Ghosts of a Holy War: The 1929 Massacre in Palestine That Ignited the Arab-Israeli Conflict

by Yardena Schwartz, Yossi Klein Halevi (foreword)

An award-winning journalist presents an even-handed, thoroughly researched examination of the Arab-Israeli conflict, and illustrates how a shocking yet little-known massacre one century ago in what was then Palestine became ground zero of a war that continues to devastate.

In 1929, in the sacred city of Hebron—then governed by the British Mandate of Palestine—there was no occupation, state of Israel, or settlers. Jews and Muslims lived peacefully near the burial place of Abraham, patriarch of the Jewish and Arab nations, until one Saturday morning when nearly 70 Jewish men, women, and children were slaughtered by their Arab neighbors. The Hebron massacre was a seminal event in the Arab-Israeli conflict, key to understanding its complexities. The echoes of 1929 in Hamas’s massacre of October 7, 2023, illustrate how little has changed—and how much of our perspective must change if peace is ever to come to this tortured land and its people, who are destined to share it. Noted journalist Yardena Schwartz draws on her extensive research and wide-ranging interviews with both sides to tell a timely, eye-opening story. She expertly weaves the war between Israel and Hamas into a historical framework, demonstrating how the conflict today cannot be understood without the context of ground zero of this century-old war, which began long before the occupation, the settlements, or the state of Israel ever existed.

 

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Israel, Middle East, Jewish, Politics, Audiobook

415 pages, Kindle Edition

Published October 1, 2024

About the author

Yardena Schwartz is an award-winning journalist, Emmy-nominated producer, and author of Ghosts of a Holy War: The 1929 Massacre in Palestine that Ignited the Arab-Israeli Conflict. From 2013 to 2023 Yardena was based in Israel, where she reported for dozens of publications, including the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Time, Economist, New York Review of Books, and Foreign Policy. She has also reported from Morocco, Nepal, Ukraine, Poland, France, Germany, and the United States.​

Yardena previously worked at NBC News, including stints at The Today Show, Nightly News, and MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Reports. She graduated with honors from Columbia Journalism School in 2011, earned an Emmy nomination in 2013, and the Religion News Association award for excellence in magazine reporting in 2016. ​

Ghosts of a Holy War is Yardena's first book.

Reviews

[adeline Bronner · Rating 5 out of 5]

The book began as many historical essays began and deployed the long and complex road of memories, facts, intimate close ups and larger view of a long period.
The end is heartbreaking. I was unable to read the words of the massacre committed that awful October 7, I can’t read nor see, nor hear, but the images are there , the violence known, the laughs and hatred recognised.
The author as any good historian is walking us from
1929 to our contemporary time with intelligence and precision. She is able to acknowledge the wrongs done, the awful political agendas followed.
But there is one thing there, one dreadful warning that the ideology, lies, falsification at large in Islamic states about Israel long past and connection to Judee/Palestine, is now spreading in the western world by students and teachers whose antisemitism is not even barely contained now.
We have to keep History and facts alive to stop the nonsense and we need to remember that there is no hope where there is no freedom for children and women to exist and thrive.

[Sarah · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is an excellent choice for anyone looking to understand the intricacies of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Compelling and accessible, it stands out among educational texts on the subject. Unlike dense, academic textbooks, Ghosts of a Holy War is easy to digest, while offering a balanced and fair perspective. I especially appreciated Schwartz’s incorporation of personal stories from key figures involved in the 1929 Hebron massacre to bring depth and more human context to these historical events, making complexities feel relatable, and grounding the reader in the human side of the conflict. By mixing narrative, history, journalism and insight, Schwartz makes Ghosts of a Holy War an essential and approachable read for anyone seeking to understand the roots of the complex, heartbreaking conflict we see today.

[Daniel Krolik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Astonishing. Devastating. Unbearably truthful. Schwartz manages to hold all the truths up at the same time - the ghosts of the past, the dangers of extremism, the gaslighting of the Jewish people, the incompetence of the current Israeli government. She makes it all make sense. Sadly, the people who most need to read this probably never will.

[Jess · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wish all my non-Jewish friends and colleagues would sit down and read this book.

