Gaza in Crisis

September 13, 2010
Although much of the material collected here precedes Israel's recent military attack on a Gaza-bound international flotilla of embargo-breaking humanitarian aid, this succinct and eye-opening collection of recent interviews and essays from the renowned linguist and activist Chomsky (Hopes and Prospects) and prominent Israeli historian Pappé (The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine) gives essential context to the crisis. The reader will find Chomsky's consistent positions on everything from the origins of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to the issue of a one- versus two-state settlement. Pappé adds vital and unexpected historical background, including a chapter on the deep American evangelical roots in the support of Zionism and the birth of modern Arab nationalism in Palestine. Pappé and Chomsky are not perfectly in synch on every point: Chomsky remains skeptical of an academic boycott of Israel, for instance, called for in the past by Pappé and others. But the fundamentals of the crisis—and its scale in humanitarian, moral and political terms—are clear, as well as clearly expressed, between them. This sober and unflinching analysis should be read and reckoned with by anyone concerned with practicable change in the long-suffering region.