War and Remembrance

their preface, this was precisely their debate on this issue does emerge in purpose in writing the book: “To pro- Israel, then Gavison, Kremnitzer, and vide a basis for public debate on Dotan will deserve a healthy share of the role of the High Court of Justice the credit. in Israeli society.” One can only hope that this excellent book accomplishes Evelyn Gordon is a journalist, and a its goal. And if a genuine public Contributing Editor of Azure. War and Remembrance Eugene L. Rogan the record by obscuring the “crimes” and Avi Shlaim, eds. perpetrated by the Zionists against the The War for Palestine: Palestinian Arabs during fighting that Rewriting the History of 1948 lasted from late 1947 until early 1949. Cambridge, 234 pages. This war, known to Palestinians as “the Catastrophe,” resulted in both the establishment of the State of Israel Reviewed by Yehoshua Porath and the creation of the Palestinian refugee problem, and therefore both ver the past decade, Israel’s self- Israelis and Palestinians see it as the O styled “new historians” and beginning of their respective national their allies around the academic world narratives. have fiercely debated more traditional Most of the research being done by scholars over the nature of Israel’s War the new historians tends to focus pri- of Independence. According to the re- marily on Jewish conduct during the visionists, the classical historical re- war: How did the nascent State of search was little more than propaganda Israel manage to defeat the Arab ar- for the Zionist narrative, distorting mies? Did the Zionists deliberately set summer 5762 / 2002 • 201 out to expel Palestinian Arabs from In building their case, the contribu- their homes? Were they really weaker tors to The War for Palestine draw and outnumbered, an Israeli David to upon the wealth of archival records the Arab Goliath? that have been released in Israel and These questions lie at the heart of other Western countries over the past The War for Palestine: Rewriting the fifteen years. One might hope that History of 1948, edited by two Oxford such a trove of new data would result University scholars, Eugene Rogan and in a more penetrating, nuanced un- Avi Shlaim. The Israeli-born Shlaim derstanding of the war. Most of the is one of the best-known representa- contributors, however, seem to have tives of the revisionist school; his first had a different aim in mind: To dis- book, Collusion Across the Jordan: King credit the standard historiography and Abdullah, the Zionist Movement and establish themselves as the sole keep- the Partition of Palestine (1987), helped ers of historical truth by selectively launch the new history a decade and a highlighting only those new revela- half ago, while his The Iron Wall: Is- tions that advance their own ideologi- rael and the Arab World (2000), cov- cal agenda. As a result, they succeed ering the entire period since Israel’s only in repeating the disservice done founding, has already gained canoni- by some of their predecessors, substi- cal status among the new historians. tuting one set of distortions for an- Rogan is a relative newcomer to Zion- other: If some of the traditional histo- ist history, although he has written rians militated the facts to serve the extensively on the modern Middle Zionist cause, this time around it is East. The new collection of essays— the Palestinian “truth” that is the ben- which includes contributions by eficiary. This book’s most significant prominent scholars such as Benny contribution, unfortunately, is that it Morris, Rashid Khalidi, and Edward exposes its authors’ shoddy research Said—attempts to debunk many of and tendentious analysis. the traditional Zionist “myths” sur- rounding the most fateful of Arab- he War for Palestine opens with Israeli wars by exposing the truth about T an introduction by the editors, Israel’s actions during the conflict—a which asks a sensible question: Why truth which, the authors claim, Isra- has a revisionist historiography arisen el’s political, academic, and educa- in Israel to challenge the prevailing tional establishments have done eve- account of the war, while no similar rything in their power to cover up. school has emerged on the Arab side? 202 • Azure Of course, this question also has a But where there is no free access to sensible answer, which may be found archival data, there can never emerge by looking no further than the list of a revisionist historiography, which institutions and archives that appears is always based on, or at least pur- in the book’s opening pages. The great ports to be based on, new archival majority of the materials researched discoveries. by all historians of the period, both The editors are aware of this imbal- traditional and revisionist, comes from ance, but they dismiss it as irrelevant. archives in the Western countries in- Israel, they argue, can