by Jacqueline Shields
The Hope Fulfilled provides a historical account
of the complicated events from the late 1800's that led up to the formation
of the State of Israel in 1948. Although
a multitude of books have been written on this subject, Stein adds to
the literature by writing a book that is much lighter than other history
books that recount this time. Stein explores the events, and offers
details on them, but the book is written in a very readable manner,
making it more accessible to the lay person. In addition to the history
that Stein provides, charts, photographs and maps are included that
help to depict points and enable the reader to gain a better understanding
of the people and their lives in Palestine at the turn of the twentieth
century and in the early half of the 1900's.
A highlight of the book is Stein's chapter on the Zionist leader Theodor Herzl. In
this section, the author discusses the life and actions of Herzl in
great depth and shows his dedication to Zionism and its growth into
a political movement to establish a national homeland in Palestine.
Stein follows his trips and meetings in great detail, and I felt I knew
and understood Herzl better from these descriptions. Another perk of
the book is the discussion of the Balfour
Declaration. Stein traces the path in great detail that led Lord
Balfour to engineer one of the most controversial and debated declarations
in history.
Despite the detail of certain historical events, in
an attempt to be more readable and a bit more of a pop-culture book
than a historical textbook, there is a lack of analysis of events, especially
with relation to the conflicts between the Jews and the Arab population
living in the region at the time of the aliyot
movements. Stein states in the preface that he wishes to remain
“balanced;” however, by remaining neutral he leaves gaps
in the book and raises many significant questions that are not addressed.
Stein writes of the increase in tension between the Arabs and the Jews,
but when the jump is suddenly made from tension to violence and pogroms
by the Arabs against the Jews, he does not explain why this suddenly
occurred. I found myself asking, what caused the Arabs to become so
vitriolic towards the Jews? He offers the theory that it was the mass
immigration of Jews from Europe that angered the Arabs, yet he also
comments that, at least initially, Jews and Arabs lived quite separately
and had little impact on each other's life. Further, since Stein contends
for the majority of the book that the Arabs were angered with the Jews
because they were moving to the Arab land and taking it away from them,
why do the Arab countries join forces together to attack Israel after
the UN Partition in 1948?
The Jews were not taking the land from Syria, Egypt, and Transjordan,
so why did they attack Israel? Stein does not answer any of these important
questions, and by ignoring them, detracts from the account.
Another criticism of the book is that Stein provides
no explanation of the Jewish claim to the land of Israel. He assumes
that the reader knows why Jews wanted to return to this region; however,
by neglecting to mention the Jewish claim to the land, it appears that
the Jews randomly chose Palestine to move to, and that the Jews were
invading a historically Arab land and displacing them. By leaving out
the Jewish claim, he provides no context in which to understand the
mass Jewish emigrations from Europe to Israel.
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