Midstream

Israel fought six wars with the Arabs. Militarily speaking, it won all of them. It was these victories that caused the late President Sadat of Egypt to initiate his peace initiative, which eventually resulted in the Egyptian-Israeli peace treaty. ...

Almost two months since the outbreak of violence began following the visit of Ariel Sharon on the Temple Mount before the beginning of the Jewish New Year, there appears to be no end in sight. Rock-throwing, makeshift incendiary bombs, massive exchanges...

Zionism conforms to only a few of the usual canons of nationalism. Most nationalism is bred in ancient soil. Zionism was pioneered in Europe, and Jewish nation building in Palestine commenced on behalf of a largely future citizenry, most of whom had...

The name "Palestine" has retained its hidden symbolic significance for two thousand years ever since the Roman Empire destroyed the ancient Jewish kingdom and sold the defeated Jews into slavery. The Romans, wanting to erase the memory of this Jewish...

Russian literature is a peculiar phenomenon, a "belated renaissance," as one writer phrased it. In 1805, Wordsworth finished The Prelude; by 1808, Goethe had already published the first part of Faust. In 1805, Pushkin was six years old; not until 1823...

In 1944, the Jewish Publication Society of America brought Charles Reznikoff's The Lionhearted to print.(1) Reznikoff's tale, suitably subtitled "A Story about the Jews in Medieval England," opens in 1189 and particularizes the Jewish community not...

The New Testament story of the trial of Jesus is a remarkable literary creation. Even beyond the traditional status of the story in the Christian world as inspired Scripture, its wide influence on Western culture has no doubt been due in large part...