This book clearly frames and connects the past with the present- and explains a lot of things I thought I knew but needed clarified in light of more recent events. I found myself saying “wow” to myself a lot while reading this book as it illuminated the consistent threads running through every cycle of violence.

Expertly researched and written, this book is one of the most important books to read if you want to understand the dynamics of the Middle East conflict as it continues to play out. It’s a very important read if you plan to open your mouth and talk about Israel in front of anyone and want to avoid sounding like an idiot.

Note that there are passages that are incredibly descriptive of barbaric violence. Unfortunately, it’s real life. I had to take a few days off of the book and come back to it for that reason. It’s heartbreaking over and over again.

[Hallie S · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was such a well-researched and yet human account of 100 years of the Israel/Palestine conflict. What I liked most about it was that it didn’t shy away from injustices on both sides, but managed to avoid whataboutism. It was painful to read at many times, especially the Oct 7 stories while still so raw in our collective memory, and with new events even since the very recent writing and publication of this book, as the current war remains ongoing. But that is all the more reason why this book is so important, now more than ever.

[Grace Walker]

Don’t normally write reviews but this was one of the most eye opening, impactful and well-researched books I’ve ever read

[MJ Brodie · Rating 5 out of 5]

A thoroughly researched, moving account of the echoes of history that are present in recent events. I was not aware of the historical precedents for the events of October 7th but this book was very enlightening and gave me a new insight into the experiences of Jewish people living in the Middle East before the founding of the state of Israel. The book also delves into current politics in Israel and the failures of the current right-wing administration there. Schwartz's account of both historical and contemporary attacks on Jewish people in the region are horrifying to read. At the same time, she does not use these attacks for justification of crimes against civilians on the other side of the divide but instead writes with compassion about suffering on both sides. As someone who had not previously read a lot about this perspective on the conflict, this book was informative and a helpful counterbalance to the dominant narrative in the usual sources that I have read up to now. I feel better informed as a result of having read this book, which provides detailed sources and eye witness accounts for the events Schwartz writes about.

[Gail Packer · Rating 5 out of 5]

A most captivating and riveting piece of Middle East history, between Israel & Palestine. The author, Yardena Schwartz, has written a masterpiece based on her incredible research. She has made connections, starting from 1929 and continuing to 2024, that have a disturbing resonance, so many (too many) parallels. This reader is left desperately wondering what will it take pro-actively to make peace for co-existence, to gain understanding about the complexities of different perspectives with a focus on humanity and that all sides are comprised of human beings. My mantra: more Mediators NOT more Missiles. I want very much to embrace the author’s message of hope.

[William Thompson · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a phenomenal history of the Arab Israeli conflict. Schwartz examines the Hebron massacre of 1929 and identifies the ways in which the antisemitism of Palestinian Arab culture set the parameters of the conflict that has been going on for nearly 100 years. The parallels between the Hebron massacre and the Oct. 7 massacre are startling. The chapter that tells some of the stories of the victims of October 7 was the most powerful chapter of the book and the most difficult to read. I found multiple sections of the book quote worthy and insightful. I can't recommend this book enough to anyone who cares about this understanding the conflict and how we got to this point.

[Yael · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a masterpiece. Every person interested in the Israeli/Palestinian conflict should read this.

[Wendy Schwartz · Rating 5 out of 5]

THE book to read to understand the Arab-Israeli conflict

I consider myself to be very knowledgeable & well informed when it comes to Israel & the Palestinians. I am a strong believer in compromise & have always been hopeful that a two-state solution can be achieved. From this book I learned things that I never knew about the major players in the conflict. It is very fair in presenting both sides of the issues. From the first pages & throughout, it is a gripping story. When reading it I found myself amazed wondering how much research the author must have done in writing this book. In looking into it I learned that she spent 5 years researching & writing it. For anyone who is curious to learn new things about the origins & history of the situation in Israel & the Palestinian territories this is a MUST READ

[A · Rating 5 out of 5]

One the best books i have ever read about the Middle East (I have read a lot of them). The author approaches it with an even handedness and brings receipts. Should be mandatory reading for everyone.

[Erika Dreifus · Rating 5 out of 5]

Extremely informative, taking the story of Hebron (and the larger conflict) up to the present time.

