The Myths Of Zionism

This is a controversial book. It is a critical account of the historical, political and cultural roots of Zionism. John Rose shows how this powerful political force is based in mythology; ancient, medieval and modern. Many of these stories, as with other mythologies, have no basis in fact. However, because Zionism is a living political force, these myths have been used to justify very real and political ends -- namely, the expulsion and continuing persecution of the Palestinians. Chapter-by-chapter, John Rose scrutinises the roots of the myths of Zionism. Mobilising recent scholarship, he separates fact from fiction presenting a detailed analysis of their origins and development. This includes a challenge to Zionism's biblical claims using very recent and very startling Israeli archaeological conclusions. He provides a detailed exploration of Judaism's links to the Middle East. He shows clearly that Zionism makes many false claims on Jewish religion and history. He questions its rationale as a response to European anti-Semitism, and shows that, if there is ever to be peace and reconciliation in the land of Palestine, this intellectual dishonesty must be addressed.

One of Israel’s most controversial writers demystifies the “peace camp” liberals Yitzhak Laor is one of Israel’s most prominent dissidents and poets, a latter-day Spinoza who helps keep alive the critical tradition within Jewish culture. In this work he fearlessly dissects the complex attitudes of Western European liberal Left intellectuals toward Israel, Zionism and the “Israeli peace camp.” He argues that through a prism of famous writers like Amos Oz, David Grossman and A.B. Yehoshua, the peace camp has now adopted the European vision of “new Zionism,” promoting the fierce Israeli desire to be accepted as part of the West and taking advantage of growing Islamophobia across Europe. The backdrop to this uneasy relationship is the ever-present shadow of the Holocaust. Laor is merciless as he strips bare the hypocrisies and unarticulated fantasies that lie beneath the love affair between “liberal Zionists” and their European supporters.

The myths and reality behind the state of Israel and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict—from “the most eloquent writer on Palestinian history” (New Statesman) The outspoken and radical Israeli historian Ilan Pappe examines the most contested ideas concerning the origins and identity of the contemporary state of Israel. The “ten myths”—repeated endlessly in the media, enforced by the military, and accepted without question by the world’s governments—reinforce the regional status quo and include: • Palestine was an empty land at the time of the Balfour Declaration. • The Jews were a people without a land. • There is no difference between Zionism and Judaism. • Zionism is not a colonial project of occupation. • The Palestinians left their Homeland voluntarily in 1948. • The June 1967 War was a war of ‘No Choice’. • Israel is the only Democracy in the Middle East. • The Oslo Mythologies • The Gaza Mythologies • The Two-State Solution For students, activists, and anyone interested in better understanding the news, Ten Myths About Israel is another groundbreaking study of the Israel-Palestine conflict from the author of The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine.

In this original and wide-ranging study, Gabriel Piterberg examines theideology and literature behind the colonization of Palestine, from the latenineteenth century to the present. Exploring Zionism's origins in Central-EasternEuropean nationalism and settler movements, he shows how its texts can beplaced within a wider discourse of western colonization. Revisiting the work ofTheodor Herzl and Gershom Scholem, Anita Shapira and David Ben-Gurion, andbringing to light the writings of lesser-known scholars and thinkersinfluential in the formation of the Zionist myth, Piterberg breaks openprevailing views of Zionism, demonstrating that it was in fact unexceptional,expressing a consciousness and imagination typical of colonial settlermovements. Shaped by European ideological currents and the realities ofcolonial life, Zionism constructed its own story as a unique and impregnableone, in the process excluding the voices of an indigenous people-thePalestinian Arabs.

One of Israel’s most controversial writers demystifies the “peace camp” liberals Yitzhak Laor is one of Israel’s most prominent dissidents and poets, a latter-day Spinoza who helps keep alive the critical tradition within Jewish culture. In this work he fearlessly dissects the complex attitudes of Western European liberal Left intellectuals toward Israel, Zionism and the “Israeli peace camp.” He argues that through a prism of famous writers like Amos Oz, David Grossman and A.B. Yehoshua, the peace camp has now adopted the European vision of “new Zionism,” promoting the fierce Israeli desire to be accepted as part of the West and taking advantage of growing Islamophobia across Europe. The backdrop to this uneasy relationship is the ever-present shadow of the Holocaust. Laor is merciless as he strips bare the hypocrisies and unarticulated fantasies that lie beneath the love affair between “liberal Zionists” and their European supporters.

A reading of this work on "The founding myths of the policy of Israel" must not engender any religious or political confusion. Criticism of the Zionist interpretation of the Torah and of the "historical books" (especially those of Joshua, Samuel and Kings) in no way implies an underestimation of the Bible or what it too has revealed of man's human and divine epic. Abraham's sacrifice is the eternal model of how a man can go beyond temporary morality and the fragile logic on which it is based, in the name of unconditional values that make morality a relative value. In the same way, the Exodus remains a symbol of a people's quest for freedom, wresting itself from bondage in its quest for God and the Spirit. What we reject is Zionism's tribalistic and nationalistic interpretation of those texts, the reduction of a great idea - an Alliance between God and all of mankind, His presence within each human being - to the most nefarious concept of all: that of a "chosen" people, elected by a partial god, a notion which justifies in advance every kind of domination, colonization and massacre. This work is based entirely on factual sources; its aim is not to preach the destruction of the State of Israel, but simply to desacralize the underlying concept: the land in question was never promised but conquered, just like that of France, Germany or the United States, according to the prevailing balance of power at the time. So I ask you: who is guilty? Who commits the crime or who denounces it? The one who seeks the truth or the one who seeks to silence it?

"A Land With A People began as a storytelling project of Jewish Voice for Peace-New York City and subsequently transformed into a theater project performed throughout the New York City area. A Land With A People elevates rarely heard Palestinian and Jewish voices and visions. It brings us the narratives of secular, Muslim, Christian, and LGBTQ Palestinians who endure the particular brand of settler colonialism known as Zionism. It relays the transformational journeys of Ashkenazi, Mizrahi, Palestinian and LGBTQ Jews who have come to reject the received Zionist narrative. Unflinching in their confrontation of the power dynamics that underlie their transformation process, these writers find the courage to face what has happened to historic Palestine, and to their own families as a result. Stories touch hearts, open minds, and transform our understanding of the "other"-as well as comprehension of our own roles and responsibilities. A Land With a People emerges from this reckoning. Contextualized by a detailed historical introduction and timeline charting 150 years of Palestinian and Jewish resistance to Zionism, this collection will stir emotions, provoke fresh thinking, and point to a more hopeful, loving future-one in which Palestine/Israel is seen for what it is in its entirety, as well as for what it can be"--