Access Today My Promised Land: The Triumph And Tragedy Of Israel Composed By Ari Shavit Presented As Publication

Shavit has written this landmark work with passion, courage, and vision, It is intensely personal. It is also a stunning overview of the rise of the modern state of Israel within the context ofth century Jewish history.
My Promised Land is like a letter, sent through time and space, to Jewish brethren round the world, It beseeches us all to open our eyes to the grim realities that beset our beloved state of Israel.
The book reflects the author's sense of mission and purpose, and it testifies to the moral and existential conundrum that besets concerned Israelis and Zionists the world over.


Ari Shavit wrote My Promised Land after interviewing countless Israelis, both Jewish and Arab, They were government officials, policymakers, writers, scientists, military and intelligence officers, entrepeneurs, The result is a controversial book that both sparks and transcends debate, Written with conviction, and erudition, the book describes and often takes issue with Israeli policies, Israeli social and political movements, and with individual voices in the conversation regarding Israels future.
It offers firm, historical contextualization, It dares to ask whether Israel can and will continue to exist, given the many forces against itfrom within and without.
The author emphatically and enthusiastically affirms his love for his homeland, He is grateful to the faithful who gave their lives to ensure the states continued viability, but he wonders how deeply that Zionist faith now resides in the generation that must bear arms to protect the nation.
After covering Israels political and social history, he asks: where are we going

Shavit begins his book with the story of his greatgrandfather, the Rt.
Honorable Herbert Bentwich, born inand raised

in London by parents who had fled Russia, Sent to the best schools, he became a lawyer, He was among the gifted and highly regarded solicitors of his day, He was blueeyed, commanding, and loyal to the crown, Unlike many of his enlightened Jewish peers, he remained an orthodox Jew, He and his wife had eleven children,

Shavit writes:

Had I met Herbert Bentwich, I probably wouldnt have liked him, If I were his son, I am sure I would have rebelled against him, His worldroyalist, religious, patriarchal, and imperialis eras away from my world, But as I study him from a distancemore than a century of distanceI cannot deny the similarities between us.
I am surprised to find how much I identify with my eccentric greatgrandfather,

Leading a group ofpilgrims, Shavits greatgrandfather sailed to Palestine in, Theodore Herzl, the founder of political Zionism, put great stock in their journey, Like Moses sending Joshua to the land of Canaan my analogy, Herzl expected a positive report from Bentwich, one that would describe the land and its inhabitants, and one that would confirm the lands “prospects for colonizing,” as Shavit puts it.
Herzl wanted the report presented at the first Zionist Congress, to be held in Basel, But Bentwichs interest in Palestine was “romantic,” not political, Bentwich journeyed to find God, not a future Jewish state, His report to Herzl was positive, Upon returning from his initial journey, he invited Herzl to his patrician London dining club, where Herzls charisma captivated all who heard him.
Ultimately, Bentwich and his family relocated to Palestine,

When Shavit writes of Israelswar of independence, he is astonished at the nascent states miraculous triumph.
“Against all odds,” he writes, Israels brave,Jews defeated the armies of,Arabs, That the tiny but determined entity, newly called Israel, could win against such enmity, is staggering, But, he goes on, the odds are shifting, The Arab majority of the middle east is growing, The menace to Israel is being harnessed with patience and resolution, Israels Dimona facilityits nuclear capabilityhas served as a deterrent to largescale war, but with the Iranian nuclear capacity at hand, the future is, at best, uncertain.
Yes, one finds glimmers of peace, here and there, and voices of reconciliation, But those glimmers and voices are quickly dimmed,

Shavit lauds Israels early pioneers, They transformed the image of Jew from victim to brawny, selfassured man of the hour, The new Jew was selfreliant, ready to take action, The change was astonishing. The technological advances that transformed the land into a picture postcard of the green thumb were and are staggering.
The Jewish Israeli was a figure of moral, physical, intellectual, and psychological strength,

But Shavit never forgets the Arab side of the story, too, What to Jews was triumph, the Arabs dubbed “nakba,” or catastrophe, The expulsions and massacres of Arab villagersin Lydda and Deir Yassin, for examplemust not be ignored, He pays heed to the legitimate grievances of Arabs living in Israel, While most live far better in Israel than they would in neighboring Arab countries, they are, compared with most Israelis, second class citizens.
Resentment grows.

