From Beruit to Jerusalem
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In From Beruit to Jerusalem Thomas L. Friedman offers his first-hand observations of life in the Middle East where he worked as a reporter for ten years from June 1979 to 1989 (3). As a two time winner of the Pulitzer Prize for his reporting in the Middle East, Friedman offers a perceptive account of his days living in Beirut and Jerusalem rendered with rare insight into the belief systems and fallacies of both Arabs and Jews. Friedman observes that his earliest interest in Israel occurred when he was in high school and his parents flew him over Christmas vacation to visit his sister who was studying in Israel (4). After studying in Israel and Egypt, he began to become mutually interested in both worlds and began studying Arabic (6). Friedman's deep appreciation for both the Jewish and Arab worlds fashions him as an excellent guide for Americans attempting to understand the labyrinth of the Middle East. Friedman, however, recognizes the precariousness of his position when he observes that a Jew who chooses to specialize in Middle East affairs will be a "lonely man" since neither the Arabs nor the Jews will ever fully accept or trust him (6). Friedman began his days as a reporter in Lebanon, a country which he observes was once proudly called the Switzerland of the Middle East. While in the Middle East he witnessed the Hama massacre and the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. Living in Beruit prepared him for living in Jerusalem. Having lived in th
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ites is suggestive of Ireland's own desperates, the IRA, since both groups seem willing to destroy themselves for the sake of some vague notion of stolen inheritance or a lost kingdom.
With clever parallels offered throughout the book, Friedman indicates that Israeli culture too is marked by this mysterious and politically vague sense of an idealized community. The Zionist tradition which forged the modern state of Israel fed off of a nationalist ideology which desperately attempted to create a nationalist identity for a displaced people. With compassion for the spiritual, political, and moral complexity of both Jews and Arabs, Friedman's From Beruit to Jerusalem appears to suggest that since the underlying goals of many factions of both societies is to restore or rejuvenate the glories of some lost or as of yet unrealized grand culture, no faction is willing to modify their position to allow the "enemy's" dream to materialize.
The thoroughness of Friedman's approach is evidenced by his quick overview of British historical involvement in the problem of the formation of the Palestine state. Dating back to 1921, Britain carved the region broadly known as Palestine into two political entities. The area positioned east of the
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Approximate Word count = 2628
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page)
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