We Will Not Be Silenced - Robinson & Griffin

Subtitled:  The Academic Repression of Israel's Critics

While I did not read this whole book, I took in parts of it.  It examines the stories of academics who have been blacklisted or had problems because of their academic work which was critical of Israel.  Each victim has submitted an essay on their experience, which can be interesting reading.  What I found more interesting though, were the brief accounts at the beginning of each case, that gives the basic outline of the offending work, and the methods of repression and exclusion used by the concerned organizations and institutions.
Interestingly, most, if not all, of the cases take place in the U.S.

Ten Myths about Israel - Ilan Pappé

Another brilliant book by this critic of Israeli policy towards the Palestinians.

The book is divided into three sections:  myths about the past and the genesis of the state; myths about current situations and myths about the two state solution.

In the first section, there are some rather shocking bits of information that I was unaware of:
- Zionism began essentially as a European Christian powers projects and initially received little support from Jewish leaders - it was seen as a back door colonialist policy for dealing with the Middle East (which it in fact is)
- in the 30s, the Zionists tried to form an alliance with the Nazis to help them fight the British in the Mandate territories!

In the second section, he clearly outlines how and why the Israeli state is a colonial power and essentially a project of ethnic cleansing, by looking at patterns of land confiscation, abrogation of basic rights, persistent harassment and use of military and extrajudicial punishments.

In the section on Gaza, he also outlines his reasons for seeing the Israeli actions as a form of genocide, based mostly on the number of deaths and the overwhelmingly civilian nature of those deaths.

Throughout the book, Pappé also underlines how elimination of the Palestinian population has always been the goal, and how Israeli governments have never entered into peace negotiations in good faith.

A well-written book - direct and to the point.

Children of the Stone - Sandy Tolan

This is the story of Ramzi Aburedwan, a Palestinian born in Ramallah during the occupation.  The book chronicles his development from a stone-throwing child to the director of a number of music schools in Ramallah and various refugee camps in Lebanon.  It is a story of how an encounter with music can transform someone, give hope and a life beyond the anger and frustration that people live with in situations of occupation and repression.  A complicated man.
The book inevitably touches on many issues related to the plight of Palestinians under occupation.  You get a picture of some of the elements of day-to-day life for Palestinians living in Israel.  As background, the book also touches on the various steps and failings of the peace process, the two Intifada's, and the current divestment campaign.
Worth the read in that it humanizes certain aspects of this troubling situation that seems to never get closer to being resolved.

The Great War for Civilization - Robert Fisk

A book by a reporter who has covered every major and minor war and conflict in the Middle east for decades.  A sickening and depressing look at what went on in Iraq (twice), Algeria (twice), Palestine, Armenia, Afghanistan.  He looks at corruption in U.S. policy, European government policy, Middle-eastern government policy.  He looks at the role of the Saudis in the region.

He catalogues both high level corruption and the sad story of the effects of all of this on the little people in these societies.

Then of course, there are the accounts of the three interviews he did with Osama Bin Ladin - I believe the only journalist from the West to interview Bin Ladin, and certainly the only one to be invited by Bin Ladin to do the interview.

Having witnessed all of that, I don't understand how he can continue on and not be crushed by all the horror and injustice he has witnessed.

The Trouble with Islam Today - Irshad Manji

A powerful book.  I'm surprised she hasn't been assassinated yet.  A well-reasoned and well-sourced critic of mainstream, and fundamentalist, Islam's controversial positions on human rights, women, other religions, and the role of reason.  It brings up issues of contradictions in the Koran, of historical and social influence on the text, of literalism vs. interpretations.  She also looks at the idea of who controls the interpreting and how that will influence the message.
A good read for anyone who would like to engage in discussion of these issues, whatever religion's position you may want to look at.  Manji pillories the west's tolerance of repressive religious practices on the basis of multiculturalism or cultural sensitivity.
She also discusses the arab warrior tribal culture element in Islam and how it has impoverished several ancient cultural and pluralistic muslim civilizations, from Iran to Baghdad to Spain to Indonesia.
There is also an interesting section on her visit to Israel where she points out that the Israeli/Palestinian relations are not quite as black and white as you could sometimes think.  This in the context of countering the demonization of Israel and Jews in mainstream Islam.  She also makes the point that the leading middle eastern countries have exported their view of the Palestinian issue as part of the religion/culture context  ex. to Indonesia, where they have other social and cultural issues much closer to home.  It would be interesting to look at her position in detail.

Much of her critique of Islam is equally applicable to any other doctrinaire or fundamentalist ideology, whether religious, political, social or economic.


Some quotes:

discussing V. S. Naipaul - (he) "was soon to discover that no colonization has been so thorough as the colonization that had come with the Arab faith..."