[Christopher J.A. · Rating 5 out of 5]

People really, really, really hate Jews and have done for millennia

Book review of Yardena Schwartz's "Ghosts of a Holy War" about the Arab massacre of Jews in Hebron in 1929.
Christopher Messina
Christopher Messina, Enlightentaining Host of Messy Times
https://messytimes.show

Feb 16, 2025
Sometimes a book calls to me from the library shelves. Ghosts of a Holy War is one of those books.


On the morning of August 24, 1929, 3,000 Muslim men armed with swords, axes, and daggers marched through the Jewish Quarter of Hebron. They went from house to house, raping, stabbing, torturing and some cases castrating and burning alive their unarmed Jewish victims. The rioters who broke into Jewish homes did not distinguish between men, women or children. Infants were slaughtered in their mothers’ arms. Children watched as their parents were butchered by their neighbors. Women and teenage girls were raped. Elderly rabbis and yeshiva students were mutilated.

Sixty-seven Jewish men, women and children were murdered, and dozens more were wounded. Many of the victims knew their assailants by name. Until that day, the rioters had been their neighbors, landlords, friends.

Those who survived were forced to leave Hebron, exiling one of the world’s most ancient Jewish communities. For centuries, Muslims and Jews had lived harmoniously in Hebron. This was when that harmony ended, and the reality we know today began.1

A riveting, detailed and deeply disturbing 150 pages describing the background and lead up to this massacre follow.

Just as we are watching today, calculating Arab leaders lied to their people about what the Jews are “really” up to, including quoting the ridiculous Protocols of the Elders of Zion, back in 1929 a fresh-off-the-Czarist presses fraud.

And just as today, the leaders of Western Civilization excused the savage Arab murderers and blamed the Jewish victims for somehow which is never explained - because it cannot be - bringing it on themselves.

In March 1930, the Shaw Commission issued its conclusions. The commission’s report delivered a crushing blow to Palestine’s Jewish population. While it described the riots as “from the beginning an attack by Arabs on Jews,” in which “a general massacre of the Jewish community at Hebron was narrowly averted,” the Shaw Commission placed much of the blame on the Jewish community.2

So… thousands of Muslims, whipped into violence by scumbag evil imams, attack and murder unarmed Jews. The “international community” - now such sleazy corrupt cesspools as the United Nations, in 1930 the British Imperial Government - blames the Jews for being attacked because the Jews “must have” caused this horrendous violence to be brought down on their heads.

Sound familiar?

The evil Muslim leader who deliberately whipped his followers into a killing frenzy, Haj Amin al-Husseini was cleared of all culpability for the massacre which he caused.

Yet the report warned, in language that could have been written today: “To the Arab and Moslem leaders there falls a duty which is unmistakably clear: They should make it known to all their followers and to all their co-religionists that, both collectively and as individuals, they are opposed to disorder and to violence… without cooperation in a spirit of mutual tolerance, there is little hope that the aspirations of either people can be realized.”

By the time the Shaw Commission wrapped up, 700 Arabs had stood trial for the massacre. Fifty-five were convicted of murder and 25 were sentenced to death.

Under pressure from Arab leaders, High Commissioner Chancellor commuted all but three of those sentences to light prison terms. Sheikh Taleb Marka, who was tried on charges of incitement to murder, received a two-year prison sentence. He served one month. Atta Al-Zeer, Mohammed Jamjoum, and Fuad Hijazi were sentenced to hang.

There you have it. Kill Jews and it’s a more than 95% chance that the Western authorities will not give a mosquito’s fart in a hurricane. You may face a trial in their very soft courts, which will be an inconvenience, but more than likely, you’ll walk free with a smirk on your face.

For the three sentenced to hang, even then the world put pressure on the British to commute their sentences. In an echo of wishful thinking among Western Useful Idiots, prominent Jews deluded themselves into believing that being merciful to those who want to kill us would be a good idea.

Albert Einstein, a self-described Zionist who had helped establish Hebrew University, wrote a letter to the high commissioner urging him to pardon the men, to “help achieve the peace between Jews and Arabs that we strive for.”

One hundred years later, we still hear the same voices who refuse to understand that the “we” who are striving for peace is largely one-sided. The prerequisite to solving any problem is to first accept objective reality. Those who fail to accept reality as it is are always fixing the wrong problem - one which exists in their fantasies, bearing no relation to facts on the ground.

