CEASEFIRE

If you think that criticizing Israel is wrong, you might want to check out these Israeli scholars

Israeli politician Simha Flapan's work is available in full at this link. He was born in Poland in 1911 and was the national secratary of the Israeli Mapam party. This book was directed at "Israelis interested in peace and Americans and American Jews who have Israel's fundamental interest at heart."

Dr. Omer Bartov is an Israeli-American Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Brown University and Fellow of the United States Holcaust Memorial Musuem.  He fought in IDF in the 1973 Yom Kippur War. Here is a NYT article from Nov. 10, 2023, in which he examines the events in Gaza. 

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This book discusses some of the most urgent current debates over the study, commemoration, and politicization of the Holocaust through key critical perspectives. Omer Bartov draws on his own personal trajectory to consider links between the fate of Jews in World War II and the plight of Palestinians during and in the aftermath of the establishment of the state of Israel.

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Today the once flourishing Jewish community of Iraq, at one time numbering over 130,000 and tracing its history back 2,600 years, has all but vanished.

Why so? One explanation speaks of the timeless clash between Arab and Jewish civilisations and a heroic Zionist mission to rescue Eastern Jews from backward nations and unceasing persecution.

Avi Shlaim tears up this script. His parents had many Muslim friends in Baghdad and no interest in Zionism. As anti-Semitism surged in Iraq, the Zionist underground fanned the flames. Yet when Iraqi Jews fled to Israel, they faced an uncertain future, their history was rewritten to serve a Zionist narrative.

“The Arabs bore no responsibility for the centuries-long suffering of Jews in Europe,” Elon wrote, voicing criticism that is common in Israel today but was rare at the time. “Whatever their subsequent follies and outrages might be, the punishment of the Arabs for the sins of Europe must burden the conscience of Israelis for a long time to come.” -- Quote from Amos Elon from his 2014 obituary in Los Angeles Times.

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Israeli historian Benny Morris' study "attempts to describe what hap­pened rather than what suc­ces­sive gen­er­a­tions of Israeli and Arab pro­pa­gan­dists have said hap­pened, and to explain the motives of the protagonists." -- Jewish Book Council

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"BORN OF THE AMBITION of one willful, reckless man, Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon was anchored in delusion, propelled by deceit, and bound to end in calamity. It was a war for whose meager gains Israel has paid an enormous price that has yet to be altogether reckoned; a war whose defensive rationale belied far-reaching political aims and an unconscionably myopic policy. It drew Israel into a wasteful adventure that drained much of its inner strength, and cost the IDF the lives of over 500 of its finest men in a vain effort to fulfill a role it was never meant to play.

 

There is no consolation for this costly, senseless war. The best one can do now is to learn its lessons well." (from the afterward)

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Written by IDF Major and Professor of Military Studies Ahron Bregman, the book provides a gripping and unvarnished chronicle of how what Israel promised would be an 'enlightened occupation' quickly turned sour, and the anguished diplomatic attempts to bring it to an end.