Israel Books

These case summaries are a great time saver. I highly recommend using w/ text for a concise break-down of the facts and consequences of the cases in the text. I have used for 2 classes so far and have improved my exam performance- my 2 highest grades were from classes for which I used High Court Case SUmmaries, no lie.

A "Historical Dictionary of Israeli Intelligence," Covers the entire Israeli intelligence community. The dictionary contains a lot of new information published for the first time. The dictionary covers all of the Israeli covert action including Blanket Operation which was never published before. The dicttonary covers the "Mossad," the name of the Israeli foreign intelligence service, is probably the best known Hebrew word after "shalom," the preface suggests.

The new Dictionary, written by Israeli professor Ephraim Kahana, provides background, updated organizational charts, and other information on the Mossad and several other Israeli intelligence and security agencies.

The 424-page Dictionary provides an introduction to Israeli intelligence, along with entries on significant persons, operations and key historical episodes. All of the obvious topics are covered, from the capture of fugitive Nazi Adolf Eichmann to the Jonathan Pollard case, as are other relatively obscure subjects, such as the defense security organization Malmab, and its querulous director Yehiel Horev.

The individual subject entries are mostly brief, and do not include sources or references. But the book includes a fine bibliography (at least for those who lack Hebrew) featuring hardcopy and online resources on Israeli intelligence.

Until Thomas L. Thompson's "The Mythic Past," this was the best (and still the briefest) read on the essential history behind the stories that inspire us. While the author questions orthodox (fundamentalist) interpretations (where do YOU draw the line between mythic truth and historical accuracy -- Adam & Eve? the Patriarchs? Moses? David & Solomon? Josiah?... you get the picture) it in no way interferes with a devout appreciation of the scriptures, or with a contemporary concern for the political integrity of the Holy Land, etc. Worth tracking down if you're interested in the subject.

The ad for this book recommends it for young teens. No way! This is a very dense series of books and requires some very close reading. If you're willing to do that though these books are very worthwhile. They discuss every presidentiaal election from that of George Washington to the younger Bush in great detail and also provide documentations from the relevant period (the Jay Treaty, editorials from newspapers, the party platforms, and much more).

I would highly recommend this series for anyone interested in the history of presidential elections and how it developed over time.

Recognized as the most important and most comprehensive of all modern attempts (to the publication date) to reconstruct the history of ancient Israel. A standard text for Old Testament university courses in the '70s and '80s -- not sure about today!?

Not that I have read all that many of them, but I consider this the best history of ancient Israel ever. Readable, factual, and enormously scholarly, It is one of those books (actually 2 of those books - it was originally a 2 volume set) I read in my college years and searched for patiently for years, trying to find an second-hand copy. Abbot Ricciotti seems to know everything there is to know about the ancient Israelis - the archealogy, languages, history, literature, etc. I was really happy to find out that Roman Catholic Books has reprinted this one, in a single rather massive volume for about $60. And the reprint quality is actually quite good, unlike many reprints.

This book is pretty much an official Zionist version of the history of the area as one will find. It has a forward by one of the high ranking members of the zionist brigrade - Shimon Peres.

Several things surprised me about the book :

1) How much of the history of this land seems to be taken from the Old Testament! Where is the verification of any of these supposed facts? What about critical analysis of the Old Testament? Perhaps the authors had axes to grind. This leads onto point 2)

2) How little verifiable data there is on the land from these times. Despite this one still can realise point 3)

3) The mulitcultural nature of the Holy Land throughout time.

The book also seems to imply that in the Roman era the Jews were only thrown out of Jerusalem and not the entire Holy Land. Before reading the book, I had had the impression that the Jews had been the only people, almost without exclusion, living in the Holy Land from antiquity to year O. How wrong I was!

Of note for Muslims are the evidences given that early in the Islamic era Muslims would make an annual pilgrimage to Jerusalem, which is interesting given the discussion over Bekka (Mecca is not mentioned as the place of pilgrimage in the Quran, Bekka is)

The book does an amazing magic trick at the end where it makes the Arabs disappear and replaces them with 'Israelis'. This leads to the happy ending where everyone lives happily ever after.

This brilliantly researched piece is true history at its best. Meticulously well done it is the only good history of the 1948 war, a masterpiece that is unfortunately only half completed. It details struggles, debates, raids and ambushes in the most honest and fair manner, using concrete evidence without bias and without politics. This book should be required reading for the Israeli-Arab conflict, however it is often brushed over to more easy to read shorter histories of the 1948 war. However despite this many volumed length of the project this is a grasping and exciting read, drawing on military and political topics, discussing minorities and often unheard of events. All students of the middle east and Israel and military history will enjoy this.

Volume II covers the period between November 29th, 1947 the partition resolution and the end of the Mandate, April 15th 1948.

Seth J. Frantzman

This is the first and probably still the best history of russian and polish jews. Written in russian before the WWI it did appear in english in three volumes in 1916, 1918 and 1920. ( up to my knowledge there is no russian edition of the book) Book of S. W. Baron written some 50 years after has aditional information but still book of Dubnow gives a lot of original research for the first time. Aniway it is different in approach with underlying philosophy of Dubnow's jewish history.

This work originally written for ' Encyclopedia Judaica' is a good account of the history of the land of Israel until 1880. It is highly recommended as a survey introductory volume.