17 June 1930 is a day that divides those who pay attention to it. For moral people interested in justice, at least three of the savage Jew Hating bastards who massacred Jews in Hebron were held accountable at the end of a rope. The three convicts were hanged at Acre Prison, an Ottoman-era citadel build on the ruins of a 12th century fortress built by the Crusaders.

Fakestinians to this day celebrate that small slice of justice as Red Tuesday, which they and other propagandizing apologists refer to as Martyr’s Day. Much like the evil events of 7 October 2023, sociopathic Islamists hacked unarmed people to death and when the murderers and rapists are held to account, they are hailed as “martyrs.”

How the moral world chooses to deal with people whose minds and outlook are so deranged is the sole issue at stake here. It’s why the Jordanians and Egyptians don’t like Trump’s idea of resettling the Gazan Fakestinians in their countries - they’ve had quite enough of insane Islamist fanatics, thank you very much.

I write this because it is important to tell the truth. It is important to let no lie go unchallenged. I doubt very much the logic and glittering brilliance of my words is going to change one Jew Hater’s tiny mind. Why would it?

Part of me would love to bathe in the faith in Education and Reason that so many Jews believe is The Answer. This belief that “if only people understood history and logic, the Fakestinians and everyone else would realize how wrong they are to hate Jews” is a byproduct of a culture which values education above all else.

Sadly, Jew Hatred has nothing to do with education. Granted, most Jew Haters are mouth-breathing moronic failures at life who have been told someone else is to blame for their loserdom, but there are plenty of Jew Haters who are erudite in myriad ways, who cling to their hatred of Jews as a core religious belief.

Schwartz write another highly informative 200 pages, which I suggest you dive into on your own time.


Aurthor Yardena Schwartz
The Hebron Massacre galvanized and strengthened the Zionist cause, prompted Perfidious Albion to come down hard against the Jewish enterprise in the British Mandate and generally set the framework for conflict.

We are living with the aftershocks of that day. The fighting will continue until one side wins. That is the very definition of war - when people cannot find any other way to settle a dispute.

Am Israel Chai.


Subscribed

Share

1
Schwartz, Yardena, Ghosts of a Holy War, Union Square & Co., 2024, page 3

2
page 158

[Erin McKinney-Prupis · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was fantastic. It tells the story of a man from Tennessee who moves to the thriving Jewish and Muslim city of Hebron during the late 1920s. In detail she describes the 1929 Massacre, including the backstories to many of the victims, heroes and political figures of the time and connects it to the current political situation in Israel and how deeply similar it is to October 7th. The author did a phenomenal job at intertwining personal narratives with Israeli history. The research and depth of the conflict was fantastic and I learned a lot. She describes the history from multiple perspectives and spent quite some time in Hebron with Palestinians and Jews. Just a trigger warning about the chapter on October 7th. Many first hand accounts are provided and it was very difficult to read....important...but still very triggering.

[David · Rating 5 out of 5]

Insightful and heart-breaking…revealing the source of the Israeli/Islamic-radical battle of wills. As a Christian who visited Israel in the 1990’s I developed friends who showed me both the historical religious sites as well as a few behind the scenes trips into restricted areas. Even 30+ years ago I understood the seemingly intractable dilemma. This book should clarify to anyone curious enough to ask “why is this still going on?”

To Yardena I say “todah” and well done.

Shalom.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

If you are looking for a balanced, comprehensive, fact-based account of the Israel-Palestine conflict, look no further. Yardena Schwartz has done an incredible job of bringing together all parts of the conflict and its layered history to show that extremism is detrimental to peace, no matter where it comes from. If you care at all about the region, please read this book.

[Jonathan · Rating 5 out of 5]

A riveting account of the Israeli/Palestinan conflict and the rise of the Islamic Faschism that pervades Palestinian society. The similarities to Trumpism are eerie. The forces of evil are alive and well in 2024.

[Gina · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is fantastic. It’s beautifully written, incredibly informative, and a great book for understanding the Israel/Palestine conflict. It’s highly readable and even-handed. I recommend this to everyone.

