Rating: 
Summary: Book Also Confronts Many Major Current US Issues
Review: Amazon has 50+ reviews of How Israel Lost, The Four Questions (HIL), so why another? This review is unique: zero comments on accuracy, errors, and the author's slant; no pro- or anti- comments about Israel and "the conflict." Those opinions are yours to make after your read.
Independent of your interest (or lack of interest) in Israel, reading HIL serves another major purpose: It forces the reader to confront current US issues with new insight. This additional audience should easily exceed the number of all past readers.
HIL is a fast, easy, enlightening, exciting, but very disturbing read; it challenges whatever givens, knowns, or truths you hold. It reminds that "...Harry Truman spoke about his opponent: `It's not what he doesn't know that bothers me. It's what he knows for sure that's just plain wrong.'" (WMDs in Iraq!)
Attack HIL with openness, keeping in mind the many major US issues of today: The US Military in Iraq and many other countries around the world; W's campaign statements, his Presidential decisions, and current priorities; US immigration problems and border security; laws passed by Congress over recent decades, especially thousands of pages of tax law exceptions to income; corporate conduct since the spread of Globalization; special interest groups and their well-paid lobbyists; decisions of courts: federal or state, criminal, civil, bankruptcy, appeal; and a major new concern: the possible tribalization of the US populace.
Tribes are the top level of clan, kin, and families (or, in the US, special interest groups with a clear and common interest). Their goal is to maximize their take, whether measured in wives, animals, land, money, power, or influence, without regard for the greater good.
HIL is hard hitting and questions everything. In Israel, they "...got addicted to cheap labor in every industry ... owners and managers ... hiring their own political protégés and ordering the rest to toe the line - or else." Today in the US, like in Israel, "...The big problem is, nothing spreads faster than a few little exceptions ... to the rule of law, ...[and] cohesion started breaking apart. ... Well. We'll deal with that later. This is war!" For Israel, the war is the conflict; for the US, it's W's worldwide war on terror.
HIL is about Israel and "the conflict," but is timely and relevant to many current US situations. The ..."grace and glue of ... society, which is honor; ...its absence is shame. ... In fact, without an awareness of honor, nothing can be made to stick - and nothing can be understood. When honor comes into conflict with facts - once again, honor is trump. ... Everybody [goes] back to business as usual ... there are powerful interests that prefer, instead, ... getting rich in the status quo ... [where] the muscle is money ... [and] the cheesy scrip of fear. It's easy to manufacture - easier still to put in circulation. [The] ruling elite ... they think [their] own thoughts ... they all come from the same old school ... wield all the power of government in Israel ... [and are] producing the terror that she claims to be fighting."
Sounds very much like the status quo in the US! Read HIL; you'll be glad you did.
Rating: 
Summary: Sloppy piece of junk
Review: Cramer's book is a crude diatribe that is superficial, often sloppy, and badly one-sided. His insults of Israel's leaders and contempt for its citizens betray him as a one-sided hack disguised as a journalist. This book has one audience only: left wing supporters of suicide bombers and other terrorists. Anyone with a mind will see it for what it is: a joke!
Rating: 
Summary: Entertaining, yes. Thought-provoking, sure. Sloppy? You bet
Review: Folks like me taking an overdue interest in the region will find this book a useful primer. For this middle-aged, comfortable Christian American who has gone along since grade school with the, "Israel is like us and that's why we support them" line, the book was inciteful. The straightforward Four Questions are a great jumping-off point for clarification and discussion of the issues for those of us who haven't until now found the energy to delve into them.
I gotta say, though, that I would have taken this book more seriously if it hadn't seemed rushed-to-print. (Was Cramer trying to get it out before the election?) Open to a page, any page, and you'll find ellipse after ellipse - and hyphen after hyphen. Some may claim this technique is "conversational," but I call it distracting and just plain lazy. Furthermore, I'm no dumbie, but I found myself stopping constantly to reread sentences, not because they were so erudite, but because they were poorly written. Finally, while the glossary was nice, I would have preferred an index.
All criticism of style aside, I'm so glad I read this book prior to the election of Abbas as the new President of the PA.
Now, thanks to this book, instead of skipping over those daily boring newspaper articles on "the conflict," I can read them with interest and some understanding.
Rating: 
Summary: Interesting - But Unabashedly Biased
Review: For someone with still unformed opinions about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, I found this book to be a dangerous primer - unabashedly biased and shockingly slanted. While the writing style is engaging and intersting, the message is almost propagandistic. Only the Palestinian side is addressed with any sympathy - Israeli victims of terror are ignored and it is plainly unbalanced. It appears that most of the reviewers' on Amazon are letting their political opinions interfere with their objective review of the text. Needless to say, the issue is quite heated and this book does nothing but fan the flames. If you already have strong opinions and don't want to be bothered by a book that presents facts on both sides or has even the pretense of journalistic integrity, then this book is for you.