afford to be volved in the affairs of Palestine dur- open, for like all victorious nations, it ing the years from 1947 to 1949, and has had the luxury of dominating the from Israeli archives. The Israeli State historical discourse with its version of Archives, the Archives of the Israel events: “The critical revision of a na- Defense Forces (IDF), and the Zion- tion’s history,” they write, “is a vic- ist Archives are open to all scholars, tor’s privilege.” This is not much of regardless of ideology or affiliation. an answer. Israel made its decisions Researchers can scour the materials about archival access against the back- undisturbed and use whatever they drop of a struggle for national inde- find to support their claims. Anyone pendence that in many respects is still intending to minimize the accomplish- unfinished. Israel opened its archives ments of the Israelis in the 1948 war, not because it was victorious, but be- or even to make outrageously false cause it sought to follow the tradition claims—for instance, that the Israeli of democratic, Western countries in victory was the result of an imperialist allowing free access to information, conspiracy or an overwhelming ad- even information that could be used vantage in manpower and arms—will to harm it in the long run. Shlaim and always be able to find plenty of mar- Rogan, however, give Israel no credit ginal facts in the Israeli archives on for its enlightened approach. which to build his case. Nor do they have any apprecia- By contrast, no Arab state has yet tion for the significant research that opened its archives to researchers was done before the debut of the re- studying these or any other important visionists in the late 1980s. Before historical events after World War I; then, they seem to believe, all writ- in only a few instances have specially ing on Zionist history was tenden- authorized historians been granted tious, every historian falling into line access to official archival material. to help create and propagate the myths summer 5762 / 2002 • 203 underpinning Zionism. Remarkably, legitimacy” than by an honest reck- they see no substantive difference be- oning with the past. tween historical research on the War Anyone familiar with the way things of Independence that was conducted work in Israel cannot but read these in Israel, and that conducted on the words in utter astonishment. In Is- Arab side. Scholars on both sides, they rael, private citizens write the school say, have equally ignored the histori- textbooks, and in most cases they do cal truth because on both sides, the it for private publishing houses. Last academy has subordinated itself to the year, the Ministry of Education found dictates of the state: itself embroiled in a public scandal Governments in the region enjoy after releasing a history textbook which many direct and indirect powers over was skewed toward the Arab side of the writing of history. Elementary and the conflict. In the end, the ministry secondary school texts in history are withdrew the textbook, but only after the preserve of the state. Most univer- an intensive public campaign, a thor- sities in the Middle East are state-run and their faculty members are state ough investigation by a panel of schol- employees. National historical asso- ars representing a wide range of views, ciations and government printing and a change of government. Israeli presses serve as filters to weed out universities are not state institutions, unauthorized histories and to dissemi- nor are their faculty members civil nate state-sanctioned truths. As pro- servants. Anyone with even a passing motion within the historical establishment is closely linked to adherence acquaintance with Israeli academia is to the official line, historians have had familiar with the wide range of politi- little incentive to engage in critical cal opinions existing in the country’s history writing. Instead, most Arab universities—and with the dispropor- and Israeli historians have written in tionate support that the views repre- an uncritically nationalist vein. In sented in The War for Palestine have Israel, nationalist historians reflected the collective memory of the Israeli enjoyed there for some time now. A public in depicting the Palestine War considerable number of revisionist as a desperate fight for survival and historians and “post-Zionist” sociolo- an almost miraculous victory. In the gists, whose criticism touches every Arab world, histories of the Palestine aspect of Israel’s history and society, War have been marked by apologet- currently hold posts at prominent Is- ics, self-justification, onus-shifting, and conspiracy theories. Both the raeli academic institutions. Many have Arab and the Israeli nationalist histo- reached positions of influence and high ries are guided more by a “quest for honor.

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