Middle East Books Review

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Palestine Hijacked: How Zionism Forged an Apartheid State from River to Sea

By Thomas Suarez, Olive Branch Press, 2022, paperback, 470 pp. MEB $25

Reviewed by Steve France

In his new book, Thomas Suarez draws on years of research deep in the bowels of British and U.S. archives, sifting through little known or recently unsealed records. From this haul he presents vivid documentation of the 1948 terror against—and ethnic cleansing of—Palestinians, as well as records of systematic atrocities that consolidated Zionist control after Israel became a state.

But it is in bringing to light the pre-1948 story of Israel’s founding that the book delivers unprecedented detail on the layers of Zionist deception and aggression. Readers encounter the incessant Zionist lies, machinations and terror unleashed against the Palestinians, but also against British police and civil servants, and not least, against recalcitrant Jews who balked at helping impose Jewish supremacy in Palestine.

The book is compulsively readable (as long as you have a moderately strong stomach), more than persuasive, and should be seminal in opening up further directions for research. Sticking to a chronological narrative, accompanied by incisive but restrained commentary, Suarez delegitimizes core assumptions relied on to justify or excuse Israel’s conquest of Palestine.

Most damaging, Suarez shows that “the professed motivation” of early Zionist lead- ers—to protect Jewish safety and dignity against anti-Jewish persecution—was never their “driving motivation.” What they wanted was to establish “an ethnically predicated settler state for which persecuted Jews were [the] renewable fuel.” This is easy enough to say, of course. Many critics of Zionism have noted Zionist hostility to the rich variety of diasporic Jews and Jewish cultures found around the world and even in Palestine, and their condemnation of non- or anti- Zionists as “self-hating Jews.”

What’s important is that Suarez can back up with hard evidence his assertion that “most victims of Zionist assassinations (i.e., targeted killings of specific individuals) were Jews.” In this vein, Suarez notes the Jewish Agency’s internal instruction in 1942 that non-Zionist Jews were the “foremost enemy.” He also points out that Jews publishing in languages other than Hebrew were labeled as enemies and systematically fire-bombed.

Other storylines that Suarez weaves through the years from early in World War I to 1956 (the year of the Suez Crisis) include:

● Britain eagerly signing on to bring the Zionists to Palestine and using its imperial power to give them dominance over the Palestinians—only to find itself treacherously re-purposed by Zionists around 1939 to play the role of colonial oppressor of the Jews in Palestine. Over the next several years, the British were driven out by a Zionist terror campaign advertised to the world as a Jewish “war of independence.”

● The Palestinians suffering massive amounts of casualties and bombings by the Zionists and the Brits during the Mandate period. However, after the Arab Revolt ended in 1939, they showed “no disposition to violence,” the British steadily reported.

● Groups of Jewish youth (male and female) going out on seemingly innocuous “hiking tours,” winding their way through Arab areas. But their real purpose, as the British belatedly realized, was to “spy out the land” and secretly photograph, map and assess the military vulnerabilities of Arab communities, often visiting “hidden military training settlements” along the way.

● Early on, U.S. politicians, intellectuals, entertainers and journalists falling for proZionist propaganda and influence campaigns and mobilizing public opinion and lots of funds vital to keeping Zionist terror gangs in business.

● The now-forgotten terror campaign in Europe that helped Zionists take control of Jews displaced during World War II and transport them to Palestine to serve the Zionist cause. The terror also generally deterred British and other European resistance to the Zionist agenda (even the very pro-Zionist Winston Churchill received a letter bomb from the Stern Gang).

● The Zionists cynically engineering a U.N. vote on Resolution 181 in 1947 to partition Palestine, but then completely ignoring the partition resolution to seize more territory. Resolution 194, calling for Palestinian refugees to be allowed to return to their homes, was also disregarded. Nonetheless, the U.N. quickly gave full recognition to the state of Israel.

Palestine Hijacked is a unique resource. Open almost any page—or follow individual index entries—and you find compelling quotes of eyewitnesses and key decision makers from all sides telling their part of the shameful tale. Anyone who wants to fully fathom the history of Israel’s founding needs to read this book. Moreover, to remain unaware of the history that Suarez presents limits advocates’ ability to overcome many Americans’ stubborn wish to believe in Israel’s basic goodness and necessity, despite Zionism’s 100 years of persecuting Palestinians.

