Reviews

Book review: "Israel and the Clash of Civilisations"

Raymond Deane 10 February 2008


Much debate on conflict in the Middle East is beset by contradictions and unanswered questions. In his second book, Nazareth-based English author Jonathan Cook seeks to cut these Gordian knots, and in the process proposes an uncompromisingly grim diagnosis of what is happening in the world’s most unstable region, and why it is happening. Raymond Deane reviews for EI. 

Film review: "USA vs Al-Arian"

4 December 2007


In February 2003, the FBI raided the home of University of South Florida professor Sami Al-Arian. Arrested in front of his wife and children, Al-Arian was charged with 17 counts related to terrorism. Through an artfully edited array of talking heads, archival and news footage, court transcripts and family interviews director Line Halvorsen, in the documentary film USA vs Al-Arian, tells not just the story of Sami Al-Arian, but of plight of the Palestinians and of the erosion of civil liberties in the post-9/11 United States. 

Film review: "Jerusalem ... The east side story"

Sam Bahour 9 December 2007


Jerusalem … The east side story squeezes nearly one hundred years of history into an hour or so of cinema. It mainly exposes the past forty years of Israeli military occupation policies in Jerusalem and their devastating impact on the city and its peoples. The producer of the film, Terry Boullata, says that the intention of the documentary is to bring the Palestinian struggle for freedom and independence to a Western audience which has shown by way of its acquiescence to the ongoing Israeli military occupation that it still needs to be educated. Sam Bahour reviews for EI. 

Theatre review: "Sunlight at Midnight"

Natasha Tsangarides 29 October 2007


Sunlight at Midnight explores one man’s existential crisis as circumstances around him force him to confront his identity, his heritage, and his people’s history. Using oral histories from Sabra and Shatila refugee camp, television footage, and live music, Sunlight at Midnight successfully transports the audience into the refugee camps and back into one man’s uncomfortable psyche. Natasha Tsangarides reviews for EI. 

Book review: "Married to Another Man"

Sonja Karkar 10 October 2007


Ghada Karmi’s latest book Married to Another Man: Israel’s Dilemma in Palestine opens with the problem European Zionists faced over a century ago when they first mooted the idea of a Jewish state in Palestine. They found then that there was already a well-established Palestinian society existing in the land they wished to claim as their own. Hence the message sent back to Vienna by the two rabbis who made the discovery: “The bride is beautiful, but she is married to another man.” EI contributor Sonja Karkar reviews. 

Book review: "The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy"

Michael F. Brown 6 September 2007


The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy by professors John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt weighs in with 106 pages of endnotes. The controversial tome challenging the might of the pro-Israel lobby is nonetheless accused of “shoddy scholarship” — much as when the authors’ shorter paper on the subject in 2006 unexpectedly burst the bubble of a lobby unaccustomed to challenge and reprimand. However, EI contributor Michael F. Brown finds that the heavy-hitting academics did not suddenly lose their intellectual acumen in penning this well-reasoned criticism of the Israel lobby. 

Book review: The fantasy of hermetic closure

Ali Abunimah 13 August 2007


The image of the separation wall that Israel began building in the occupied West Bank in 2002 has emerged as a trope in literature about Palestine. Its concrete slabs are found on covers of recent books, including Jimmy Carter’s Palestine Peace Not Apartheid, Norman Finkelstein’s Beyond Chutzpah, Rashid Khalidi’s The Iron Cage, Joseph Massad’s The Persistence of the Palestinian Question, and Tanya Reinhart’s The Roadmap to Nowhere. Ali Abunimah reviews two recent books that take the wall itself as their central subject. 

Book review: "On the Hills of God"

Lora Gordon 23 July 2007


As the first English-language fictionalized account of the nakba (catastrophe), which befell the Palestinian nation as the state of Israel was declared on the land of historic Palestine, Ibrahim Fawal’s celebrated novel On the Hills of God is an important achievement. But despite its relevant timing, its impressive Pen Oakland award, and its tomelike 446 pages, Fawal’s book only barely manages to surmount its faults. The story takes place in 1947-48, in the fictional village of Ardallah, literally “the land of God,” an everyvillage of sorts. 

Film review: "Occupation 101"

Maureen Clare Murphy 27 June 2007


“You begin to suspect that there is something extremely odd going on … it is deeply disturbing,” says Alison Weir, narrator of the new documentary Occupation 101, on what one experiences as soon as they read between the lines of news reports from Israel/Palestine. The film indeed succeeds in instilling this feeling in its viewers. The chronology of the conflict is explained through snappily edited interviews with activists, journalists, clergy people, and others, while richly illustrated by archive footage and photographs. EI’s Maureen Clare Murphy reviews. 

Book Review: "Overcoming Zionism"

Raymond Deane 13 May 2007


Overcoming Zionism, Joel Kovel’s first book on the question of Israel, is a contribution to the growing body of literature advocating “a single democratic state in Israel/Palestine.” However, while Kovel’s subtitle is longer than his title, it is the devastating critique of Zionism that occupies eight of the book’s ten chapters. What is unique about Kovel’s project is its multi-perspectival nature: he demolishes Zionism from historical, political, cultural, environmental, ethical, and psychological perspectives, and still has space left for elegant invective and stimulating digression.