Customer Rating: 
Summary: Brilliant analysis, illuminating and very well expressed
Comment: I couldn't believe the review posted here previous to mine. I have just purchased this book and I am very glad I did. I think the reviewer who gave it one star is either biased against discussing certainthings, or simply didn't understand the book. It is not the kind of book that preaches at anyone. Nor is it either the kind of book that begins with a message and then sets out to prove it. Instead, it begins with a question and sets out to explore that question.
The writer does this in a very intelligent and literate way, with many illuminating quotations and ideas referenced as she explores the question. It broadens its topic, instead of reducing it to a set of arguments. This is partly why it is so illuminating. The writer herself is Jewish and genuinely concerned for Isreal. She believes that Zionism emerged out of the legitimate desire of a persecued people for a homeland.
The only critism I would have is that the cover could have been better designed but that is not the author's fault.
The author has clearly thought about her subject very deeply and bravely and she deserves better readers than those who will flick through to see if the book conforms to certain shibboleths or not. It is a book that illuminates issues that are pertinent to any individual, so deep is its psycholgical analysis. I was very impressed and will return to it many times.
Customer Rating: 
Summary: Psycobabble
Comment: Rose uses her skills to argue her case. That is certainly true. Her case is that Israel is so evil that its academics should be boycotted. That is so even though they have as much influence on government policy as she does on Blair and Brown.
Underlying such a call is a mind already made up and impervious to contrary argument. To take one example - Zionism did not trample on the rights of Palestinians. Rose says it did. She is wrong. Firstly, the Zionists bought land. That is only a problem if you don't want certain types of people to buy land. It seems to be a problem for Rose. Secondly, the Palesinians did not have any rights. They were the peasant class of a corrupt leadership. Thirdly, whatever discrimination and prejudice there is in Israel (plenty) it is a land in which people are free to come and go. Plenty of Jews have left Arab countries - forced out - and western countries - willingly. But very few Israeli Arabs leave for the life of luxury they could doubtless expect in Syria or Saudi Arabia.
It isn't that all of this escapes Rose. It's that she doesn't want to think it through. Like a number of academics who write books on topics which are outside their specialist area she thinks that because the University pays her salary she must be clever. But to write a good book on this topic you also have to be fearless, challenging of your own fixed opinions, able to change your mind, and reflective. Perhaps that's why it's a bad book.
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