When reading this book you will stare into the face of an evil so disturbing it is not recognizable as human. The sheer hatred and malice of official Israeli government policy toward the indigenous people of Palestine exists on a scale not even duplicated in Nazi Germany.
People in the west only think they know what racism, belief in racial superiority and ethnic cleansing/genocide is. These concepts have been taken to a level by the Israeli government that even apartheid South Africa would have envied and are made all the more insidious because they are being carried out under cover of the stalling tactic known as the "peace process".
The author does not draw conclusions for the reader, this is a book about facts and Palestinian daily life (and death) under official Israeli government policy.
If every American read this book and understood what billions of our tax dollars (annually) in the form of so-called "aid" are supporting there would be hell to pay in Washington and Tel Aviv.
This book will make you sick, it will make you cry and it will scare the be-jesus out of normal minded people to see the depths of depravity, inhumanity, and evil that can lurk in the hearts of a people consumed with their own superiority and determination to be separate and set apart from their fellow human beings.
The state of Israel is NOT a democracy. It is an apartheid terrorist state executing holocaust on an innocent people whom it does not believe has a right to exist. I repeat, Israel is not a democracy. It puts Nazi Germany to shame for it's acts of inhumanity, terrorism and war crimes against the Palestinian people for the crime of being non-jews. Even Nazi Germany was not allowed to practice it's evil for 60 years!

FINAL REVIEW of 15 June 2008

I was moved and outraged by the cancellation of the author's appearance at the Politics & Prose bookstore, which shall never--in consequence--receive my custom. However, the benefit is that the author received space in the Washington Post, and the idiocyof the Politics & Prose management may well have done more good than bad as a result.

I have one word that summarizes my feelings after reading this book:

FURY

The other word, now in vogue in Egypt, is

ENOUGH

The author, an American with both Lebanese and Palestinian heritages, is a scholar of English literature. His book is NOT a polemic. His book is an elegant essay on reality, perhaps the finest work I have ever been privileged to read on this topic, with notes, maps, and statistics of the first order.

The author does NOT seek to damn the Israelis, only to demonstrate, in calm reasoned well-documented language, that the Israelis have become the Nazis of our era, and that their ghettoization of Palestine, with gates, roadblocks, checkpoints, and walls, has become the atrocity of all atrocities in our time.

The opening insight grabs me: like Gandhi, the author sees that Palestine and Israel are one in spirit. He nails the Israeli objective: to occupy as much sacred land as possible, without regard to other peoples, religions, historic rights, or common perceptions of justice.

Gandhi had it right in the first place: the English were idiots to divide India. Similarly, Palestine is a Holy Land for all of us, and if the Israeli's cannot accept Gandhi's vision, then it is time we imposed it on them--there could be no better expenditure of $250 billion a year than in occupying Palestine, knocking down the fascist walls, and restoring the nature of that land to green and goodness, while making Jerusalem an international city similar to the Vatican, but open to all faiths.

I am completely fed up with ideological zealots, both left and right. Israel is clearly the enemy of peace in the Middle East, and an obstacle to progress there. I support the author's view, that a single holy state is needed, one that does not allow the Israelis to be the Gestapo of our time. More to the point, I agree with the author with respect to the inhumanity, immorality, indignity, and fiscally fatal inconvenience being imposed by the Israelis on the Palestinians.

This is where the book shines brightly: it is a meticulou8sly documented, ably presented catalogue of the day to day atrocities committed by the Israeli "police state" against individual Palestinians, families, and small businesses. Kafka could not have done better, but in this case, the author is not making it up. It is real, and it is a genocidal crime against humanity, day after day after day.

I have read many books, and a number on the Middle East, and I can only conclude that this book is totally extraordinary for the following reasons:

1) Multicultural perspective
2) Pragmatic review of the consequences of Israeli Gestapo tactics
3) Fullsome use of statistics to demonstrate Israeli atrocities against "day to day" Palestinian life and families
4) Timely--the era of state terror is over. It is time for We the People, including Palestinians and Jews, to rise up and dismember governments that cheat us, steal from us, and misrepresent us.