Rating:
Summary: A Must-Read for Americans who want to know Israeli reality
Review: For two years here in America I've been trying from time to time to convey Israeli/Palestinian reality to Americans, with partial success. Many times I encountered surprise or misunderstanding, because what I said contradicted existing misconceptions. This is because, to put it mildly: the typical American discourse about Israel is more fiction than reality. I thought to myself: one should write a whole book, just to bring reality in.
It turns out someone just did. It is Richard Ben Cramer, who won a Pulitzer prize for his Israel and Middle East reporting in the late '70's and early '80's. Now he returned to the land, and was so dismayed by what he found that he named his book "How Israel Lost". The name is perhaps an overkill (forgive the pun) and makes the book less attractive to some.
Forget the name. Go to the nearest library or bookstore and get it. The thing I liked most about it was the unromantic approach and the off-the-cuff language. That's the way people think, act, write and talk in Israel/Palestine. The typical American sugar-coated texts seem to remove the essence of what's going on. Cramer's definitely a "leftist" in the sense that he thinks Israel's out of line with the Occupation - no excuses accepted - but you won't find any romantic admiration of Israel's peace movement (or of the Palestinian cause) in his book. In fact, there's not a single Israeli peace activist there (as far as I can remember). And not because he wants to portray Israelis as warlike: Cramer is simply interested in the mainstream, a place where the peace movement does not exist anymore. As he aptly describes.
The book is divided into 4 parts, to "answer" 4 questions like the 4 questions of Passover eve. Parts 1 and 3 look at Israel, part 2 at Palestine, and part 4 wraps them up together. The first 3 parts are mostly based on individual stories. If by the end of part 1 you think Cramer is just another "self-hating anti-Israeli", hold your breath till part 2, where he lashes out equally harshly at the Palestinian leadership. In between he shows quite a bit of compassion and understanding to the people of both nations. He brings people, events and reports which are well-known (even iconic) to Israelis and Palestinians, but rarely make it past the American filters.
As an Israeli I can testify that most of Cramer's analysis of Israel is right-on. He clearly has an insider's knowledge of the culture. Regarding Palestinians, I don't know enough to judge and seems like he too (as he admits) has less knowledge of them. Yet, the overall picture of "current status" in the land is by far the most reliable and accurate I've seen from an American, and his analysis places the ball squarely in... American and international hands.
Which is another reason why you should go and read it. And if you like it, tell your friends. If enough people read this book, it might yet make a difference.
ps: there are some inaccuracies in the book are regarding the wall/fence/barrier, but these seem to be mostly because at the time of the book's closing (late 2003), there was still a lot of uncertainty about what's going on. In fact, by now the fence/wall story has gone way worse than Cramer describes. The reasons for mild optimism he quotes at the end of the book have all but evaporated, while IDF Air commander, General Dan Halutz (who 'stars' in part 1) has been promoted to deputy chief of staff.
Rating:
Summary: A deeply probing account
Review: Four simple questions are given in this book. Why A Jewish State? Why no Palestinian State? Why do we care? Why is their no peace? The book then precedes to answer these questions. Many characters are brought in and many characters are quickly glossed over with aside comments, such as Tommy Lapid. References are made to infamous statements such as 'break their Bones' by Mr. Rabin. A whirlwind of information is sifted through, presupposing either that the reader is knowledgeable or gullible about the subject. And this is where the 'evidence' and the argument begins to unravel.The major drawback of this kind of book is that it gives the arm chair 'I could solve that' interpretation of events. Although background is given and fair shirking is given to both sides, for instance admitting that the Palestinian protests are over-emotional and the 'human rights' groups predictably overreact, there is still a slight bias against Israel. Unlike "Right to Exist' this book presupposes certain elements that are not entirely accurate. For instance the argument about peace is boiled down to 'Why didn't Barak give that three percent back' as if allowing the Palestinians stewardship over the Temple Mount would bring peace or tranquility, which it would not. As for the whirlwind tour through why Israel exists and why we care the book is perhaps more fair. The idea that Israel is a 'bulwark of imperialism' is quickly debunked. But in the end one is left with a real feeling of pedestrianism with this read. For Israel enthusiasts or those familiar with the conflict and its many sides this book will not add much kindling to the fire. For those looking for an introduction 'Case for Israel' or 'Right to Exist' is a good companion to this volume. As another viewpoint in the literature on the conflict this is certainly a welcomed addition. Seth J. Frantzman
Rating:
Summary: Unproven Thesis
Review: How Israel Lost by Richard Ben Cramer contains no documentation of any kind; not even an index. (Surprisingly, there aren't even any endorsements on the back cover.) Rather it is a rambling first-person account of a visit to Israel by a man who had been a correspondent there over twenty years earlier. The book consists largely of brief anecdotes about various Arabs and Israelis Cramer met, many of which come across as unfinished. In discussing matters of religion, Cramer is very respectful towards Islam but quite contemptuous of Judaism, especially in its Orthodox form.
