Perceptions of Palestine: Their Influence on U.S. Middle East Policy

by Kathleen Christison

For most of the twentieth century, considered opinion in the United States regarding Palestine has favored the inherent right of Jews to exist in the Holy Land. That Palestinians, as a native population, could claim the same right has been largely ignored. Kathleen Christison's controversial new book shows how the endurance of such assumptions, along with America's singular focus on Israel and general ignorance of the Palestinian point of view, has impeded a resolution to the Arab-Israeli conflict.

Christison begins with the derogatory images of Arabs purveyed by Western travelers to the Middle East in the nineteenth century, including Mark Twain, who wrote that Palestine's inhabitants were "abject beggars by nature, instinct, and education." She demonstrates other elements that have influenced U.S. American religious attitudes toward the Holy Land that legitimize the Jewish presence; sympathy for Jews derived from the Holocaust; a sense of cultural identity wherein Israelis are "like us" and Arabs distant aliens. She makes a forceful case that decades of negative portrayals of Palestinians have distorted U.S. policy, making it virtually impossible to promote resolutions based on equality and reciprocity between Palestinians and Israelis.

Christison also challenges prevalent media images and emphasizes the importance of Two examples are the designation of who is a "terrorist" and the imposition of place names (which can pass judgment on ownership).

Christison's thoughtful book raises a final disturbing If a broader frame of reference on the Palestinian-Israeli conflict had been employed, allowing a less warped public discourse, might not years of warfare have been avoided and steps toward peace achieved much earlier?

Genres: History

379 pages, Paperback

First published July 1, 1999

Reviews

[Soraya Fattahi · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very thorough and meticulous account of middle eastern and U.S. affairs as it relates to Palestine. It offers a timeline of the relationship between the U.S./zionism/Palestine since the beginning of the 19th century and extrapolates on how manipulation of Western opinion has benefited zionism and Israel at the detriment of Arabs.

[Foxglove · Rating 1 out of 5]

Extremely disappointed with the book, it basically whines that Jewish people utilized their political capital, but ignores the powerful lobby groups which pushed back, such as Saudi Arabia, the Catholic church and many Americans. How DARE Jews use their political capital? How dare they organize? It's sickening and racist.

Her book is riddled with errors, lies and distortions. Every time Jews organize, it's bad. She ignores the peaceful liberal Zionist movements, because it doesn't fit her thesis that RICH EVIL JEWS fooled the US into supporting Israel. Jews clearly were plotting evilly together, they weren't traumatized by the genocide of European Jews, they were rich plutocrats who drink the blood of Arab children. She basically uses the term Jew and Zionist interchangeably, which does make me wonder why.


Here's one of my favorites. She denies that the Mufti of Jerusalem was in any way Jew-hating, merely nationalistic. Let's examine him in his own words.
On February 1941, al-Husseini submitted to the Nazi German Government a draft declaration of German-Arab cooperation, containing a clause: Germany and Italy recognize the right of the Arab countries to solve the question of the Jewish elements, which exist in Palestine and in the other Arab countries, as required by the national and ethnic (völkisch) interests of the Arabs, and as the Jewish question was solved in Germany and Italy.=
The Jewish question in German and all areas occupied by the Nazi regime were ethnically cleansed. The Mufti was calling for the same for all Jews, including those outside the Mandate who had nothing to do with Judaism.

Every single problem is Israel's fault. Terrorism during the Intifada, including the murder of Israeli civilians? Israel's fault.
The fact that no Arab country has offered to help repatriate the refugees, the way Israel repatriated Jewish refugees? Israel's fault.
Sharon visiting the Temple Mount, which she admits is holy to Jews? Evil. Because barring Jews from a holy site is so very moral.

I'm happy to continue, and I'm not saying Israel is completely innocent, but this woman openly hates Israel and can't even be trusted to look at the situation with any sort of even handedness. "I have nothing against Jews, but I want the dismantlement of Israel as a Jewish state," is her exact quote. So basically, how can anything she said on Israel be trusted if she comes in seeing it as the villain? She can't speak of Palestinian nationalism in one breath, but then deny the same right to Jews, who have been recognized as an ethnicity? More importantly, her book is more radical than people in Palestine and Israel, who support a two state solution.

http://www.dailytargum.com/news/activ...

Why not listen to the people in the actual region?

In other words, this white savior complex of a writer clearly comes in with an axe to grind, and her work lacks any scholarly merit. For a balanced view, which is still extremely critical of Israeli mistakes, An Uneasy Relationship: American Jewish Leadership and Israel, by Zvi Ganin.

Or read anything by One Voice, an organizations by Israelis and Palestinians who are working together to achieve self determination on their terms.

[Theresa Leone Davidson · Rating 1 out of 5]

Almost any reading one does on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict has to be taken with a grain of salt; there are so few objective people, and once a writer has committed to the topic, their own opinion, not a factual, objective view, is the one they are going to lean towards in their writing. As a result, I have yet to read a book on the subject that was not heavily slanted one way or the other, and Perceptions of Palestine is no different. In many ways, though, the book is worse than others I have read: Christison is not a gifted writer and her words do not flow. And given her biography, it is surprising how limited her vocabulary is, at least in this book. It is, however, the ideas she presents, that the Palestinians have suffered mightily, they continue to suffer, they are innocent victims who only turn to violence when all other options are exhausted, and that, most offensive of all, it is the fault of the United States that peace eludes the people in this area of the world. Christison presents valid, strong arguments for only the first part, which I am pretty sure few people would reject anyway, that the Palestinians have suffered. Of course they have suffered, and for the last thirty years it has been almost exclusively due to their leadership. The Palestinian leadership, not the leadership of the United States. The rest of what she wants the reader to believe is just not supported here, her arguments are weak at best, and of course the only time she brings up the constant assault of Israel over the years, she blames it all on Israel. If they were not so horrible, no Palestinian would ever commit violence. And she ignores all of the olive branches that have been extended to the Palestinians and rejected over the years. Any book that veers this heavily in favor of Israel, and tries to make the reader think Israel can do no wrong, is just as bad. My search for an objective history of the ongoing conflict continues.