatives. Apparently, for some of our "bien-pensants," Jew-hatred is acceptable if it can be tarted up as multiculturalist concern for some "poor, oppressed people of color" du jour. The fact that the "people of color" we are dealing with here are the Palestinians makes the hypocrisy of the Israel-haters even more nauseating, for if there was ever a people who have contributed mightily to their own misery it is the Palestinians. When you BEGIN with the premise that the other guys, namely the Israelis, don't even have a right to exist; when your principal negotiating tactic is essentially reducible to the formula of "give us whatever we want or we'll suicide-bomb you into submission," then it is clear that your oppression is more self-inflicted than imposed from without.

Anti-Israel belligerents like to propagate the sophistry that Israel is the aggressor because she is militarily more powerful than the Palestinians. But as any student of history can see, aggression is not a function of how many weapons you have. It flows from hatred and the desire to do violence in the human heart. When the Nazis marched into the Rhineland in 1936, they were in no military position to withstand the 100 French divisions on their border had the French chosen to respond militarily. Militarily the Nazis were considerably weaker than the French in 1936; yet no one disputes that they were the aggressors. So too in the Middle East, it is the militarily weaker Palestinians who are the aggressors, for they are the ones who teach their children racial hatred of Jews; they are the ones who glorify acts of terrorist murder. For their part, if the Israelis want anything, it is to be left alone, and most of them would gladly give up the West Bank if the Palestinians ever became sincere about wanting only a compromise. Indeed, the very fact that the Palestinians are constantly resorting to terrorism to pick a fight with the militarily superior Israelis is an ironic admission that the Israelis, for all their flaws, are immensely superior to the Palestinians not only militarily, but above all, morally. If Israel's behavior even remotely resembled that of the typical Arab state, the Palestinians wouldn't dare provoke them in so barbaric a fashion, for to do so would be tantamount to inviting their own annihilation.

All of this is demonstrated very effectively by Lozowick, a man who nevertheless comes across as having more genuine sympathy for the Palestinians than in my estimation the latter have ever deserved. And although I don't think Lozowick intended to place Israelis on some kind of pedestal, his book nicely illustrates the fact that a people, like the Israelis, can be far from perfect and yet still remain infinitely preferable to their morally Neanderthal antagonists. So even if you ARE a critic of Israel, assuming you have at a minimum a rudimentary capacity for fair-mindedness, try reading this book. Unless you are a committed anti-Semite, or the sort of leftist buffoon who may not hate Jews per se, but who must always take the most virulently anti-Israeli stance as an oblique way of expressing your anti-American hatred, "Right to Exist" SHOULD challenge your assumptions. If Lozowick's arguments cannot get through your skull, then short of a direct hit from a cruise missile I suspect nothing will.

This is a good book for someone like me. I realize that Israel's cause is just and that, as one of the few democracies in the Middle East (and the only one until very recently), it deserves my support. I also find it hard to articulate just how disgusting the all out Jew-hatred is among too many Muslims and Western intellectuals and how stomach-turning the Palestinians have become with their tactics. Even without every detail at my disposal, I know the Palestinians have rejected their own state at least twice and now blame Israel for their present circumstances. Yet I wanted more information on these subjects and RIGHT TO EXIST by Yaacov Lozowick provided it.

The book is a bit slow going at first by taking us through the history of Zionism and how it developed into a burgeoning movement in the late 19th to early 20th Centuries. For people not of a Jewish background, many of the Hebrew terms and place names can be a tad difficult to keep straight. But groundwork must be laid and here it is.

The middle sections of the book pick up steam and discuss the particulars of Israel's various wars. Lozowick is exceptionally impressive here as he in no way attempts to sidestep numerous mistakes Israel has made in her history in the conduct of these wars. Yet the point is never lost that these mistakes were made within the context of just wars inflicted upon Israel by neighboring Islamic states that simply refuse to recognize a Jewish state. Further, the mistakes Israel has made have been the exceptions. For the most part, Israel recognizes how to fight its fights in a moral fashion and has done so even in the absence of one scrap of reciprocity.

