Saving Israel: How the Jewish People Can Win a War That May Never End [Hardcover]

Daniel Gordis (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 3, 2009 | ISBN-10: 0471789623 | ISBN-13: 978-0471789628 | Edition: 1

Is Israel worth saving, and if so, how do we secure its future?

The Jewish State must end, say its enemies, from intellectuals like Tony Judt to hate-filled demagogues like Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. Even average Israelis are wondering if they wouldn't be better off somewhere else and whether they ought to persevere. Daniel Gordis is confident his fellow Jews can renew their faith in the cause, and in Saving Israel, he outlines how.

• 2009 National Jewish Book Award winner
• Addresses the most pressing issues faced by Israel-and American Jews-today, without recycling the same old arguments
• Lays to rest some of the most pernicious myths about Israel, including: Jews could thrive without Israel; Israeli Arabs just want equality, and Palestinians just want their own state; peace will come, if Israel will just do the right things
• "Morally powerful . . . from a writer whose reflections are consistently as intellectually impressive as they are moving. . . . Gordis addresses the exigencies of our time with the urgency they overridingly demand, and with the depth of feeling they inspire."-Cynthia Ozick

Gordis has written many popular personal essays and memoirs in the past, but Saving Israel is a full-throated call to arms. Never has the case for defending-no, celebrating-the existence of Israel been so clear, so passionate, or so worthy of wholehearted support.

Editorial Reviews

Review

Few books can combine the sweep of Israel's complex and extraordinary history with personal insight and passion. Saving Israel accomplishes this and more, it educates and inspires it readers while furnishing them with well-grounded hope for the future. Daniel Gordis has written an essential text for students, scholars, journalists--anyone concerned with the survival of the Jewish State.
--Michael Oren, Bestselling author of Six Days of War and Power, Faith and Fantasy: American in the Middle East, 1776 to the Present

Daniel Gordis's morally powerful Saving Israel, from a writer whose reflections are consistently as intellectually impressive as they are moving, engages in an acutely necessary argument: that sovereignty has significantly changed the Jewish condition by influencing how we think. Gordis addresses the exigencies of our time with the urgency they overridingly demand, and with the depth of feeling they inspire.
--Cynthia Ozick

Daniel Gordis' Saving Israel is an important book. Bold in his willingness to be forthright and politically incorrect, Gordis sets forth propositions which are difficult for many to accept, such as the fact that Israel's existence is more important than peace and that Israel can never be a copy of the American style liberal democracy. For, as he notes, what is at stake is not merely a state, but the only Jewish State in 2000 years, and the very future of the Jews worldwide, including those who do not live in that State. Hopefully, Saving Israel will inspire constructive discussion and analysis of core issues that Israelis, Jews everywhere, (and the entire West) have studiously avoided for far too long.
--Natan Sharansky, Former Soviet dissident and Israeli Cabinet Minister; author of Defending Identity: Its Indispensable Role in Protecting Democracy

Daniel Gordis has written a book about the future of Israel that is both heart-wrenching and heart-warming. His has consistently been, these past few years, one of the most engaging voices to have emerged from this time of trial for the Jewish state, and it is impossible not to be moved by his plea for hope in the land whose very existence should be a living symbol of hope.
--Sir Jonathan Sacks, Chief Rabbi of the United Hebrew Congregations of the Commonwealth

One of Israel’s most thoughtful observers – An American who made Israel his home, despite its imperfections and dangers.
--Alan Dershowitz, author of The Case for Israel

From the Inside Flap

Israel is beset from all sides. In the international community, it is the only country whose right to exists is still debated. Closer to home, many Arab leaders continue to call for its destruction. Inside its borders, Israel’s own Arab population grows ever more hostile. And now, countless Jews within Israel and around the world have begun to lose faith in the very idea of a Jewish state. Can Israel weather these challenges?

In Saving Israel, Daniel Gordis offers a new defense of the Jewish state, asking first why Israel is necessary, and then discussing what Israel has to do in order to survive its enemies. Gordis begins with a novel discussion of Israel’s purpose, reflecting on the overlooked ways in which Israel has changed the existential condition of Jews everywhere. In the process, he grapples with controversial questions about Israel, Israeli Arabs, Muslims, and the International community that many Israelis and American Jews are loath to confront. Gordis lays to rest an array of pernicious myths about Israel:

• Jews in the United States could thrive without Israel
• Israeli Arabs just want equality, and Palestinians simply want their own state
• Peace will come, if Israel is willing to make appropriate territorial compromises
• Fighting and winning wars is antithetical to Judaism

Gordis suggestions for what Israel must do to survive, and more importantly, for how it must think if it is to have a future, are sure to arouse debate and even controversy. For Gordis’s book is a passionate reminder of Israel’s purpose, a celebration of what Israel has already accomplished, a renewal of faith in the cause, and a bold guide for carrying on the struggle. Saving Israel is a full-throated call to arms. Never has the case for defending the existence of Israel been made with such confidence, passion, and clarity.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 272 pages
• Publisher: Wiley; 1 edition (March 3, 2009)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0471789623
• ISBN-13: 978-0471789628
• Product Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.3 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #249,754 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Dr. Daniel Gordis is Senior Vice President of the Shalem Center, where he is also a Senior Fellow. The author of numerous books on Jewish thought and currents in Israel, Dr. Gordis was the founding dean of the Ziegler School of Rabbinic Studies at the University of Judaism, the first rabbinical college on the West Coast of the United States. Dr. Gordis joined Shalem in 2007 to help found Israel's first liberal arts college, after spending nine years as vice president of the Mandel Foundation in Israel and director of its Leadership Institute.

