David’s Reviews > The Passionate Attachment: America's Involvement With Israel, 1947 to the Present > Status Update

Not a fan of Ball's assertion that "Soviet Jew" inexperience with democracy contributed to the rise of Likud in the 90s; put into the context of the neoliberal rise and fall of the Eastern Bloc with its support for Arab nationalism, it makes much more sense that settler-colonialists would feel more comfortable putting aggressive, expansionist parties into power since they had the backing of the only world superpower.

While it is clear that the attitude towards Israel in this book will be far more progressive than the mainstream of American politics, starting with an assertion that Arabic peoples "thoughtlessly" follow military strongmen due to their "inexperience" with liberal democracy seems to me to be a willful ignorance of the impact of imperialism and neocolonialism on the MENA area.