The mainstream media and political establishment act as if Israel’s war on Gaza began on October 7. In this climate of enforced conformity with a single pro-Israel narrative, any attempt to analyze events in their historical context or to understand the political currents and geopolitics involved is ruled out of bounds. Ironically, political debate in the mainstream press in Israel itself is more wide-ranging and critical than what passes for analysis in most of the U.S. and the European press.
With that in mind, the ISP has collated a list of sources that readers seeking to understand what is happening in Palestine—and why—can consult.
On Israel and Zionism
Lance Selfa, “Zionism: False Messiah”
Ari Bober, ed., The Other Israel: The Radical Case Against Zionism.
Ilan Pappé, The Ethnic Cleansing of Palestine (One World, 2006) and Ten Myths About Israel (Verso, 2017).
The US and Israel
Noam Chomsky, The Fateful Triangle (Haymarket, 2015).
Lance Selfa, “Israel: The US watchdog”
Naseer Aruri, Dishonest Broker: The Role of the United States in Palestine and Israel (South End Press, 2003).
On the Palestinian national movement
Rashid Khalidi, Palestinian Identity (Columbia University Press, 1997)
Samih K. Farsoun with Christina E. Zacharia, Palestine and the Palestinians (Westview Press, 1997)
Mostafa Omar, “The Palestinian national liberation movement: A socialist analysis” in Selfa, ed., The Struggle for Palestine (Haymarket, 2002). Reprinted in Sumaya Awad and Brian Bean, eds., Palestine: A Socialist Introduction (Haymarket, 2020).
Israeli-Arab/Palestinian Conflict (a compendium of articles and documents on the conflict from left organizations and publications going back to the 1920s).
On Hamas and Islamism
Jean-Pierre Filiu, “The origins of Hamas: Militant legacy or Israeli tool?” in Journal of Palestine Studies (Spring 2012).
Gilbert Achcar, Marxism, Orientalism, Cosmopolitanism (Haymarket Books, 2013).
News and analysis sources on the current conflict
Institute for Palestine Studies
Georgetown University’s Center for Contemporary Arab Studies and MENA Forum series.
Lance Selfa
Lance Selfa is the author of The Democrats: A Critical History (Haymarket, 2012) and editor of U.S. Politics in an Age of Uncertainty: Essays on a New Reality (Haymarket, 2017).
