3 Review(s)

Alan Dershowitz's detailed and penetrating analysis of the issues that fuel the continuing war in Israel should be read by everyone interested in reaching a fair conclusion as to how that tragic conflict should be ended. Every charge leveled by Israel's opponents is dealt with lucidly and convincingly by one of the nation's brightest minds and most effective advocates. --Mario M. Cuomo The Jewish nation of Israel stands accused in the dock of international justice. The charges include being a criminal state, the prime violator of human rights, the mirror-image of Nazism, and the most intransigent barrier to peace in the Middle East. Throughout the world-from the chambers of the United Nations, to the campuses of universities-Israel is singled out for condemnation, divestment, boycott, and demonization. Its leaders are threatened with prosecution as war criminals. Its supporters are charged with dual loyalty and parochialism. The time has come for a proactive defense of Israel to be offered in the court of public opinion. In this book, I offer such a defense-not of every Israeli policy or action, but of its basic right to exist, to protect its citizens from terrorism, and to defend its borders from hostile enemies. I also try to present a realistic picture of Israel, warts and all, as a flourishing multiethnic democracy, similar in many ways to the United States, that affords all of its citizens-Jews, Muslims, and Christians-far better lives and opportunities than those afforded by any Arab or Muslim nation. Most important, I argue that those who single out Israel for unique criticism not directed against countries with far worse human rights records are themselves guilty of international bigotry. . . . But when the Jewish nation is the only one criticized for faults that are far worse among other nations, such criticism crosses the line from fair to foul, from acceptable to anti-Semitic. -from The Case for Israel