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Summary: understanding the israeli problem
Review: This is Edward Said's landmark and remarkable book about the origins of the palestinian question. It is not his most achieved essay but certainly the most poignant one. Said's great achievement is to include the israeli problem in a bigger historical picture and link it to his early views of european colonialism (readers should look at 'Orientalism'). He provides us with a methodical, powerful framework to understand how the creation of israel was a foreign implant in the middle east. He recognizes mistakes from both sides, including the numerous judgment errors from the arab side and their inability to deal pragmatically with israel after its creation. Said's speech is far more powerful than all the emotional (and useless) speeches arab leaders generally give us. Said's rethoric is so precise and scary that israeli politicians (e.g. nethanyahou) refused repeatedly to confront him in a TV debate while visiting the US. They could never present Said as an emotional, hot blooded arab as they do with others.In these times of turmoil, this is an essential reading for anyone looking to better understand why a nation partly built by extermination camp survivors is now creating an apartheid nation, shooting 9-year old children in the head and forming bantustan in Gaza and other occupied territories. All of this with the full support from the US, a kind of blind support the South african white regime was never allowed to enjoy.
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Summary: Exellent book ...Powerfull decumentation
Review: THIS IS THE BEST BOOK I'VE FOUND THAT WAS ABLE TO EXPLAIN THE MOST POPULAR CONFLECT IN OUR MODERN TIME I LIKED MR EDWARDS ABILITY OF COMMUNICATING WITH THE WESTERN MIND ,I'VE READ IT TWICE , MY CO-WORKERS WERE SO AMAZED OF MY ATTACHMENT TO THIS BOOK THAT 3 OF THEM BOUGHT IT AND AFTER THEY READ IT, I WAS SURE THAT I DIDN'T WASTE MY TIME OR MONEY ON THIS BOOK,I WOULD SAY ANYBODY WHO'S INTERESTED IN MIDDLEEAST POLITICS SHOULD HAVE THIS BOOK IN HIS/HER LIBRARY
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Summary: A Must Read For Those Who Those Who Can Handle The Truth
Review: When the British published their Balfour Declaration Zionist Organizations proclaimed the phoenix-like resurrection of an Israel which hadn't existed for 2,000 years. Conspicuously absent from any of the subsequent conferences, press accounts, and celebrations was any representitive of the 700,000 Arabs who lived in the area. Those who accept as an article of faith that God gave Israel to the Jews and the Great Britain was acting as his lawful instrument will have no use for this book. Those with open minds who understand that the above created an essential conflict will learn a lot from this book...
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Summary: A reasoned response to the prolonged occupation of Palestine
Review: While harsh in its indictment of both the Israeli left and right vis-a-vis the occupation of Palestinian territory since 1967, Said offers a comparatively moderate view of the conflict and its possible solutions, giving no excuse for terrorism on either side and no quarter for brutality.
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