Since moving to Israel in 1998, Dr. Gordis has written and lectured throughout the world on Israeli society and the challenges facing the Jewish state. His writing has appeared in magazines and newspapers including the New York Times, the New Republic, the New York Times Magazine, Moment, Tikkun, and Conservative Judaism. His latest book, Saving Israel: How the Jewish State Can Win a Way That May Never End was published by Wiley in March 2009.

Dr. Gordis is presently at work on two new books. A volume about 19th and 20th century rabbinic responsa on conversion, which he is writing together with Rabbi David Ellenson of the Hebrew Union College, is tentatively entitled For the Sake of Heaven: Conversion, Law and Politics in the Modern World of Jewish Orthodoxy. And another book, on Zionism and its contributions to human freedom and vitality worldwide, is tentatively called Israel's Promise: How Zionism Can Help Preserve the Nation-State and Human Freedom, is also now being written.

Dr. Gordis received his B.A. from Columbia College (Magna Cum Laude), a Masters Degree and Rabbinic Ordination from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America, and his Ph.D. from the University of Southern California.

He blogs at http://danielgordis.org/

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

81 of 89 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars required reading, February 28, 2009

By 

A. Arnovitz (jerusalem, israel) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Saving Israel: How the Jewish People Can Win a War That May Never End (Hardcover)

My first thought as I was swept through page after page of this intense and chilling book was that it should be required reading for every Jew, every Israeli, every person who cares even the slightest about Middle Eastern politics. This book should be part of the compulsory curriculum for Jewish high school seniors both in America and in Israel. And it wouldn't hurt if a few key members of the State Department and Obama's foreign policy team read it as well. This book needs to be translated into Hebrew at the first possible moment because Israelis, more than anyone, need to confront the cold, hard truths that Daniel Gordis so eloquently lays out. Without apology, the author speaks of the reality that exists in Israel today in a way that few dare. The fact that he lives in Israel, is an insider, makes his premise all the more compelling. The suspicion that peace may be unattainable for many years to come, and the soul searching that is required of this lonely little democracy in order to confront that lack of peace, is much of what the book is about. The questions of what we are passing along to future generations, and the ability of these generations to be able to articulate why Israel deserves to exist, were the most thought-provoking chapters in the book. I think we are going to need to read and re-read this book over and over again in the coming years.

41 of 44 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Compelling and very insightful!, March 8, 2009

By 

MSB (Boston, MA) - See all my reviews

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This review is from: Saving Israel: How the Jewish People Can Win a War That May Never End (Hardcover)

Very well written and incredibly insightful, Gordis makes a very compelling case for Israel as an ethnic democracy in need of a stronger sense of purpose. It is not a "mini America", but a homeland for the Jewish people. Unlike any other ethnic group, Israel has been consistently singled out as a convenient scapecoat for all the world's ills and held to a higher standard than any other country. At long last the Jewish people have a homeland, and it must be kept secure, guided by its own moral compass and the realities of Middle East politics and fanaticism. I trust his book will have wide positive impact, both within Israel and the world of principled diplomacy.

46 of 51 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A profound book., March 4, 2009

By 

J.Kalman (Jerusalem, Israel) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Saving Israel: How the Jewish People Can Win a War That May Never End (Hardcover)

Saving Israel by Daniel Gordis is a profound book which should be read by anyone who is concerned about the future of Israel. The main thrust of his argument is that in order to survive and function as a 'Homeland for the Jewish people' Israel must strengthen its own sense of purpose as a Jewish State. In the face of constant criticism from the world community, many of whom question the country's right to exist, it is vital that Israelis and the Jewish Diaspora understand that their country cannot be exactly like any other; it is a unique country with unique accomplishments and problems. It cannot simply be a "mini America".

Daniel Gordis offers a cogent analysis of the stalemate of the peace process and takes issue with the widely held view of many Jews today that somehow the 'default' Jewish position is a passive, non-military one. He argues that "When peace is not achievable, when enemies still seek to destroy the Jewish state and thereby to destroy the Jewish people, there is, sadly, no choice but to wage war". He doesn't advocate war as a strategy, but if the alternative is national suicide, it is both correct and inevitable. This will no doubt grate with the growing conventional western wisdom that all wars are essentially bad things (which sadly equates both the aggressor and the victim on the same subjective scale without acknowledging that there is an objective 'right and wrong') but given the inability of the UN to act to protect the legitimate interests of Israel and its population and the downright hostility of various nations to the State of Israel it is clear that an existential threat still exists to its existence. If this is the case it is only common sense to acknowledge the problem and prepare to deal with it. If unpopularity is the price to pay, so be it.

Gordis advocates that the future of the country lies in a concerted effort to restore the primacy of Jewish content as a mainstay of the culture of the country and to restore faith in Israel's existence. He thinks and writes with great clarity about the problems that Israel faces today and offers a strong, coherent and insightful call to action.