Invited to Witness: Solidarity Tourism Across Occupied Palestine

By Jennifer Lynn Kelly, Duke University Press, 2023, paperback, 344 pp. MEB $30

Reviewed by Walter

L. Hixson

centers on explaining how and why organizers chose solidarity tourism to illuminate and publicize “the contours of Israeli colonial violence.” The study, however, also analyzes the limitations and contradictions of solidarity tourism.

The early chapters analyze the emergence of solidarity tourism as a strategy. The author probes specific aspects of the division and displacement within historic Palestine, such as settler violence that targets olive planting programs. Another chapter centers on the isolation, fragmentation and expulsion of Palestinians from occupied Jerusalem. Subsequent chapters focus on “mixed cities” under Israeli political control, as well as the roles of virtual and celebrity tourism. The seventh and final chapter homes in on the views and interpretations of U.S. tourists and their role as “witnesses” back home.

Solidarity tourism has enlightened countless numbers of tourists to the brutal realities of Israel’s occupation and the systematic erasure of Palestinian narratives. Like countless others, I know this from personal experience, as my two-week tour through Eyewitness Palestine in 2013 was one of the

In this sophisticated academic study, Jennifer Lynn Kelly probes the complexities of solidarity tourism in Palestine. Flourishing since the Oslo Accords, which divided the West Bank into designated areas with varying administrative and security controls, solidarity tourism has become a noteworthy industry as well as a significant source of knowledge production about Israeli settler colonization.

Invited to Witness draws on the author’s interviews primarily with Palestinian tour guides, but also with community members, tourists and activists during multiple trips to the region spanning a decade. The book most enlightening yet disturbing experiences of my life. I have been a “witness” ever since.

Contributing editor Walter L. Hixson is the author of Architects of Repression: How Israel and Its Lobby Put Racism, Violence and Injustice at the Center of US Middle East Policy, along with several other books and journal articles. He was a professor of history for 36 years, achieving the rank of distinguished professor.

That said, Kelly’s impressive field research yields a nuanced analysis rather than an uncritical celebration of solidarity tourism. She notes that in many ways, “solidarity tourism is about failure.” Indeed, solidarity tourism originated as an effort to “get through” to internationals as witnesses, because other means had failed to expose and destabilize Israeli settler colonialism.

Invited to Witness underscores the inability of many tourists to understand that unbridled U.S. support for Israel is grounded in another and pernicious form of solidarity—namely settler solidarity between Israel and the United States. Moreover, tourists, unlike Palestinians under occupation, enjoy the privilege to move with relative freedom and to return home—and on the part of many, to maintain a blind eye to the core identity of the United States as a settler society. Although Kelly analyzes the limitations and contradictions of solidarity tours, she rejects derision or dismissal of the tours as mere “occupation tourism.”

This book is an academic analysis grounded in feminist studies, American studies, Asian American studies, critical ethnic studies and Palestinian as well as U.S. history. Despite what the uninitiated reader might consider excessive jargon, the book remains readable, well put-together by Duke University Press and illustrated with several photographs.

Rooted in Palestine: Palestinian Christians and the Struggle for National Liberation 1917-2004

By Xavier Abu Eid, Dar al-Kalima University Press, 2022, paperback, 349 pp. MEB $20

Reviewed by Daoud Kuttab

talked, worked, protested, been tortured, imprisoned and martyred in the shared pursuit of Palestinian liberation. Published by the university press of the Bethlehembased Dar al-Kalima University, the book contains more than 500 footnotes, allowing it to also serve as a Palestinian Christian bibliography of sorts.

With skill and grace, Abu Eid provides a panoramic view of the contributions of Palestinian Christians across many different fields, including: academics and educators like Edward Said, Hanna Nasser, Hanan Ashrawi and Nabil Kassis; legal experts such as Camille Mansour; human rights activists like Raja Shehadeh and Jonathan Kuttab; nonviolence proponents like Mubarak Awad and Father Elias Chacour; businesspeople and philanthropists like Said Khoury and Hasib Sabbagh; mayors such as Bethlehem’s Issa Bandak and Elias Freij and Ramallah’s Karim Khalaf; politicians like Wadie Haddad; and PLO leaders like George Habash, Kamal Mansour and Nayef Hawatmeh.

Abu Eid, a practicing Christian who was born in Chile and moved to Palestine to advise the PLO and conduct research, also gives much space to the activities of church leaders, including the well-respected Latin Patriarch Emeritus Michel Sabbah, detailing his entire life story and reflecting on his influence. Other Latin patriarchs are not given the same positive remarks, as the author is critical of Sabbah’s non-Arab predecessors, who he believes were more loyal to their country of origin than their Palestinian flock.

