Books About Arab Israeli Conflict

[Thomas Merino]

Thisis the first English-language book to apply psychoanalysis to the most intractable international struggle in the world today—the Arab-Israeli conflict. Two ethnic groups fight over a single territory that both consider to be theirs by historical right. Avner Falk makes a close historical examination to show that the two parties to this tragic conflict have missed innumerable opportunities for a rational partition of the territory between them and for a permanent state of peace and prosperity rather than perennial bloodshed and misery.

Falk suggests that a way to understand and explain such irrational behavior is to explore the unconscious aspects of the conflict such as denial, splitting, externalization, projection, and the grandiose group self. He examines large-group psychology, nationalism, psychogeography, the Arab and Israeli minds, and suicidal terrorism, and he offers psychobiographical studies of Ariel Sharon and Yasser Arafat, the two key players in this tragic conflict today.

"Falk's command of many literatures and disciplines is at once awesome and necessary for the task of psychoanalytic interpretation he assigns himself. Falk's use of psychoanalytic theory is consistently rigorous, measured, and supported by evidence. . . . [He] backs his psychoanalytic interpretations with copious data from many disciplines and sources. His writing is clear, at times beautiful."—Howard F. Stein, Ph.D., professor of family and preventive medicine, University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center.

"I believe it is important that attempts be made to apply psychoanalytic ideas to public events. Dr. Falk is to be commended for the courage to do so. The book's extensive bibliography lists just about everything written . . . that touches on the subject."—David A. Rothstein, M.D., psychiatrist

Avner Falk, Ph.D., is one of the foremost Israeli political psychologists and the best-known Israeli psychohistorian. He has been a clinical lecturer in psychiatry at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem School of Medicine and a resident scholar at the Rockefeller Foundation Study and Conference Center in Bellagio, Italy. He is the author of psychoanalytic biographies of Moshe Dayan, David Ben-Gurion, and Theodor Herzl and of A Psychoanalytic History of the Jews.

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Daniel Heller, Ghassan Hage, Ian Parmeter, Micaela Sahhar, and Ned Curthoys do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

I recommend two much-needed books in the present time. Despite the Gaza massacres seemingly planting the seeds of endless future hatred, the future of Palestine/Israel can only be a future of togetherness.

In his book, Rethinking the Holocaust, the eminent Holocaust historian Yehuda Bauer offers a balanced perspective on the 1947 vote in the United Nations that approved the partition of British Mandate Palestine and creation of separate Jewish and Arab states.

Did the world feel guilty about the Jewish tragedy? Bauer says no. Both sides followed geopolitical considerations. The United States wanted to solve the problem of Holocaust survivors scattered over displaced persons camps in occupied Germany, and Stalin hoped Israel would become a communist state.

Year Zero of the Arab-Israeli Conflict 1929 investigates the 1929 violent riots during which Arabs killed 133 Jews in mandatory Palestine. Almost a century later, Cohen sifted through never-accessed documents and uniquely uncovered a trove of insights, interviewing elderly Israelis and Palestinians, descendants of those who were alive at that time.

Given the brutality of Hamas and the upsurge of antisemitism, Jews today feel particularly vulnerable. But Beinart recognises that it is Palestinians who are the victims, trapped between Israeli occupation and groups like Hamas and Hezbollah.

Beinart is an American Jew with close connections to both Israelis and Palestinians. He has become increasingly sceptical of the call fora two-state solution, which was the basis of the 1993 Oslo Accords. Yet as Beinart makes clear, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has consistently worked against any realistic two-state solution.

I would recommend Dov Waxman, The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: What Everyone Needs to Know. This is a highly readable, engaging and accessible account of the origins of the conflict and the reasons it has proven so difficult to solve.

The book explains key events, examines core issues, and presents competing claims and narratives of both sides. Waxman also offers a range of Israeli and Palestinian perspectives, showing readers that there is no one Israeli or Palestinian view of the conflict, and that this very diversity of views is one of the reasons this conflict has proven so intractable.

