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BEGIN'S BEGINNINGS UNDERSTANDING THE POLITICIAN WHO WAS BOTH A TERRORIST AND A PEACEMAKER
The Life and Times of Menachem Begin By Amos Perlmutter Doubleday, 444 pages, $21.95 To Win or To Die: A Personal Portrait of Menachem Begin By Ned Temko Morrow, 460 pages, $18.95 Though both are solid and essentially fair, the two books, like their authors, are quite different in character. Amos Perlmutter is an Israeli-born academic, currently teaching at American University in Washington. Ned Temko is an American journalist who long served as the Christian Science Monitor's correspondent in the Middle East. As one might except, Perlmutter's book relies more heavily on documentation, Temko's on interviews. Perlmutter's is more critical, Temko's more graphic. If I had to choose between them, I would say that Perlmutter's is the better. The test is not the period since 1977, with its plentiful material on Begin's exercise of power, but the formative years of Begin's life in Poland, Russia and British Palestine. Perlmutter's languages give him an advantage, as does his knowledge of the early conflicts within Zionism and his instinctive understanding of the Jewish-Israeli character. Perlmutter does not have all the answers to the mysteries of Begin's past, but he generally knows the right questions to ask.
Newspaper Article
Bush Also Has to Stop the Israel-Palestinian War
No government can do much to change the nihilistic world outlook of a bin Laden. It can only stamp out its murderous agents.To be sure, the apocalyptic vision of Hamas, the organization most involved in anti-Israeli terror, shares some of bin Laden's nihilism. Hamas is not interested in a sensible peace. But it is important to remember that in the years after the 1993 Oslo peace accords, which offered the prospect of a reasonable settlement, support for Hamas was at single digits in Palestinian polls and terrorism dropped dramatically. Only within today's context has Hamas gained support in the polls. In refusing to meet with [Yasser Arafat], [George W. Bush] has instead endorsed [Ariel Sharon]'s declaration that Arafat is \"irrelevant.\" And since Sharon had already said his offer would be much less generous than previous proposals Arafat had already rejected, it was tantamount to no offer at all. Bush, however, seems unable to recognize the differences between Palestinian resistance and bin Laden's pure destructiveness, much less the link that exists between them. Relatively few Muslims identify with bin Laden's extremist ideology, but most identify with what they see as oppression of their own people. Every night, they see on television tanks and helicopters manned by Israelis, built and paid for by Americans. If many indiscreetly cheered when the Twin Towers fell, it was not for bin Laden but for the punishment inflicted on those they consider the oppressors.
Newspaper Article
CARTER REVEALS MORE ABOUT HIMSELF THAN MIDEAST THE BLOOD OF ABRAHAM BY JIMMY CARTER HOUGHTON MIFFLIN, 257 PAGES, $15.95
In \"The Blood of Abraham,\" Jimmy Carter writes of the Arab-Israeli peace process, in which he was involved both during and after his White House years. It reveals more about him than the Middle East. It is not that Carter lacks an intellectual grasp. Thankfully, he abjures the slogans that dominate so much of the thinking about the Middle East. But the book contains no new insights and little that Carter did not already reveal in his earlier memoir, \"Keeping Faith.\" The book affirms Carter's moral and religious commitment to peace, but his ideas have no connection to any body of strategic thought or political ideals. The answer is, first of all, that he received a great deal of help from Anwar Sadat, the president of Egypt, who broke the Middle East deadlock by making an offer that Menachem Begin, the Israeli prime minister, could not refuse. Carter seized the opportunity to serve as intermediary, did not hesitate to use his power to advance the ensuing negotiations and refused to let them be derailed by domestic political considerations. For that, he deserves all the credit he has received.
Newspaper Article
TALENTED ARAB NOVELISTS BRING A BITTER MESSAGE TO THE WEST
Cities of Salt By Abdelrahman Munif Translated from the Arabic by Peter Theroux Random House, 627 pages, $18.95 The Sand Child By Tahar Ben Jelloun Translated from the French by Alan Sheridan Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 176 pages, $17.95 Logically enough, leadership has come from Egypt, the first of the independent Arab states. The Arab world's geographical center, Egypt also is the most self-assured of its societies and the culture that is most at home with Western literary forms. Nagulb Mahfouz, the merciless dissecter of Egyptian mores, is a world-class novelist and a candidate for the Nobel Prize. Not far behind him is a generation of younger Egyptians whose talents are matched by Palestinians and Lebanese willing to place their unhappy societies under a literary microscope. Meanwhile, writers at the edges of the Arab world are scrambling to catch up.
Newspaper Article
Paris Wasn't for Burning But the Saga Is Slighted
IN AUGUST, 1944, WHEN THE ALLIED armies were streaming out of their Normandy salient, Adolf Hitler issued the order to his crumbling but still savage Western forces to fight in France to the last man. Between Hitler's foes and the German frontier stood Paris. Stalingrad had already demonstrated how a large city could serve as a great bastion.
Newspaper Article