[Erik Folkerts · Rating 5 out of 5]

My top book of 2024. Yardena Schwartz shines as a story teller and Journalist piecing together the life and legacy of a young Jewish scholar and the conflict always on our minds these days. I wish I could get every one of the young “activists” protesting the Jewish state to sit down and read this.

[Forrest · Rating 5 out of 5]

Critical reading. One of the most important books on Arab Israeli conflict in years.

[Mara Har · Rating 5 out of 5]

Anyone who wants to learn about the Middle East should read this book. Amazingly fair and informative, everyone should read this book to learn about Israel's history and Palestinian nationalism.

[Elior Doani · Rating 5 out of 5]

Such an incredibly well researched and well written book - this is a MUST read for everyone from every religion, race, community and every end of the political spectrum. Simply a *brilliant* book.

[Chanie · Rating 5 out of 5]

Painful. Powerful. The cyclical nature of this conflict on clear display.

[Ebookwormy1 · Rating 2 out of 5]

Everything changed for Israel on October 7, 2023. In those horrible hours of civilian massacre, torture, kidnapping, and violence, the two-state solution evaporated in the Middle Eastern sun.

After unique designation of United Nations for Palestinian refugees (treating them like no other conflict refugees in the world) through UNRWA,
after Oslo and Oslo II,
after Camp David,
after Intifada first and second,
after the Gaza disengagement,
after prisoner exchanges of kidnapped Israeli civilians and soldiers, for incarcerated Palestinian terrorists,
after Israeli homes are built with safe rooms/ bomb shelters to protect from Palestinian rockets,
after Hamas defeats Fetah and the PLO,
after disputes over the development of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital,
after Israeli counterterrorism operations in the West Bank,
after the Abraham Accords are initiated between Israel and some Muslim countries,
after worldwide funding of billions, and
after restricting Israeli settlement in Judea and Samaria which form the heart of the country…

October 7, 2023 made it clear that Gaza was not going to become the Singapore of the Eastern Mediterranean, because the Palestinians – or at least their leadership – were not interested in a peaceful two-state solution; they were seeking a mono-state solution through annihilation of the Jewish population from the (Jordan) River to the (Mediterranean) Sea.

This is the context in which Ms. Schwartz finished her book, Ghosts of a Holy War: The 1929 Massacre in Palestine that Ignited the Arab-Israeli Conflict. October 7, 2023 changed the Israeli people, her book, and Ms. Schwartz herself. Overall, I found the book to be helpful, but somewhat disappointing.

The historical background on Hebron, including the David Shainberg, was well researched. The investigative timeline, presenting history alongside interviews with generations affected by the 1929 Massacre was particularly effective at illuminating primary source material. I particularly appreciated the discovery of and reporting on heroic actions by both Jews and Muslims in the midst of the Hebron Massacre of 1929 to preserve life, and the outcomes their families experienced as a result of their intervention (many of which were not positive).

Insightful background on the Al-Aqsa as a focal point to rally Muslim jihadism, the role of Haj Amin-al Husseini as well as his projection of leadership through Yassar Arafat were powerfully articulated. I also found Schwartz’s examination of the vicissitude of English policy throughout the British Mandate to be well accounted, though the original partition plan (Jordan for the Arabs, Israel for the Jews, similar to the Indo-Pakistani plan but with the Arabs given the larger land mass) was somewhat minimized. Alternating chapters between personal interviews and documentation of the context was effective in illuminating how national (and international) policy impacted everyday life – and death—in the land of the Levant.

But the reading suffered from a few flaws. First, the subtitle indicates that Ms. Schwartz is going to present the 1929 Hebron Massacre as the beginning of the Arab-Israeli conflict, which is incorrect by over a millennia. The Arab-Israeli conflict began as the Muslim-Jewish or Muslim-Christian + Jewish conflict in the seventh century when Mohammed labeled Jews (and Christians) “People of the Book”, who had the choice to convert to Islam, live as dhimmis/ slaves, or die (unlike polytheists, who were to be killed outright), which was a teaching of Islam’s initial conquest to the present day. This concept also explains why the United States (as a nation with Christian heritage/ identity) is contemporarily labeled the Great Satan, and Israel (as a nation with Jewish heritage/ identity) is labeled the Little Satan, by those engaged in jihad because these two People of the Book have refused Islam’s offer of the three paths, and instead determined to fight to maintain their autonomy, making these two peoples (Christians & Jews) impediments to the expansion of Islam across the earth.