For perspectives that completely support the author's views as described in his article (I have posted a summary review of each):

A Power Governments Cannot Suppress
The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence, and the Will of the People
The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Vintage)
Web of Deceit: The History of Western complicity in Iraq, from Churchill to Kennedy to George W. Bush
The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic (American Empire Project)
Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy
Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight Against Imperialism
All Rise: Somebodies, Nobodies, and the Politics of Dignity (BK Currents)
Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People
The Health of Nations: Society and Law beyond the State

I have also published (free online, in superb low-cost hardback on Amazon), COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace, the first in a series from Earth Intelligence Network.

The bottom line of all of the above books is that governments are dysfunctional, corrupt, and cannot deal with complexity and adversity. We the People need to revitalize participatory democracy and stop waging war. Peace and prosperity for all seven billion can be achieved for one third the price we pay now for war. A strategy of peace is a strategy that will create infinite wealth.

It's time for America the Beautiful to be honest and open again. I totally embrace the idea of an international occupation of the Holy Land, with Jerusalem as an international city, the Israeli's stuffed back in their box, and a 50-year occupation that fully integrates Palestine and Israel and Lebanon, while providing both an international and a regional guarantee of dignity and justice for all in this sacred land.

The Israelis have dishonored God, dishonored man, and dishonored faith. They have become a modern holocaust unto themselves. For this they are damned by this author's bearing witness, as a people, absent a public uprising or international intervention.

FINAL REVIEW of 15 June 2008

I was moved and outraged by the cancellation of the author's appearance at the Politics & Prose bookstore, which shall never--in consequence--receive my custom. However, the benefit is that the author received space in the Washington Post, and the idiocyof the Politics & Prose management may well have done more good than bad as a result.

I have one word that summarizes my feelings after reading this book:

FURY

The other word, now in vogue in Egypt, is

ENOUGH

The author, an American with both Lebanese and Palestinian heritages, is a scholar of English literature. His book is NOT a polemic. His book is an elegant essay on reality, perhaps the finest work I have ever been privileged to read, with notes, maps, and statistics of the first order.

The author does NOT seek to damn the Israelis, only to demonstrate, in calm reasoned well-documented language, that the Israelis have become the Nazis of our era, and that their ghettoization of Palestine, with gates, roadblocks, checkpoints, and walls, has become the atrocity of all atrocities in our time.

The opening insight grabs me: like Gandhi, the author sees that Palestine and Israel are one in spirit. He nails the Israeli objective: to occupy as much sacred land as possible, without regard to other peoples, religions, historic rights, or common perceptions of justice.

Gandhi had it right in the first place: the English were idiots to divide India. Similarly, Palestine is a Holy Land for all of us, and if the Israeli's cannot accept Gandhi's vision, then it is time we imposed it on them--there could be no better expenditure of $250 billion a year than in occupying Palestine, knocking down the fascist walls, and restoring the nature of that land to green and goodness, while making Jerusalem an international city similar to the Vatican, but open to all faiths.

I am completely fed up with ideological zealots, both left and right. Israel is clearly the enemy of peace in the Middle East, and an obstacle to progress there. I support the author's view, that a single holy state is needed, one that does not allow the Israelis to be the Gestapo of our time. More to the point, I agree with the author with respect to the inhumanity, immorality, indignity, and fiscally fatal inconvenience being imposed by the Israelis on the Palestinians.

I have read many books, and a number on the Middle East, and I can only conclude that this book is totally extraordinary for the following reasons:

1) Multicultural perspective
2) Pragmatic review of the consequences of Israeli Gestapo tactics
3) Fullsome use of statistics to demonstrate Israeli atrocities against "day to day" Palestinian life and families
4) Timely--the era of state terror is over. It is time for We the People, including Palestinians and Jews, to rise up and dismember governments that cheat us, steal from us, and misrepresent us.