Shavit writes much of the book in present tense, giving a sense of immediacy, even urgency, to the narrative.
The book is often punctuated with personal memories, but it is not a memoir, Nor does Mr. Shavit allow his personal biases to dictate the realities he presents, This book is the how and why of the Zionist cause an enterprise that bound Jews together for millennia.
In the face of Nazi Germany, the Zionist cause became an imperative, “In, Zionist justice is an absolute universal justice that cannot be refuted,” writes Shavit, The establishment of a state of refuge was essential to the existence, vitality, and future of the Jewish people.
For centuries, the Jewish people had invoked Zion in their daily prayers, In theth Century, whether or not a Jew began the day with prayers, whether or not he believed in God, safe haven was essential to life.


In his endnotes, Shavit writes: “My Promised Land is not an academic work of history, Rather, it is a personal journey through contemporary and historic Israel, recounting the larger Israel saga by telling several dozen specific Israeli stories that are significant and poignant.
”

According to the New York Times, My Promised Land was written in English with an American readership in mind.
It is an important book, Plaudits abound. Among them:

“This is the epic history that Israel deservesbeautifully written, dramatically rendered, full of moral complexity.
” Franklin Foer, editor, The New Republic,

“A beautiful, mesmerizing, morally serious, and vexing book, ” Jeffrey Goldberg

“one of the most important books about Israel and Zionism that I have ever read.
” Daniel Gordis

Be warned, However riveting, this book can be as depressing as it is thoughtprovoking,
A well researched history and analysis of Israel providing lots of food for thought, An amazing book presenting the triumph and tragedy of Israel, as promised in the My Promised Land's subtitle,

The human experience,
The beautiful along with the ugly,
the good along with the bad,
the sexiness along with the uncouth,

I loved the fact that there was no whitewashing, The moral ambiguity along with the love of the land shines through in every page,

I grew up with mixed feelings about the state of Israel, I didn't come from a rabidly anti Zionist home, yet the stuff we were taught in school gave me uncertain vibes.
As I grew older I was leaning towards zionism in a stronger way, yet toward the right, As time went on and my ideological identity further developed, I wasn't so sure that the right was what I identified with anymore.
Reading this book somehow clarified so many things for me, in an abstract way, Helped me formulate my thoughts, Although I'm not sure I share the political view of the author, I also don't feel like I need to have a political opinion on Israel.
I'm just glad that I can love the land in my own way,

Truly a book worth reading, Books on Israel typically fall into two categories: heavily proIsrael or heavily leaning towards the Palestinian cause, Ari Shavit as a reporter for one of Israel's leading daily newspaper falls into the proIsrael category, so perhaps one would expect a cheerleading love letter about the glories of Israel.
But the picture painted by Shavit is far more complex than Israel being an absolute good or bad,

Shavit takes the reader on a historical and biographical journey from the's through present to discuss the founding of Israel, the growth and development of the state, and the challenges facing the state in the future.
What really struck me is that he was able to interview members of Israeli society including writers, businessmen, and politicians so that it doesn't appear that the analysis was weighted towards any one class.


