Be Strong and of Good Courage : How Israel's Most Important Leaders Shaped Its Destiny

Modern Israel's founding fathers provided some of the boldest and most principled leadership of any nation--now Israel needs their example more than ever.


Modern Israel's founding fathers provided some of the boldest and most principled leadership of any nation. Now Israel needs their example more than ever.At a time when the political destiny of Israel is more uncertain than at any moment since its modern founding, Be Strong and of Good Courage celebrates the defining generation of leaders who took on the task of safeguarding the country's future.

David Ben-Gurion, Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Rabin, and Ariel Sharon were all present at the creation of the new nation in 1948. Over the next sixty years, each experienced moments when the country's existence was directly imperiled. In those moments, Israel needed extraordinary acts of leadership and strategic judgment to secure its future, and these leaders rose to the occasion. The strength they showed allowed them to prevail.

Today, Israel may be on the verge of sacrificing the essential character that its greatest citizens fought to secure. This is the story of that epic struggle.

Dennis Ross is an American diplomat and author. He has served as the Director of Policy Planning in the State Department under President George H. W. Bush, the special Middle East coordinator under President Bill Clinton, and was a special adviser for the Persian Gulf and Southwest Asia to the former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. Ambassador Ross has published extensively on the former Soviet Union, arms control, and the greater Middle East, including most recently Doomed to Succeed: The U.S.-Israel Relationship from Truman to Obama (Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, October 2015). He has authored many op-eds in the New York Times, Washington Post, and other papers and magazines. In addition, he writes monthly columns for US News and World Report and the New York Daily News. He lives in Washington, D.C.

David Makovsky is the Ziegler distinguished fellow at The Washington Institute and director of the Project on Arab-Israel Relations. He is an adjunct professor of Middle East studies at the Johns Hopkins University's School of Advanced International Studies since 2000 and was a senior advisor on Israel-Palestinian affairs in the Office of the Secretary of State during the Obama Administration. This is his third book.