For perspectives that completely support the author's views as described in his article (I have posted a summary review of each):

A Power Governments Cannot Suppress
The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence, and the Will of the People
The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Vintage)
Web of Deceit: The History of Western complicity in Iraq, from Churchill to Kennedy to George W. Bush
The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic (American Empire Project)
Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy
Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight Against Imperialism
All Rise: Somebodies, Nobodies, and the Politics of Dignity (BK Currents)
Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People
The Health of Nations: Society and Law beyond the State

I have also published (free online, in superb low-cost hardback on Amazon), COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace, the first in a series from Earth Intelligence Network.

The bottom line of all of the above books is that governments are dysfunctional, corrupt, and cannot deal with complexity and adversity. We the People need to revitalize participatory democracy and stop waging war. Peace and prosperity for all seven billion can be achieved for one third the price we pay now for war. A strategy of peace is a strategy that will create infinite wealth.

It's time for America the Beautiful to be honest and open again. I totally embrace the idea of an international occupation of the Holy Land, with Jerusalem as an international city, the Israeli's stuffed back in their box, and a 50-year occupation that fully integrates Palestine and Israel and Lebanon, while providing both an international and a regional guarantee of dignity and justice for all in this sacred land.

The Israelis have dishonored God, dishonored man, and dishonored faith. They have become a modern holocaust unto themselves. For this they are damned as a people, absent a public uprising or international intervention.

Edit of 11 June 2008. Got book. Chapter headings are cryptic, great maps at the end, good index, the author is a professor and also a frequent commentator for Los Angeles Times, my favorite after the Boston Globe (NYT became an Israeli propaganda mill long ago--Judith Miller as the very low standard). Will read and review this coming week-end. This strikes me as the kind of book that needs its own website with color maps and easy interaction among Arabs, Palestinians, Israelis, and other parties, with real world casualty and budget information as a baseline. Once I review the book, I will delete this material and probably revise the links list. I urge one and all to buy this book and join in the discussion.

Edit of 9 June 2008 to add two slides (vulnerability of US supply line from Kuwait, Syrian equities; and Hezbollah-Iranian response to a nuclear strike) and comment: US White House and Israeli leaders are over the cliff morally and intellectually--they are blind to ground truth. The only thing that will save Israel is a one-state solution with a 50 year occupation *and investemnt* that yields two generations grown from 0-50 in enforced peace.

I have ordered this book and will provide a summative review next week-end.

I was moved and outraged by the cancellation of the author's appearance at the Politics & Prose bookstore, which shall never--in consequence--receive my custom.

Gandhi had it right in the first place: the English were idiots to divide India. Similarly, Palestine is a Holy Land for all of us, and if the Israeli's cannot accept Gandhi's vision, then it is time we imposed it on them--there could be no better expenditure of $250 billion a year than in occupying Palestine, knocking down the fascist walls, and restoring the nature of that land to green and goodness, while making Jerusalem an international city similar to the Vatican, but open to all faiths.

I will summarize the high points of this book next week-end, but as a ranking reviewer who is almost exclusively focused on non-fiction, I urge as many as possible to buy, read, and share this book.

For perspectives that completely support the author's views as described in his article (I have posted a summary review of each):

A Power Governments Cannot Suppress
The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence, and the Will of the People
The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Vintage)
Web of Deceit: The History of Western complicity in Iraq, from Churchill to Kennedy to George W. Bush
The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic (American Empire Project)
Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy
Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight Against Imperialism
All Rise: Somebodies, Nobodies, and the Politics of Dignity (BK Currents)
Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People
The Health of Nations: Society and Law beyond the State

I have also published (free online, in superb low-cost hardback on Amazon), COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace, the first in a series from Earth Intelligence Network.

The bottom line of all of the above books is that governments are dysfunctional, corrupt, and cannot deal with complexity and adversity. We the People need to revitalize participatory democracy and stop waging war. Peace and prosperity for all seven billion can be achieved for one third the price we pay now for war. A strategy of peace is a strategy that will create infinite wealth.