"Why, over the past one thousand years, has the entire Arab world translated only as many books as Spain translates every year?  Is it be because the more people know about foreign notions, the more likely they'll be to examine their own?"

- from  Amin Malouf "Traditions deserve to be respected only in so far as they are respectable - that is, exactly in so far as they themselves respect the fundamental rights of men and women."

From the Holy Mountain - William Dalrymple

An interesting look at an aspect of Middle Eastern history that is not discussed much - the history and state of Christianity in the Middle East.  The book is loosely structured as a travelogue built around an account of a journey by two monks it the 6th century.  Dalrymple sets out to follow their root and compare the churches, monasteries and Christian communities John Moschos and his companion visited 1400 years ago.
Dalrymple's travels and comments bring up a number of interesting points or threads.
1)  You get a strong sense of Christianity as essentially a middle eastern religion with historically a very strong presence in the region.  This is something ignored by European and American christian churches, as if they wanted to forget its essentially Arabic origins.  This also explains the indifference of western churches to the plight of Christian communities in Israel and Egypt (amongst other countries) where governments are working to eliminate Christianity from the country and its history.  You can include Turkey in this mix, but there the process of elimination is almost complete (and is strongly tied to ethnic issues also).  This indifference also I think points to the narrowness of the various Christian sects and their lack of acceptance of other branches of the faith; perhaps also to the strong historical link between nation states and organized religion.
2)  The strong link between Islam and Christianity - there are early orthodox sects that pray in the same way Muslims do, except they also cross themselves while genuflecting.
3)  Links between early church liturgy and Arabic/middle eastern culture.  The music of some of the Syrian orthodox sects sounds so much like Arabic vocal music - there's lots on Youtube.
4)  The fact that Syria has historically been a haven for middle-eastern Christians pushed out of other countries.  Unfortunately, due to their strong ties to the Assad family, with the Syrian revolution this may no longer be the case -we could be looking basically the end of Christian communities in the middle east.  Especially when you add in the current situation with the Copts in Egypt.
5)  Just the simple fact that large parts of the middle east were essentially Christian at one point in time.
6)  His travels and encounters in Israel and Jerusalem dovetail perfectly with Ilan Pappé's account of Israel's policies and actions in relation to Palestinians regardless of whether Christian or Muslim.  (You can also add Armenians to the list when considering Jerusalem.)  Dalrymple in fact reaches many of the same conclusions about the nature of Zionism.
7)  The Jews only controlled the area of Israel for about 600 years, which certainly doesn't grant much of a title to the land. (this fact to be verified)
8)  Archaeologically, the Muslim take over of Byzantine middle eastern lands does not seem to have created much of an archaeological, cultural or economic break in the historical record.  Any cultural and  population shifts  were very gradual - this was no barbarian horde wreaking havoc as they moved through.
9)  The strong relation between Syrian monks/monasteries and the church in England - one of the first Archbishops in Canterbury was Syrian.  There also seems to be a link between the illustrated manuscripts produced in Syrian monasteries and the early illumination work of Irish monks (now that's travelling...)
10)  There are some interesting bits about Urfa and Diyarbakır which would be worth noting if travelling in that area again.
11)  Lots of travel information for Syria, but I'm not sure at this point how much of it will remain after the current conflict is over.

Includes a decent bibliography

TO FIND:
John Moschos, The Spiritual Meadow
A History of the Arab Peoples, Albert Hourani
The Slaughterhouse Province, Leslie A. Davis (turkey?)
The Cradle of Mankind:  Life in Eastern Kurdistan,  W. A. Wigram (1914)

The Forgotten Palestinians - Ilan Pappé

Subtitle:  A History of the Palestinians in Israel

A meticulous account of the ethnic cleansing of Palestinians in the years immediately following the establishment of Israel in 1948.  Pappé is a meticulous historian who made use of recently released archival material (such as notes and journals of some of the main actors and leaders of the time) to determine the exact nature of the policy towards Palestinians and Palestinian villages post 1948, and also to catalogue forced removals, destruction of villages, massacres and rapes as noted in these sources.  It turns out these archival sources corroborate many of the actions and events Palestinians have claimed for decades.
His style is not hysterical or hostile; he maintains a historian's tone for most of the book.  There are occasional glimpses of he feeling and reactions as he discovers the truth behind the propaganda and myths he has been fed growing up in Israel and passing through the education system.
There are interesting quotes at the beginning of chapters mostly taken from statements, descriptions and international reactions to what went on in Bosnia - these stand in stark contrast to the west's and UN's statements and reactions to the events that occured in Palestine.  They also serve to back up his conclusion that the Palestinians were subjected to ethnic cleansing, given the similarities between the two conflicts.
A very important book because of who he is and his profession as a historian.  A difficult read, but not brutal - there are very few graphic details.  It's just the endless repetitive nature of the actions against the Palestinian villages over a period of years.