Lozowick is persuasive in his argument that the main sticking point with those Muslims that would like to see Israel destroyed is not due to some mistreatement of the Palestinians. For most of its history, the Palestinian issue was a minor one in the Arab world which wanted to destroy Israel anyway. Rather the issue is the refusal of many Muslims to see Jews as anything other than a helpless minority. Jews who can pack a punch are a serious threat to the Muslim mentality.

Far from expelling Palestinians, most Palestinians voluntarily left at Israel's creation to join fellow Arabs in their initial attempt to destroy the nascent country. They fully expected to return to their land after wiping the Jews out and now cry buckets when the Jews not only won but have kept the land that they won fair and square. Further, we rarely hear of the much larger number of Jews expelled from their homelands throughout the Islamic world who then headed to Israel because they had nowhere else to go. What about their so-called right of return? Lozowick discusses this hypocrisy and places it in the proper context of anti-Jewish sentiment.

The final third of the book absolutely redeems its slow start. Lozowick discusses Israel's current crisis involving the Palestinians and provides the reader a lot to chew on. What, he asks, can Israel possibly offer the Palestinians that has not already been offered? And exactly how does one trust a negotiating partner that promised in front of the entire world to put an end to the violence only to escalate it immediately? How could Israel have responded to the second intifada except to take the fight to the terrorists themselves? Even if one were as sympathetic as could be to the Palestinian cause, one cannot help but reach the conclusion that much of their misery is of their own making.

Some of the anecdotes Lozowick employs are deeply troubling. A group of Israel liberals placed an advertisement in a weekly magazine recognizing all those killed in the previous year due to violence. They controversially included the suicide bombers themselves. Yet when they asked their Palestinian counterparts to also print the ad, the Palestinians refused. They could not mourn the death of Jews lost in the conflict even given the barbaric ways in which they died. What is striking about this is that these Palestinians were not the extremists, nor were they even the moderate middle (whatever that means in this context). These were the enlightened elite of Palestinian society! These were the ones most willing to build a bridge with the Israelis! If they would not publish the ad, what does this tell us about the rest of their society? At the least, it should open the reader's eyes to exactly what the Israelis are dealing with.

One final point is worth noting as I never saw it anywhere else and it was really rather interesting. Let us assume that an independent state of Palestine is created. Israel would almost certainly have to divide Jerusalem and so people would be living in the same city who were not only of different backgrounds but literally citizens of different states. Putting aside all the specific factors that make the Israeli-Palestinian issue so complex, there would still arise another issue. Israel is an affluent nation and would become even more successful if it could devote more of its energies to commerce. But what of Palestine? Every non-oil producing Arab state is a third-world country with a corrupt government. Perhaps Palestine would be the exception (it would have Israel right next door as a good example of the benefits of free enterprise) but perhaps not. Putting aside all other issues, citizens living in a poor and corrupt country are often quite hostile to citizens of more successful nations. Are we to presume that this hostility would do anything other than increase if the citizens of the rich nation are not only in the neighboring country, but are literally living across the street? The situation would be one combining the tensions between successful and non-successful nations with the tensions of extreme proximity. A thought, again, to chew on.

It is fair to say that solutions are a long way off. In the meantime, the best that can probably be done is to educate ourselves on the issues so that we know what we are talking about. RIGHT TO EXIST may not have all the answers, it may not even have some of them, but it does what it can. At this point, that is more than enough.

