Customer Reviews

Unlocking the Middle East: The Writings of Richard Falk

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1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book covers a great many subjects in the middle east from Lebannon to Israel to Iran. Much insight is provided for those who are willing to listen.

Falk stands up for the rights of Palestinians. He wastes no time on humoring the Israeli extremists who deny their existance or who want to pick their leaders for them. He just puts out the basic truth of the situation. That the only road to real peace is a road that involves giving self-government and political rights to Palestinians.

There are plenty of people who deny Falk's truth. But they don't have a vision for peace. Their vision is a west bank consisting of walled urban reservations for Palestinians surrounded by Israeli settlements. Each compound will have "self-government" in the form of an israeli-appointed collaborator "mayor". The role of the Mayor will be to maintain order for the Israelis, organize the explotation of Palestinian manual labor in Israel and to assist with the confiscation of more land from Palestinians. The Palestinians will be made to pay for their own occupation in the form of punitive taxes. Its a familiar system to many as palestinians lived under this form of "peace" in the 1970s until they rose up against it in the intifada.

The other vision these people have for peace is the mass explusion of Palestinians from the West Bank and Gaza. They call it "transfer".

Falk lays out the truth for those listening. He shows that almost every rational person now accepts a two-state solution including the Israeli government. The fanatics who don't accept it can only slow progress but not stop it.

Finally, Falk shows that the justification for a peace based on a two-state solution is that the alternatives are unacceptable. The two alternatives are ethnic cleansing or reducing the palestinians to a permenant status where they have no political, legal or civil rights.

Falk is an expert in international law and professor of global studies at UCSB - he knows what he is talking about. Take the time to hear his thoughts and gain a better understanding of the issues.

This book is full of sound analyses on the situation & history of the Middle East...despite the automatic 1-Star review that fanatics will inevitably give it.

Richard Falk presents a picture of the Middle East which turns reality upside down. He is sympathetic to Khomeni who he sees as a kind of human- rights activist. He has argued in a U.N. forum that suicide bombings are a legitimate 'method of 'struggle'. He regards Arafat (one of the major architects of modern Terrorism) as a great leader. He is especially vicious in attacking Israel . Israel happens to be the one state in the Middle East that shows real concern for human life. But for Falk Israel is guilty of 'genocidal tendencies'. This is a remarkable accusation. The Arab and Islamic media are night and day calling for the destruction of Israel, for the murder of Jews whether military or civilian. Israel is a nation which continually under attack, nonetheless makes a maximum effort to minimize casualties on the other side. Falk sees it upside down.
In the opening interview of the book he talks about his family background. They were assimilated Jews who cared nothing about Jewish communal life. His father was a lawyer of renown who among other things, defended Kerensky. But his father also opposed the Jewish state. This family bias pervades all of Falk's work on the 'Middle East' in which he singles out Israel always for blame.
All of Falk's intelligence and argument in this book are used in service of the bad guys.

This book has nothing for me. After all, it spends a significant amount of time discussing the Levant. And what it says seems so wrong that it makes me doubt the trustworthiness of the entire book. Falk insists that Arafat was the only legitimate representative of the Levantine Arabs, whom he treats as a people whose rights have been violated by the Jews. As near as I can tell, he's simply blaming the victims.

Suppose his side is triumphant. What then? Well, if that happens, folks will get to steal a little land from the land-poor Jews. And that seems unproductive. Suppose a robber steals your last dollar. The robber will gain very little. You will have lost "everything," but you will not have lost much (especially if you have a high-paying job!). I think it would be far better for people to value truth than to jettison it just for a chance to rob or oppress a few Middle Eastern Jews. Valuing truth might lead to peace agreements which could reduce strife and increase happiness and prosperity. Devaluing it can lengthen conflicts.

And that means that this book may not have much for others.

We do see a bunch of different "perspectives" on various issues, especially in the 2001 Report of the UN commission on human rights. But all that accomplishes is to put truth and falsehood on an even basis (at best), so that either might be chosen.

Books such as this one are way off track. We need to go back to basics. That includes the truth about the history and geography of the region, as well as an understanding of what various groups of people have wanted, worked for, and fought for.

There is one more problem with blaming the victims in the Levant and stealing land from them. Namely, the justification will be that it is proper to punish thieves and reclaim stolen property. If I were a thief, I'd want to avoid making that into a precedent.