For historic documentation, see the following article and book of military history by scholar, Raymond Ibrahim:
The Historical Reality of the Muslim Conquests, Raymond Ibrahim, www.raymondibrahim.com, Mar 1, 2012.
https://www.raymondibrahim.com/3/1/20...

The Sword & The Scimitar: Fourteen Centuries of War between Islam and the West, Raymond Ibrahim, 2018
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

For a recent example of this principle in action, as recorded in the secular press, see:
https://www.reuters.com/article/world...

It would be fine if Ms. Schwartz were to limit her study to the twentieth-century, but her silence on the conflict between Islam and the West, whose Judeo-Christian heritage has been Islam’s greatest opponent, makes her appear ignorant. (To be clear, I’m not saying she IS ignorant, only that she appears so, which could have been corrected by effective editing).

Secondly, the Shainberg story seemed pieced together in a way that denied it emotional impact. Even though I was interested in Shainberg’s experiences, and Schwartz provided the factual background of his life, the journalistic style lacked the power of biographical narrative. Rather than present her investigative process, this section of the book would have been aided through a narrative of Shainberg’s perspective that was then enhanced by the interviews of others – essentially making Shainberg the through line of the story.

Third, Ms. Schwartz’s profoundly painful – and accurate—account of the October 7th massacre culminates in the decision of a surviving Jewish family to abort their unborn baby in response to the horrendous massacre of their community at Kibbutz Be’eri (Chapter 28, The Al-Aqsa Flood). (Lord have mercy! For they do not know what they are doing!) That a Jewish family would participate in violence against their own Jewish child, denying their own flesh and blood offspring life, is essentially a sacrifice to the demonic spirits that seek Jewish annihilation. Yet Ms. Schwartz presents this as reasonable, and even possibly commendable. This response of violence against a Jewish child is completely antithetical to the numerous appeals I’ve seen for survivors to build parks, give gifts to students, start ministries to trauma survivors, and create memorials to their loved ones full of light, love, and healing.

Finally, Ms. Schwartz hasn’t been able to integrate her own leftism with the events of the October 7th—a challenging task to complete in the short turnaround. Her perspective has begun to shift, but it is clouded by constant disdain for the conservative right in Israeli politics, particularly Israel’s longest serving Prime Minister, Benyamin Netanyahu. Netanyahu is a flawed man to be sure, but Ms. Schwartz’s condemnation of him reads like Trump Derangement Syndrome. Although she recognizes that Israel was weakened by the political conflict brought about by Netanyahu’s attempts to bring checks and balances into Israeli governance, she incoherently blames Palestinian opportunism to kill, rape, and murder, entirely on Netanyahu, and is neither able to articulate reasoned objection to Netanyuhu’s policies nor articulate any other threats beside him. Every adjective and adverb chosen when referencing the current Prime Minister is a weapon for attack. Furthermore, she has consumed the propaganda regarding ongoing negotiations for the hostages, and has no sympathy of the weight of governance shouldered by the mere mortals involved, who are fighting for the survival of the only Jewish nation, which is surrounded by enemies, while seeking to free the captives and minimize civilian casualties – both of whom are being used as human shields. The reverse is also unfortunately true. Ms. Schwartz’s beatific adjectives and radiantly sprinkled adverbs describing American President Biden and his administration were extravagant to the point of hilarity (see Chapter 29, Hostage Nation), especially given Biden’s clear cognitive challenges that prevented him from completing his run for a second term. One can only imagine what would be said about Trump if her publication had been delayed, but there is nothing to indicate capability of integrating anyone not of a progressive globalist mindset.

In conclusion, Ms. Schwartz has done solid research on this issue and presented it in a journalistic style with an investigative through line. However, she is picking up the issue mid-stream and later chapters suffer from a leftist worldview that is unable to integrate the tragic events of the contemporary conflict. I will keep this title for reference on my shelf for a bit, though I do not think it will remain permanently; if someone were to request ONE title on this issue, I do not think Ghosts of a Holy War would be my recommendation.