I am totally fed up with rabid Zionists and their neo-con cronies that lied to us 935 times while Dick Cheney committed 25 documented impeachable offenses and Congress (both parties) abdicated its Article 1 responsibilities. I recommend this book as a first step in understanding that everything we have learned or been told about achieving Middle East peace is a lie from cretins who have been paid to lie. ENOUGH!

It's time for America the Beautiful to be honest and open again.

Edit of 9 June 2008 to add two slides (vulnerability of US supply line from Kuwait, Syrian equities; and Hezbollah-Iranian response to a nuclear strike) and comment: US White House and Israeli leaders are over the cliff morally and intellectually--they are blind to ground truth. The only thing that will save Israel is a one-state solution with a 50 year occupation *and investemnt* that yields two generations grown from 0-50 in enforced peace.

I have ordered this book and will provide a summative review next week-end.

I was moved and outraged by the cancellation of the author's appearance at the Politics & Prose bookstore, which shall never--in consequence--receive my custom.

Gandhi had it right in the first place: the English were idiots to divide India. Similarly, Palestine is a Holy Land for all of us, and if the Israeli's cannot accept Gandhi's vision, then it is time we imposed it on them--there could be no better expenditure of $250 billion a year than in occupying Palestine, knocking down the fascist walls, and restoring the nature of that land to green and goodness, while making Jerusalem an international city similar to the Vatican, but open to all faiths.

I will summarize the high points of this book next week-end, but as a ranking reviewer who is almost exclusively focused on non-fiction, I urge as many as possible to buy, read, and share this book.

For perspectives that completely support the author's views as described in his article (I have posted a summary review of each):

A Power Governments Cannot Suppress
The Unconquerable World: Power, Nonviolence, and the Will of the People
The Looming Tower: Al Qaeda and the Road to 9/11 (Vintage)
Web of Deceit: The History of Western complicity in Iraq, from Churchill to Kennedy to George W. Bush
The Sorrows of Empire: Militarism, Secrecy, and the End of the Republic (American Empire Project)
Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy
Democracy Matters: Winning the Fight Against Imperialism
All Rise: Somebodies, Nobodies, and the Politics of Dignity (BK Currents)
Society's Breakthrough!: Releasing Essential Wisdom and Virtue in All the People
The Health of Nations: Society and Law beyond the State

I have also published (free online, in superb low-cost hardback on Amazon), COLLECTIVE INTELLIGENCE: Creating a Prosperous World at Peace, the first in a series from Earth Intelligence Network.

The bottom line of all of the above books is that governments are dysfunctional, corrupt, and cannot deal with complexity and adversity. We the People need to revitalize participatory democracy and stop waging war. Peace and prosperity for all seven billion can be achieved for one third the price we pay now for war. A strategy of peace is a strategy that will create infinite wealth.

I am totally fed up with rabid Zionists and their neo-con cronies that lied to us 935 times while Dick Cheney committed 25 documented impeachable offenses and Congress (both parties) abdicated its Article 1 responsibilities. I recommend this book as a first step in understanding that everything we have learned or been told about achieving Middle East peace is a lie from cretins who have been paid to lie. ENOUGH!

It's time for America the Beautiful to be honest and open again.

I think one would indeed be hard pressed to find a more detailed and accurate account of the predicament faced by the Palestinians since the establishment of Israel in 1948 and the subsequent Six Day War(resulting then in the occupation of Gaza and the West Bank). Of course there have been other books(most recently, Jimmy Carter's account based on his trip to Israel)but this book is unique in presenting a true "microscopic" account of the effect of the occupation on the lives of Palestinians in the occupied lands. I occasionally found myself rather depressed by it, even angry that the Israelis could act with such brutality and callous disregard for the welfare of those they treat with such contempt(but of course they're not out to win any popularity contests as both this and their historical disregard of U.N. Resolutions so amply demonstrates!).

So based on the evidence presented, Makdisi presents a clear cut solid case arguing for the desirability of having a single state instead of a two state solution to resolving the long term conflict there.