Product Description

Ilan Pappe writes the story of Palestine, a land inhabited by two peoples. It begins with the Ottomans in the early 1800s and traces a path through the arrival of the early Zionists at the end of that century, through the British mandate at the beginning of the twentieth century, the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948, and the subsequent wars and conflicts which culminated in the intifadas of 1987 and 2000. While these events provide the background to the narrative and explain the construction of Zionist and Palestinian nationalism, at centre stage are those who lived through these times, men, women and children, Jews and Arabs. It is a story of coexistence, as well as oppression, occupation, and exile. Ilan Pappe is well-known as a revisionist historian of Israel. Lucid and typically forthright, his account is a unique contribution to the history of this troubled land.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #650590 in Books
• Published on: 2003-11-03
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 356 pages

Review
‘Pappe’s latest work will inspire …’. James Cullingham, Seneca College

‘Along with the late Edward Said, Ilan Pappe is the most eloquent writer of Palestinian history. He is also one of the most scholarly … here, for the first time, is a textbook on Palestine that narrates the real story as it happened - a non-Zionist version of Zionism … To its credit, Cambridge university Press has published Pappe’s pioneering and highly accessible work as an authoritative history.’ New Statesman

'Ilan Pappe is a 'new historian' and this book is true to this label. It adopts a revisionist approach and it challenges the old ways in which the history of Palestine is written which makes it such an exciting read.' Ahron Bregman, King's College London, International Affairs

' … Ilan Pappe has written a book that is lucid and fort[hright]. It is a unique contribution to the history of this troubled land, and all those concerned with developments in the Middle East will have to read … Ilan Pappe's book is a valuable contribution to the historical research of Palestine as a general survey for those studying the subject. Designed for students and general readers, the book's new approach to the analysis of well-known events will be of interest to academics, journalists, foreign-policy makers, and to all those concerned with Palestine's complex past and its uncertain future. The inclusion of illustrations, maps, short biographies, a glossary of terms, a bibliography, and a reliable index further increases the usefulness of the book.' Quarterly Journal of African and Asian Studies

‘Pappe’s new book is lucid and readable: its historical scope, taking up the story in 1856, is useful and welcome because unusual, as is its desire to distance the narrative of the peoples living on the land of Mandate Palestine from their respective nationalisms - and to incorporate the subaltern classes to balance out the overwhelming prominence of elites in the existing historiography.’ Tribune

‘… excellent analysis of the historical background to the present state of the Israel-Palestine conflict. … a thoughtful and well-researched volume which needs to be read by anyone who has an interest in the region‘s histories, politics and faiths.‘ Reviews in Religion and Theology

'The author's approach is valuable and fresh …' Yearbook of Overseas History

About the Author
Ilan Pappe teaches politics at Haifa University in Israel. He has written extensively on the politics of the Middle East, and is well known for his revisionist interpretation of Israeli history and as a critic of Israel’s policies towards the Palestinians. His books include The Making of the Arab-Israeli Conflict, 1947–1951 (1992/4) and The Israeli-Palestine Question (1999).

Customer Reviews

Useful study of Palestine
This is a history of Palestine and its inhabitants from Ottoman rule to the Intifadas of 1987 and 2000. It complements, but does not replace, Avi Shlaim's superlative, and presciently titled, book 'The Iron Wall'.

Palestine's British rulers tried from 1918 to get the two peoples to build a British protectorate, but failed. After the British allowed a division of the unitary economic system in 1929, Jewish leaders built up an independent, privileged Zionist enclave. They mobilised the Jews by intensifying enlistment, imposing coercive taxes, preventing emigration and encouraging immigration.

In the 1948 war, the Zionist leaders, under the cover of a war of national liberation against the British Empire and its puppet Arab royals, expelled most Palestinians from their homes. Pappe writes of the Zionists' military Plan D's two aims: "the first being to take swiftly and systematically any installation, military or civilian, evacuated by the British. ... The second, and far more important objective, of the plan was to cleanse the future Jewish state of as many Palestinians as possible." Atrocities carried out by Zionist forces, including the massacres at Dir Yassin and Balad al-Shaykh, forced 690,000 Palestinians to flee under threat of death.

Decades of partition and occupation followed. Now Israel is building yet more illegal settlements, blockading the Palestinians (causing 50% unemployment), manning an electric fence around the Gaza Strip, abusing people at checkpoints, demolishing houses, assassinating at will, conducting mass arrests, torturing detainees, and building a wall dividing the West Bank from Israel. In the last three years, Israeli forces have killed 2,750 Palestinian civilians, and Palestinian suicide bombers have killed 892 Israeli civilians.

The US state massively subsidises the Israeli state. Bush fully backs Sharon the career terrorist: ten days after assuming the Presidency, Bush told the National Security Council, "We're going to correct the imbalances of the previous administration on the Mideast conflict. We're going to tilt it back towards Israel."

US and EU interference have inflamed, not resolved, the conflict. Outside attempts to achieve a solution by backing one people against another will always fail.