Exodus

Rating:
Summary: An opinion-shaping book.
Review: "Exodus" isn't perfect. The characters are rather
stereotypical. I think Herman Wouk is a better author.
But I found "Exodus" at just the right time in my life
for its message, I guess. One has to remember it IS
historical fiction, and one might describe some of it as
propaganda, but it is powerful. He is sympathetic to the
Palestinian Arabs, used as pawns by the
Arab governments, who
are the main villains of the story
though they don't come off as heroic as the Israelis....I can live with all the
characterizations.

Rating:
Summary: Good, if you can get past rascist attitudes toward Arabs
Review: I've read Exodus many times since I first read it in jr. high, and have always been drawn into the story and the characters, in no small part because of the actual history behind the events in the book.

I understand that Uris' historical accuracy isn't always perfect, and I can suspend my disbelief and get beyond that. However, in my latest rereading of the book I found myself offended by his portrayal of Arabs. On the surface, Uris excuses the 'unenlightened behavior' of the Arab population by attributing it to selfish, greedy, stupid leaders, and even seems sympathetic toward their plight, but I get the feeling that he believes that all Arabs are selfish, greedy, and stupid, and that the only smart thing they could do would be to put their fates into the hands of the Jews. This attitude is too simplistic and inexcusably ignorant.

Uris' propoganda, and his determination to make the Arabs enemies of Israeli Jews takes away from what is otherwise an engrossing, exciting book. I would recommend it anyway, as long as the reader keeps a healthy dose of cynicism regarding his portrayal of Arabs. For anyone specifically interested in a longer (and better) account of the Warsaw Ghetto than Uris provides for Dov Landau's history, I would strongly recommend _The Wall_ by John Hersey.

Rating:
Summary: Powerful book
Review: It warms my heart to see Christian reviewers like Karina Suarez saying nice things about the Jews after reading this book. I listen to progressive radio, ... in New York, and whenever they mention the Middle East they slam the Jews and Israel, and they sympathize with the Arabs. I feel like telling them to read Exodus by Leon Uris. Get the other side. The author beautifully presents history from the Jewish point of view, from the Holocaust to the prison camps on Cyprus to Jewish immigration to Palestine to the Jewish conquest of the desert and conversion of it into farmland, to the U.N. vote to allow the Jews their own homeland (since no country on Earth was willing to accept Hitler's Jews, thus sealing their fate in the death camps), to the Arab attempt to exterminate the Jews and finish what Germany started, to Israel's victory in the first war against a union of Arab invaders. This book also explains that the Palestinian refugee problem was manufactured by the Arabs, not by the Jews, and is hypocritically exploited by Arabs for propaganda value when in fact no Arab nation would allow the Palestinians to live among them. One criticism I have of this book is that it leaves the reader despising Arabs and British, and even a Jewish reader has to be left thinking they couldn't have been so completely evil, they must have had something to say for themselves. You walk away from this book thinking that Arabs are insane. Well, let's say they are overly propagandized to hate the Jews and leave it at that. The Mideast crisis will never be solved until the hateful propaganda is stopped. When every Arab country drums up vicious hatred against the Jews, similar to Goebbels and Hitler, it spells eternal trouble.