The War in Israel and Related Book Reviews

When asked about why there was a war going on I tried to explain the ongoing fight in the Middle East and the role that religion has played in it. I have studied the Middle East both formally and also just doing my own research. At the same time I felt like even I who had an understanding of the situation needed to dig deeper. So I decided to check out some books on the topic and one of the ones I found at the Auraria Campus Library was Hamas A Beginner's Guide by Khaled Hroub.

The first thing I did with this book was read the quick little blur about the author, which clued me into that this specific book was going to be at least somewhat biased. It turned out that this book was not only super biased, but could serve as outright propaganda for Hamas. There is a lot of cherry picking, misinformation, and a misrepresentation of both history and religion in this book. As both a historian and anthropologist I think that this was actually one of the most blatant examples of bad information I have seen in all of my years doing research. I was super disappointed that a person that would try to pass off this book as factual would work at Cambridge University. It lowered this school in my opinion and I don't even know if you can take them or the people that work for them seriously now.

In the first part of the book he tries to make an argument that Hamas only has issues with the people they see as Jewish colonizers of their land and that they say that they will not carry out attacks outside of this focus. This directly goes against what we have seen in the recent attacks the Hamas have done. They attacked a concert with civilians and also took Americans hostage and killed Americans. Also while watching NHK (2:05pm on 10/12/23) they were also talking about Tai citizens being killed and injured. Tai workers are common in agriculture in Israel. This shows Hamas just openly killing everyone and don't even follow their own moral code of just focusing on the Palestine/Israel issue. They have proven themselves killers of everyone and a danger to humanity globally for they are not attacking military targets, but common people and tourists. He also kept talking of a Zionism push to control the thinking of the rest of the world. Conspiracy theories do not make for any real life facts. This could only hold ground if most of the world had converted to Judaism and that the world had no free thinkers. It shows how little he thinks about the mental capabilities of non-Muslims. Historically he glazes over the whole reason why the British took over Palestine was because Palestine had sided with the Nazis during the war. This is a major thing that he just quickly mentions then moves on instead of digging into how Palestine is responsible for what happened to itself and the rise of Israel. He tries to divert blame to the West instead of how horrible it was that Palestine took up the Nazi cause. This is a form of classic cherry picking.

Chapter 3 was a real mess since Hroub was trying to play off what anti-Semitism/anti-Jew meant to the point that he was trying to justify their discrimination of people. He said that they couldn't be anti-Semite because they were Semite. Wrong, yes some of the Jewish beliefs/practices are a part of their faith, but everything else is warped and changed to a point that it is a different religion. Also he defeats his own argument then about the Jews being colonizers if they are the same as the Muslims. Also by recognizing that Islam came from the Jewish faith it would show that the Jewish people also have older rights to the land that they are 'occupying' and that these rights are older then any Islamic right. This is a key thing that he avoids addressing since it could strip away any argument that the Hamas might have about land control. 

I would say only read this book if you want a glimpse of how distorted the perception is of those that support Hamas. It could also be good as a study on propaganda trying to pass as fact. I say it is important to read books like this just so that you can be aware of what is out there.

Notes:

-"Hamas considers itself to be an old tradition that goes back to the early twentieth century struggle against British and Zionist colonialism in Palestine." (P16) This shows how they are not willing to accept the reason why the British took over the government for awhile. After the war the allies of Germany were subjected to administration by foreign governments. They were responsible for this because they choose to side with Germany and all of the horrible things the Germans were doing including to the Jews. Hamas and Palestine is in denial of how horrible their history and that they have a history of support violence even before the birth of Israel.  

-"Hamas's social and educational activities in the Occupied Territories have become so interwoven within the Palestinian community that neither the Israelis nor their peace partners in the Palestinian Authority have been able to extricate them one from the other." (P17) This shows how Hamas has worked to infest the daily life of Palestinians, and how supporting Palestine in any way actively supports Hamas's violence, rapes, murders, and overall terrorist activities. Remember that the author of this book is a Palestinian and he is showing that there is no difference between Palestinians and Hamas and he is actively showing how all Palestinians are guilty of supporting terrorist activities.

-P70 shows how Hamas is using its charities to keep support form the general population in Palestinians. 

-P70 also shows how Hamas did a military fundraiser in the Gaza area and local people donated around $1.2 million US dollars to directly support Hamas's military/terrorist/murderous activities. This is a Palestinian showing that the general population of the Gaza was willing to financially support Hamas's terrorist activities. He is showing how the Palestinians are not victims, but even the general population is part of Hamas's terrorist activities. No one is innocent in Gaza based on what Hroub presented.

-"...feed Hamas with sustained support and popularity among the Palestinians." (P133) More that shows that you can not separate Hamas from the general Palestine population.

-On the Islamization of society, " Hamas persistently justifies this stance by arguing that these aspects reflect the true aspirations of society." (143)

Lebanon by Jan McDaniel

Another book I read Lebanon by Jan McDaniel which had been sitting in my house for awhile. I had gotten it for free from the Aurora Public Library when they cleared out some of their books. This was a much more neutral/less biased book. One of the things that this book looked at was the failure of the Reagan administration in relation to it's lack of a response to terrorism including when Americans were killed. It could be this lack of response that could have also led to the 9/11 attacks because it showed the US as being weak. It also showed how the US was willing to try and still be friends with/work with Lebanon even when the country harbors terrorists and refuses to clean up their own country in relation to those groups and violence within the country. This book made me really think about why the US would invest so much money in a country when that money by proxy helps terrorists. I think that the US should really cut back on our relations with Lebanon until they do the work internally to show that they are willing to be a part of a peaceful world. I would recommend this book for those seeking quick information, but it helps if you have at least a base understanding of the history of the region. 3 stars out of 5 or a C. At least I didn't find obvious misinformation about history or religion in it.

Jordan by Anna Carew-Miller

This book I had gotten at the same time as the above book and is from the same series. This book did focus of the stronger connection that Jordan has with the US then many other countries in the region. At the same time it also showed how Jordan has failed the global community by its inability to deal with terrorist organizations within its boarders. The common people have the ability to say no and stand join together to fight against those who think it is ok to hurt others and yet they don't. This seems to be a pattern in the Middle East where the people there just stand aside and allow the terrorist organizations do whatever they like if they do not actively join them. It seems like book after book that I read, even those written by those from the Middle East show this same failure of both the leaders of these countries and the people themselves.

*NHK is a Japanese news station, and I recommend that people watch international news stations to get a full picture of what is going on. For example Tai workers being impacted by the war is not being covered in the US news I have seen and NHK covered this topic recently. This shows how more cultural groups are impacted then just those that make the headlines.

Picture 1 From: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/6633954-hamas
Picture 2 From: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27064159-lebanon
Picture 3 From: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/27064151-jordan