Cramer considers Israel's ongoing occupation of lands gained the in 1967 Six-Day War to be the source of nearly all of its troubles. (That is "How Israel Lost.") He emphasizes that the occupation has been humiliating to the "Palestinian" Arabs, which it undoubtedly has been, and then concludes that if Israel would just go back to the pre-1967 borders then peace would break out and reign forever more. Cramer completely ignores the pre-1967 Arab-Israeli conflict-its origins and its true nature-namely that the vast majority of Arabs consider all of Israel to have been stolen from them. He is therefore unable to prove his thesis and hence his entire book rests on one untenable assumption.
Rating:
Summary: Richard Ben Cramer Throws Out The Baby With the Bathwater
Review: I gave it two stars instead of one because "Ben-Cramer" (mocking Israeli names like "Ben-Gurion"?) does do a good job of presenting a true understanding of what goes thru the minds of those on both sides of the conflict. But while I, also, question the value of endless, mindless Jewish (or other) rituals, I can see that "Ben-Cramer" has an underlying bias that Judaism and Israel are bad with maybe some positive elements. I would argue the truth is the other way around. He throws out the baby with the bathwater! He downplays the security concerns that come with giving up the disputed territory. And he seems to try to justify Arab-caused atrocities by pointing out that this is how they claim honor while hinting strongly that most Israeli-caused atrocities are done on purpose.
Finally, "Ben-Cramer" seems to blame the Jews for the downsides of capitalism in Israel, which come in ANY capitalistic society. His mocking use of Yiddish/Hebrew/English Slang pretty much exposes his bias claiming that Israel and Jews are the problem. I would argue that certainly many of Israel's problems are indeed self-induced, but what society isn't this way? "Ben-Cramer's" basic hypothesis is wrong: there is no moral equivalent between Arab terrorism and the use of the Palestinians as pawns by their Arab brethren with securing the Jewish homeland.
Rating:
Summary: A very informative book
Review: I heard about this book on NPR and decided to read it to learn a little more about this ever lasting conflict. I truly recommend it to anyone who is not satisfied with the media coverage. I respect the author for being honest and brave to tell stories that few journalists would touch. These topics seem to be taboos for average journalists and I think Mr. Ben Cramer being Jewish helps in many ways. I very much appreciated learning more about the people of Israel. All we hear about in the media is the bombing statistics on the two sides. But this book describes ordinary and some not so ordinary people and their lives, as well. This book is very easy to read, as I think the author has full grasp of the topic.
Rating:
Summary: Don't Bother
Review: If anything, "How Israel Lost" is not a wise and courageous book as another reviewer penned. It is an hand-wringing apology for Palestinian terrorism.
Ben Cramer argues that Israel is losing its soul by occupying Judea-Samaria aka the West Bank. But he convienently ignores or whitewashes Arafat's decision to reject Barak's offer of a virtual Palestinian state encompassing almost all of the territories and even the unheard of offer to divide Israel's capital Jerusalem in favor of the murder, mayhem and terror that has engulfed Israel and the territories since September 2000.
Even now Arafat's handpicked cronies cannot summon up either the courage or the will to put down the genocidal bombers, even as Ariel Sharon is willing to use force to dismantle Jewish settlements. Cramer barely addresses this in his paean to Peace Now.
When nearly 90% of Palestinians still favor the eradication of Israel and its Jewish population, then books like Cramer's are useless. For the real facts and opinions, read Dershowitz's "A Case for Israel". Dershowitz, like Cramer is a Liberal, and is willing to see the Palestinian side of the coin, but unlike Cramer rightly places the blame for the end of peace on the shoulders of Arafat, Abbas, Qurei, Ashrawi and the rest of the PLO thugs.
Cramer may be an excellent sports writer, but he is a babe in the woods when it comes to the Israel-Arab conflict. Stick to Babe Ruth, fella, not Arafat.
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