[Howard Jaeckel · Rating 5 out of 5]

On October 7, 2023, the world witnessed a day of Jewish slaughter unsurpassed since the Holocaust. Hamas terrorists in Gaza crossed the border to invade Israeli communities and went on a murder spree.

But”murder” is an inadequate description of what the terrorists did. They beheaded babies. They burned families alive. They raped. They tortured. They killed children in front of parents and parents in front of children. They sent videos of the agonies suffered by their victims to the victims’ families by the victims’ cell phones. They gloried in their sadism, sending videos of their exploits all over the world.

Besides the Nazi period, had humanity ever seen its like? It had, though few outside Israel now remembered.

Some 85 years earlier, in Hebron — site of the Tomb of the Patriarchs and Matriarchs, holy to both Jews and Muslims — Muslims had slaughtered 67 of their Jewish neighbors, religiously orthodox and non-Zionist, in ways equal in their appalling sadism to those of October 7. The toll would have been much worse but for courageous Arabs who, at great risk to themselves, saved hundreds of Jews.

“Ghosts of a Holy War,” by American journalist Yardena Schwartz, recounts the story of the 1929 Hebron Massacre, an event which the author views as an essential trigger of the Israeli-Arab conflict. It is a riveting read.

Schwartz's own skills as a storyteller are enhanced by a Tennessee family whose members are no strangers to the Hebron story. Their great uncle, David Shainberg, had been a spiritually-inclined young man who wanted to pursue religious studies in the ancient city that was Judaism's birthplace. In order to attend a Hebron yeshiva, he had arrived in the city about a year before the massacre. Schwartz uses his letters to his family, and interviews with survivors she was able to find, to create a vivid portrait of the ancient city and the young American who went there to study. He and his yeshiva friends are likable people, religious but in no way fanatical. Learning that David was murdered in the riots shocks the reader and makes the tragedy more concrete.

To understand the ongoing effects of the massacre, Schwartz travelled extensively in Gaza and the West Bank with her translators, speaking with many Palestinians. Her recounting of those conversations is striking and significant.

Virtually every Palestinian with whom she spoke, even those few wanting a peaceful settlement with the Jews, fully believes and accepts Islamist propaganda. No Jews lived in Palestine before arrival of the settler-colonialists who were intent on stealing Arab land. A Jewish Temple on the Harem al-Sharif (Temple Mount) is a Zionist myth, archeological evidence notwithstanding. The 1929 riots began when Muslims walking through the area near Al-Aqsa mosque after prayers were attacked by Jews. Contrary accounts in contemporaneous news reports only reflect Jewish control of the media.

Those “facts,” along with virulently anti-Semitic passages from the Quran, are hammered into the heads of Arab Muslim children from their youngest days. UNRWA, the United Nations agency established for the sole purpose of aiding Palestinian refugees, teaches these incendiary myths as part of its elementary school curriculum in the schools it runs. With this kind of indoctrination of the young, how can peace ever be possible?

Schwartz lived in and reported from Israel for ten years, has an Israeli husband and is Jewish. Her sympathies are clearly with Israel. But her book does not neglect the role of Jewish extremists in exacerbating the conflict. The story of Jewish terrorist Baruch Goldstein, who murdered 29 Muslims praying in the Tomb of the Patriarch, is given full play, along with the shocking veneration of Goldstein by some of the Jewish residents of Hebron. (Itamar Ben-Gvir, who was a minister in the Israeli coalition government until his recent resignation in protest of the ceasefire agreement, used to have a picture of Goldstein hanging on his wall.) Schwartz also details the ways in which some Jews living in the Hebron area harass their Arab neighbors and the difficulties that Israeli security restrictions entail for West Bank Palestinians, however peaceful they may be. Of course, those security restrictions are the result of acts of terror by Arabs, and Jews who mistreat Muslims are condemned by the overwhelming majority of Israelis and prosecuted criminally where appropriate.

As it concerns the Arab-Israeli conflict, the book can generally be characterized as evenhanded. Indeed, if there is any unfairness in “Ghosts of a Holy War,” its object is Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, whom the author appears to blame for the plight of the hostages and whom she accuses of being interested primarily in his own political survival. She also says the government he leads is the “most incompetent” in Israel’s history.

