Books by Tom Segev
“This book tells the story of the great interruption in European history – the Holocaust. It’s no accident that the Jewish reaction after the Holocaust was to return to Jerusalem. Zionism had been ambivalent about Jerusalem, but, after the Holocaust, that was no longer the case. Tom Segev’s book explains why. The title refers to the six million who died in the Holocaust; the seventh million are the Israelis who were traumatised by what happened.” Read more...
James Carroll, Memoirist
“It was a mock receipt for the handover between high commissioners in Palestine: the one handing on to his successor ‘one Palestine, complete’, in the same way someone handing over a battleship might give it into the hands of the next commander, itemising all aspects of the battleship. So it’s very much a reflection of a British notion of their responsibilities as commanders of this colony or ship. But the irony of it is, of course, that Palestine was made, by the British, into a twice-contested land: between Palestinian Arabs and Jewish Zionist immigrants. It was a country slated for partition. Arabs and Jews in Palestine were taking Palestine in the direction of a divided land, not ‘one Palestine, complete’. But, actually, Segev doesn’t dwell on that irony at any length. Instead, what he gives us is a very human history about the encounter between British imperial rulers, the indigenous Arab people and the Jewish immigrants in the inter-war years, when Palestine was created as a British mandate. The book is very richly peopled – these vivid characters from all three communities – and Segev tracks the way they didn’t live in isolation from one another, but interacted and were shaped by each other. It’s a book full of startling challenges to assumed wisdoms and borrowed wisdoms.” Read more...
Eugene Rogan, Historian
Interviews where books by Tom Segev were recommended
The best books on The Arabs, recommended by Eugene Rogan
Eugene Rogan is Director of the Middle East Centre at Oxford University. His research focuses on the social and economic history of the Arab provinces of the Ottoman Empire and the Arab states in the 20th century.
The best books on Israel, recommended by Michael Goldfarb
Award-winning broadcast journalist and author chooses five books on Israel. He says that perceptions of Israel and Palestine are always filtered through expectation and prejudice – which makes the problem unsolvable
The best books on Jerusalem, City of Peace?, recommended by James Carroll
Jerusalem has been at the center of conflict for millennia and its current problems cannot be blamed on Israelis and Palestinians alone, says bestselling author and former Catholic priest James Carroll. He picks the best books to understand Jerusalem’s complex history and its message of peace which still gives him hope.