The tiny, democratic, western industrialized nation of Israel has been under relentless attack, not just by its Arab enemies but by a growing class of haughty post-modern European elites. In their efforts to de-legitimize Israel, her enemies not only wrongly attack her present efforts to defend against a murderous onslaught but, in Orlwellian fashion, recreate history to create a phony justification for Israel's pariah status. Many of Israel's own defenders and supporters have fallen into a trap by accepting the premise that Israel is an immoral state, born in sin. As Yaacov, Lozowick, former Labour supporter, current Sharon voter, demonstrates in this excellent book, nothing could be farther from the truth. In presenting the moral case for Israel's actions to ensure its own survival, Lozowick makes no effort to cover up or exonerate Israel's wrongful actions, of which their are many. Indeed, he makes no excuses for the relatively rare number of atrocities committed by Jews against Arabs but simply points out how such actions are always rejected by Israeli society at large while the reverse is surely not true. Moreover, he is critical of numerous Israeli actions and policies that he thinks were wrong or incorrect but that don't really rise to the level of "atrocity", such as Israel's settlement policies or the Lebanon War. It is this willingness to criticize that which cannot be defended that strengthens his argument that Israel is a just society that fights wars in a just manner even while its enemies commit savage crimes against humanity.

Lozowick's purpose here is not to write a history of Israel's wars but to set forth a moral justification for those wars. In this he fully succeeds merely by presenting the truth in a coherent manner. He succinctly examines the facts of each of Israel's wars and concludes, with the exception of the Lebanon war, that they are all justified under theories of just war, under international law and under the Geneva Convention while the reverse is clearly not the case. The bottom line of course is that Israel, a tiny country founded largely by peace desiring socialists, has been under attack from all of its neighbors since before its creation in 1948. Despite constant harassment and threat, which devolved into open warfare five separate times, Israel has almost always behaved in a scrupulously moral way, seeking to avoid harming civilians, offering to return its gains in exchange for a genuine peace. Even when misguided, such as in the relentless pursuit of settlements amidst hostile Arab populations, Israel's policies have always been for the pursuit of a secure relationship with her neighbors.

In the last part of the book, Lozowick spends a good deal of space analyzing the Oslo years and the ensuing war which is still going on. While Lozowick was a supporter of Oslo, he now, looking back, acknowledges that he and people like him willfully deluded themselves that the Palestinians were prepared to end the conflict. The evidence shows him that no peace is possible and he expects it won't be for at least 150 years. I tend to agree with his assessment. In discussing Israel's response to the eruption of massive terrorism and the creation of a Palestinian death cult, cultivated and promoted by Arafat and his henchman, Lozowick makes a strong argument for Sharon's policy of proportionate military action designed to put things in a holding pattern until the Palestinians are genuinely willing to make peace. Like the majority of Israelis but unlike his former political allies, Lozowick does not see capitulation under fire as an option. This book is really an excellent read and I recommend it along with its cousin, Alan Dershowitz' "The Case for Israel" for any defenders of Israel as well as anyone interested in truth rather than propaganda.

Who better to bring us his clear-eyed perspective of the Jewish state than the director of archives at Israel's Holocaust Museum, Yad Vashem. History can be our best teacher only if we are willing to learn and remember its often bitter lessons. The author's provocative title gives us all pause, a momentary intake of breath, and a profoundly sad testament to the current discourse round the world. This timely exploration by a former peace activist doesn't merely make an arid, historical or legal case, but rather brings to light and to life his most personal journey. Websters defines the word "exist" as "to cause to stand." This book stands as tall as its title suggests.

By his own admission Yaacov Lozowick did not come easily to the conclusions that he subscribes to, yet he presents one of the most logical and historically consistent explanations and of Israel's current policy positions I have read. As the title suggests, this book defends the Israeli position, and may not be seen as "balanced" by those who believe that the wars against Israel are justified. Still, Mr. Lozowick's detailed, logical, and balanced (yes, I believe that is the right word) presentation of the historic and political landscape make this book a must-read by anyone who wishes to inform themselves of the current conflict.

This book should be required reading in our universities, which are becoming a hotbed for the knee-jerk antisemitism of the left. And I say that as a true-blue liberal.