Although these statements would almost certainly be deemed legally non-actionable expressions of opinion in the United States, from a broader perspective they are nothing less than defamatory. In the judgment of this reviewer, an American friend of Israel, the Prime Minister’s handling of the war has been outstanding, especially in his resistance to pressure from the Biden administration to end the fighting prematurely, thus allowing Hamas to survive and emerge as the victor. The author’s grossly unfair treatment of Netanyahu is unfortunate, since her book on the whole is excellent.

Perhaps the radically different views Ms. Schwartz and I have about Prime Minister Netanyahu stem from the different lessons we learn from the 1929 Massacre and October 7. Ms. Schwartz correctly writes that “[s]o long as Palestinian leaders refuse to accept the right of a Jewish state to exist, and continue their detrimental history of incitement and disinformation, this endless cycle of carnage will continue.” Therefore, she says, “[i]f protesters and world leaders truly wish for peace, their focus should be on ending this century of armed resistance, which has only bred more extremists and more suffering on both sides.”

Well, however much world leaders may "focus," how does Ms. Schwartz imagine this will happen? Her answer, in essence, is that we can always hope.

Hope did not consign Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan to the ash heap of history, and turn two of the most horrific regimes ever known into the productive, friendly and peaceful countries they are today. What did so was the application of overwhelming military force, applied to bring about the total and catastrophic defeat of those evil governments, which was not achieved without massive death and suffering by the populations of those countries.

There is no ‘two-state” solution. Israel will not be so suicidal as to allow a state alongside it that is ultimately sure to be ruled by the heirs to the perpetrators of 1929 and October 7. President Trump’s proposal to turn Gaza into a Mideast Riviera is outlandish, but it has the virtue of moving the United States away from the two-state fantasy that has defined American policy for so long.

It isn’t pleasant to say, but the best hope for a more peaceful future in the Mideast is more war, with the object of totaI Israeli victory. Those who truly wish for peace should get out of Israel’s way.

[Tali · Rating 5 out of 5]

An imperative read full of context, history, personal accounts, and perspective. This is a must read for understanding the intractable Israeli-Palestinian conflict and how history repeats itself to catastrophic ends.

Filled with well-researched and perfectly conveyed historical accounts dating back to the last 1920s, this book sheds light on life for Jews and Arabs in British Mandate Palestine before the creation of the only Jewish state in the world. The book cements the dangers of extremism and the importance of empowering Jewish and Arab peace seeking moderates.

There is a lot of graphic detail of several atrocities, including the horrifying facts of October 7, 2023, but they are not added in gratuitously but rather as truth-telling and fact sharing that is often obscured. With these accounts comes a very healthy and necessary criticism of the current Israeli government and the tenuous political climate following the largest attack on Jewish people since the Holocaust, in a county that promised to protect them.

With many eye-opening, thought-provoking, and informative passages, Schwartz ties a direct thread from a little known about massacre of Jewish people in Hebron in 1929 to the atrocities in 2023 and demonstrates how revisionist history, denial, learned hatred, and political decisions and actions gave birth to the extremists that stoke the fires of war and never ending suffering in Israel, Gaza, and the West Bank.

[Kate Martin · Rating 5 out of 5]

A must-read.

[Alan Pickering · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well written and engaging

Ms Schwartz is to be commended for this very readable and well researched book which gives a useful introduction to anyone seeking to understand the historical background to the conflict in the Middle East. Sadly in gives no reason to be optimistic. Ms Schwartz is balanced in her criticisms of the players and goes to some lengths to stress that within this nightmare there are individuals seeking to do the right thing; but between religious zealots (on both sides) whose ‘certainty’ is confirmed by generations of conditioning and the larger forces of both local global politics it is hard to see a solution. As the lady says - each atrocity strengthens the position of the hardliners. The section on the 7th October massacre is very impressive and covers ‘truths’ / ‘raw reports ’ seen very early in news cycle but then lost in later reporting. It also neatly parallels the misinformation campaign which HAMAS created in 2023 / 2024 with that undertaken by their predecessors in 1929. Impressive piece of work and well worth reading.

[JL · Rating 5 out of 5]

Intense - so important

There are so many headlines and sound bites out of this part of the world, having the deeper context of this book has been so helpful to my understanding- I wish more people could take the time to dig in a bit deeper.