The Invention of the Land of Israel: From Holy Land to Homeland - Hardcover

Sand, Shlomo

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 1844679462 ISBN 13: 9781844679461

Publisher: Verso, 2012

Synopsis

What is a homeland and when does it become a national territory? Why have so many people been willing to die for such places throughout the twentieth century? What is the essence of the Promised Land? Following the acclaimed and controversial The Invention of the Jewish People, Shlomo Sand examines the mysterious sacred land that has become the site of the longest-running national struggle of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries.

The Invention of the Land of Israel deconstructs the age-old legends surrounding the Holy Land and the prejudices that continue to suffocate it. Sand’s account dissects the concept of “historical right” and tracks the creation of the modern concept of the “Land of Israel” by nineteenth-century Evangelical Protestants and Jewish Zionists. This invention, he argues, not only facilitated the colonization of the Middle East and the establishment of the State of Israel; it is also threatening the existence of the Jewish state today.

About this title

About the Author

Shlomo Sand studied history at the University of Tel Aviv and at the École des hautes études en sciences sociales, in Paris. He currently teaches contemporary history at the University of Tel Aviv. His books include The Invention of the Jewish People, On the Nation and the Jewish People, L’Illusion du politique: Georges Sorel et le débat intellectuel 1900, Georges Sorel en son temps, Le XXe siècle à l’écran and Les Mots et la terre: les intellectuels en Israël.

Geremy Forman teaches in the Department for Land of Israel Studies at the University of Haifa. He has most recently contributed to the collection Reapproaching Borders: New Perspectives on the Study of Israel–Palestine.

Reviews

Sand is an Israeli academic with a talent for outraging holders of mainstream Jewish opinions both within and outside of Israel while providing fodder for anti-Zionists. In his previous work, The Invention of the Jewish People (2010), he described the Jewish people as an artificial construct grafted upon disparate groups adhering to a religious confession. Here he builds on that premise, asserting that centuries-long Jewish attachment to “Eretz Israel” is a myth perpetrated by Zionists and Christian fundamentalists beginning in the late nineteenth century. Although Sand has some useful things to say about the fostering of a national identity, this is basically a one-sided polemic utilizing intellectually sloppy arguments. If one follows his criteria for “peoplehood,” one could exclude Arabs, Kurds, and many other groups. In “demolishing” opposing arguments, he takes statements by extremists and presents them as standard views. Sand’s real agenda seems to be to change current Israeli policy towards Palestinians. That may be a worthy goal, but it deserves a better advocate than Sand. --Jay Freeman

Edition details

• Publisher: Verso
• Publication date: 2012
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1844679462
• ISBN 13: 9781844679461
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 304