The church that comes out with the highest marks in the book is the Greek Catholic Church, whose leaders are referred to as being close to their congregations, speaking out for their rights and refusing to acquiesce to the various powers. Anglican (Episcopal) and Lutheran Palestinian bishops also receive positive reviews, although their church sizes are relatively small.

The Palestinian national struggle has always prided itself on its secular nature, rejecting attempts to introduce religion into the conflict taking place in what is often referred to as the Holy Land. In fact, the strong connection between Christian and Muslim Palestinians has been a major part of the Palestinian narrative. This historic relationship, while well-known and understood within Palestine and the region, has been dismissed or overlooked by many in the West.

Rooted in Palestine seeks to change this reality by comprehensively documenting the role of Christians in the Palestinian movement, giving a name and face to the many Palestinian Christian leaders who have been involved, side by side with their fellow Palestinian Muslims, in the national struggle. Christians, the book shows, have

Daoud Kuttab is an award-winning Palestinian journalist and former Ferris Professor of Journalism at Princeton University. Follow him on Twitter @daoudkuttab.

Abu Eid also names Christians who became martyrs for Palestine: The Beit Jala mayor who was killed by the British; a PLO representative in Brussels, Naim Khader, who was most likely killed by the Abu Nidal Group; Rania Murrah, a 24-year-old mother who was killed by Israeli fire while on her way to buy milk; Johnny Thaljieh, a 19-year-old Palestinian who wanted to become a priest but was killed while on his way to serve at Mass at the Church of the Nativity; and the 40 Armenian Christians who were killed during the 1948 war.

The breadth of Palestinian Christian thinking is also evident in the book, as Abu Eid shares stories and opinions of individuals possessing different views about crucial events and issues, such as the Oslo Accords and the role of armed resistance.

In addition to its vital information, Rooted in Palestine tantalizes readers with interesting anecdotes, such as PLO Chief Negotiator Saeb Erekat kicking out Mayor Elias Freij from the front row of the Madrid Conference, and a Latin priest, Fr. Iyad Twal, performing the baptism of Anglican twins because the Israeli army barred Rev. Samir Esaid from reaching his parish in the Ramallah-area village of Birzeit.

Rooted in Palestine is an important and valuable addition to the many books written about Palestine, especially since it focuses on a narrow (but important) element of Palestinian life. Abu Eid is to be commended for revealing and celebrating the many Palestinian Christians who have done so much for their country, almost always without seeking any attention or praise.

Western Sahara: War, Nationalism and Conflict Irresolution, Second Edition

By Stephen Zunes and Jacob Mundy, Syracuse University Press, 2022,

paperback, 400 pp. MEB $28

Reviewed by Ian Williams

One of the world’s most thinly populated nations, Western Sahara, or the Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), epitomizes the concept of “lines in the sand.” Its reality is shaped by lines drawn on maps by colonial cartographers and by a physical wall of sand—the 1,700-mile-long Berm piled up by the Moroccan occupiers in emulation of the Israeli separation wall. The country’s desert expanse is at the crossroads of modern geopolitics, sovereignty, international law and diplomacy, where it is an Ozymandian monument to international law; “look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair!”

U.N. correspondent Ian Williams is the author of U.N.told: The Real Story of the United Nations in Peace and War.

Rabat shares with Israel a determination to ignore U.N. resolutions and international decisions, as well as an effective cabal of friends determined to cover for its occupation despite international law. Stephen Zunes and Jacob Mundy, the authors of Western Sahara: War, Nationalism and Conflict Irresolution, go deep into the issues and are heroically objective in the face of flagrant duplicity and defiance from Morocco, and the obfuscation of sponsors and bystanders in the West.

Unfortunately, the U.N. has totally failed to provide an effective answer to “The Question of Western Sahara,” but as Zunes and Mundy demonstrate, figuring it out raises many more fundamental questions which all need answers.

So, what qualifies a nation to claim the right to self-determination? U.S. Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart invoked the subjective element in 1964 when he stated, probably presumptuously, that we recognize pornography when we see it. Similarly, in the absence of more objective indicators, if a majority of a people think they constitute a nation, then it is wise to assume their views are conclusive. The authors convincingly demonstrate that the furnace of colonial struggle against Spain, Morocco and Mauretania has indeed forged a genuine Western Saharan identity.

However, this aspiration is often unrecognized within the Arab world. It almost takes an effort of historical data mining to remember the heady days of Arab nation-