This is an exceptionally well-written book and a joy to read, that expertly takes on the Jew-hatred of anti-Zionism and the apologists for terrorists. Yes, terrorists, not freedom fighters. Freedom fighters don't target children, while terrorists make a moral choice to choose evil. This he clearly shows.

With laser-like precision, the noted historian Yaacov Lozowick gets to the heart of the matter of the current vogue to attack the very legitimacy of the Jewish State. What makes his work more noteworthy and profound is that, more than a simple history, Lozowick's work is part memoir tracing his own path from an active and influential advocate for the Oslo peace process to a supporter of the current hawkish government. What brought about these dramatic shifts in this thoughtful and well informed analyst?

Lozowick details the recent history and his own profound disappointment at the failure of the last peace process. Particularly incensing for him is the insistence of the so-called "peace camp" in Europe in particular an to a lesser extent North America to write lengthy apologies for the suicide bombers who regularly murder civilians and children. In the parlance of their European supporters, these acts of terrorism are more political statements then they are barbaric blood shed.

However, the heart of this work a defense of Israel against the attacks against the state's very legitimacy. Here the author really shines. The author makes short work of argument such as the idea that Israel is a racist state. Lozowick points out that Arab citizens have all the rights and privileges of Jewish and Christian Israelis, moreover that they have a greater degree of political freedom and civil rights then citizens of any of the 22 Arab countries, including those living under Arafat's oppressive Palestinian Authority.

Lozowick goes further detailing how Israel's strong sense of morality has caused it to limit its responses in the face of terror and how little recognition this willingness receives. For example, Palestinians in the first intifada had but did not use guns for fear that Israel would respond with the full force of its considerable military. Detailing Palestinian material he demonstrates how surprised Palestinians were when, in the current uprising, Israel responded with only a tiny portion of the force at its disposal.

Indeed, this is one of the least discussed factors in the current conflict. While Israel is continually criticized for supposed excesses, Israel uses a tiny portion of its military capability. While Palestinian attacks are designed to maximize civilian casualties, Israeli attack on terrorists are focused on reducing them. The often overlooked fact, is that Israel could likely kill most of the population of the West Bank with little effort and make their citizens far safer. Less extreme, they could destroy whole villages which send suicide bombers to murder Israeli children.

They do not take such extreme measures, though they are common place in the reason. Detractors of Israel say this is because of foreign pressure, though wonders how the Europeans and the UN could be more anti-Israel. The real reason is Israel's profoundly moral sense of itself. Where else can a country's sworn enemies get a hearing in a Supreme Court that then orders limits to be placed on a military in war time?

Many other authors have written about the strange singling out of Israel among all the nations of the earth. How the UN focuses more attention on Israel's behavior then any other member state and how alone among the nations, Israel is barred from serving on the Security Council while model countries such as Syria and Iran are allowed to hold the rotating chair. Few writers, however, have achieved Lozowick's elegance in detailing the pernicious tendency to bend and twist facts, indeed the double standard created in order to condemn the Jewish State.

Thoughtful readers should give Lozowick's work a careful reading. As for those who attack the Jewish State, he offers many challenges that they will need to answer if they wish to claim their position holds any legitimacy.

Those who disapprove of Israel will denounce this as a pack of lies (whether or not they've read the book), and some of Israel's most ardent supporters will complain that this book airs too much of the nation's dirty laundry. I found this book to be a remarkably well-argued and well-reasoned one that also is useful as a history of a nation and as a portrait of the people who inhabit Israel. You certainly don't have to agree with all or most of the author's points to find value in this book.

A superb work based on history and fact, not on rhetoric. Told with both points of view and perspectives on this historial in mind, this book sees beyond the misconceptions and biases on both sides of the press to present the reader with an informative, accurate accounting of the events and background in the region from the Balfour declaration of 1917 to the present day. Engaging and easy to read; highly recommended!