What the reader ends up with is this complex picture of a society that is both prospering from the days of its founding and a society that is currently or will soon be confronting severe demographic challenges that threaten to alter the character of the state, and international challenges that threaten Israel's survival once again.
All in all, a solid effort, Old review Missing in Action, . .
but there are many excellent reviews,

Ari Shavit tries to be fair to everyone, The first third of the book is heartbreaking as he reminds us of the horrors of the holocaust and the centuries of antisemitism that drove the Jewish people to want a homeland of their own while telling an honest story of the displaced Palestinians who lost their homes to the forces of history.
He knows Palestinian history and acknowledges their displacement, and he knows Jewish history and acknowledges it in a very personal way, using his own family story as a framework.
He tries to keep his head up and his eyes open, especially to better be able to see the true situation of the Palestinians.
I learned a lot from his open and straightforward history,
The second third of the book was hard for me to read as he highlights the contradictions of modern Israel, a Jewish state founded by non religious Jews now threatened demographically by a non Jewish occupied population.
He outlines seven threats to the existence of the country, starting with the surrounding and inhospitable Islamic world and ending with the Israeli people's own loss of identity in the modern world.
The threats and contradictions are daunting, confusing and scary, He interviews leftists and settlers, Generals and ordinary citizens, He walks the fields with a Palestinian friend and listens to his story, his anger and emotion, After reading all this, you have to think, this cannot go on,
Finally, he tries to bring it all together, leaving room for some hope, Amazingly, he does so, in spite of it all, and I am left with a feeling of possibility for the future.
Nonetheless, modern Israel is a country living on the edge, living surrounded by threats, living in the moment and trying to live up to its own history, but living!
Ari Shavit's Promised Land is not a fairy tale or an apology, it is an attempt to put it all in perspective, honestly, without an agenda.
An enemy of Israel will find much in the book to agree with and much to hate about Israel, and a lover of Israel will find much to admire and much to cringe at.
I recommend the book for both, “There was hope for peace, but there will be no peace here, Not soon. There was hope for quiet, but there will be no quiet here, Not in this generation. The foundations of the home we founded are somewhat shaky, and repeating earthquakes rattle it, So what we really have in this land is an ongoing adventure, An odyssey. The Jewish state does not resemble any other nation, What this nation has to offer is not security or wellbeing or peace of mind, What it has to offer is the intensity of life on the edge, The adrenaline rush of living dangerously, living lustfully, living to the extreme, If a Vesuviuslike volcano were to erupt tonight and end our Pompeii, this is what it will petrify: a living people.
People that have come from death and were surrounded by death but who nevertheless put up a spectacular spectacle of life.
People who danced the dance of life to the very end, ”

I have been living with this book for more than two months, I started with the audio, but the CDs did not want to play in my car player, So I switched to the book, One way or another I felt like I was having a conversation with Shavit and that I was learning how one man sees Israel.
That is the significant fact for me about this volume, This story is being told by Shavit and it is his version of events, Although this contains history, it also contains opinion, Not all or even most Israelis would see their country as Shavit sees it,

I appreciate his version, Shavit did help me see Israel as history and as current events, We walked through the history of Shavits country decade by decade with each decade getting its due, Other nonfiction books I have read have concentrated on the highlights the battles for independence, for survival, I knew nothing about what happened in Israel as the country absorbed all the emigrants that moved there or about the Israeli nuclear developments.
Although I know that some of the history told here is skewed by the teller, that is true of any history.


I am really glad to have read a book about Israel by someone who has lived there his entire life.
In my opinion, this is a great part of this book, Shavit is an Israeli and very proud of that fact, He is willing to admit that his country has made mistakes something that some Americans struggle with, I dont agree with everything Shavit says, but I feel that my opinions are worth more because I read this work.
I may not see Israel clearly, but my vision is improving,

I have to mention one note of concern, My head says that Shavits personal behavior should not have affected his journalism, However, his behavior did affect my reading of this book, In the acknowledgements, Shavit says the book would not have been written without his wife who he calls his love and inspiration.
I had to take these words with a large grain of salt, Shavit is one of the many men who have abused women over the years, sitelink nytimes. comwo I learned of these accusations as I read this book,

When I got to the acknowledgements, I found his words to his wife hard to take, I admit, I dont know anything about Shavits marriage, I just know how I would feel if my husband was accused of behaving as Shavit did, I also wondered about what other things we dont know about Shavits conduct, I am hoping that his journalistic ethics are better than his sexual ethics, .