A few years later, I was fortunate to spend a gap year in Israel between high school and college. I lived half the time in Jerusalem and the other half on kibbutz. That December, the first Intifada broke out. I vividly remember a trip to Neve Shalom / Wahat Al-Salam, a village made up of Jews and Arabs setting an example by raising their children together. (See the book about it below.) Mixed in were trips to Yad Vashem Holocaust Museum, Masada, and visits with so many cousins.

The conflicts between Israelis and Palestinians have been going on long before you or I were born. It had always been my hope that my daughter and her generation would be able to experience a true peace between Israel and its neighbors. With the horrific events of the past few weeks, it feels like we are further away from peace than ever. Amid the latest Israeli Palestinian conflict, I wanted to share books filled with hope for young readers showing pathways toward peace.

Snow in Jerusalem written by Deborah da Costa, illustrated by Cornelius Van Wright and Ying-Hwa Hu

When Avi, who is Jewish, and Hamudi, who is Arab, discover that they are caring for the same stray cat and her new kittens, they fight over her. She runs away from their arguing. As snow begins to fall (a rare occurrence in Jerusalem) they worry for her safety. The boys work together to find her and also come up with a plan to share her and the kittens.

A Moon for Moe and Mo written by Jane Breskin Zalben, illustrated by Mehrdokht Amini

A story of two boys, both named Mo(e), who find they have more in common than they expected. Moses is Jewish, and Mohammed is Muslim. They are both getting ready to celebrate the holiest days of the year (Rosh Hashanah and Ramadan). While this story takes place in New York and not Israel, it is still a timely and important read.

Samir and Yonatan by Daniella Carmi

Samir, a Palestinian boy, shatters his knee in an accident and ends up in an Israeli hospital waiting for a specialist. As he waits in the shared room, he gets to know the other children there, both Jews and Arabs. Most notably are Tzahi, an Israeli boy who taunts him and Yonatan, who becomes his friend. As the weeks drag on, Samir faces the stereotypes he has always known and learns more about Israelis on a personal level. Note: this is a Palestinian point of view written by an Israeli author.

Neve Shalom / Wahat Al-Salam: Oasis of Peace written by Laurie Dolphin, photos by Ben Dolphin

This cooperative village outside of Jerusalem brings Jews and Arabs together in the hopes that by raising their children together, they will create a peaceful co-existence. Told from the point of view of two 10-year-old boys, with photographs throughout.

Sharing our Homeland: Palestinian and Jewish Children at Summer Peace Camp by Trish Marx

Peace Camp is a day camp operated by Givat Haviva, an educational organization that works toward Jewish-Arab peace. Most of the time, Jewish and Palestinian children have no contact. At Peace Camp, they play sports, create arts and crafts projects, go on field trips, and have fun together, all in the hope that they will create friendships as children that lead to better understanding and peace as they grow up.

Yapha Mason was a school librarian for 28 years, working at schools in California, Massachusetts, and New York. During that time she served on the Newbery Medal Committee twice as well as the Children's Literature Legacy Award. She is currently operations manager for BookBreak, which brings virtual author visits to schools across the country.

This original and deeply provocative book was the first to make Palestine the subject of a serious debate--one that remains as critical as ever. With the rigorous scholarship he brought to his influential Orientalism and an exile's passion, Edward W. Said traces the fatal collision between two peoples in the Middle East and its repercussions in the lives of both the occupier and the occupied--as well as in the conscience of the West.

Author of the groundbreaking The Question of Palestine, Edward Said has been America's most outspoken advocate for Palestinian self-determination. As these collected essays amply prove, he is also our most intelligent and bracingly heretical writer on affairs involving not only Palestinians but also the Arab and Muslim worlds and their tortuous relations with the West. "Solidly imbued with historical context and geopolitical conjecture...fresh, unpredictable, personal and incorruptible writing."--Boston Globe In The Politics of Dispossession, Said traces his people's struggle for statehood through twenty-five years of exile, from the PLO's bloody 1970 exile from Jordan through the debacle of the Gulf War and the ambiguous 1994 peace accord with Israel. As frank as he is about his personal involvement in that struggle, Said is equally unsparing in his demolition of Arab icons and American shibboleths. Stylish, impassioned, and informed by a magisterial knowledge of history and literature, The Politics of Dispossession is a masterly synthesis of scholarship and polemic that has the power to redefine the debate over the Middle East.

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