Fortress Israel: The Inside Story of the Military Elite Who Run the Country—and Why They Can’t Make Peace

In this revealing chronicle of Israeli foreign and defense policy, New York Times correspondent Tyler (Running Critical) contends that Israel is dominated by military and intelligence cliques who just won’t give peace a chance. He follows this theme through an exhaustive recap of Israel’s conflicts from the Suez Crisis and the Six-Day War through the interminable struggle against the Palestinians, with its bloody counterpoint between Israeli air strikes, armored incursions, and targeted assassinations, and Palestinian rocket attacks and suicide bombings. At most junctures his intimate narrative of policy making shows a government driven by the “martial impulse[s]” of officer-politicians, like Moshe Dayan and Ariel Sharon, riding roughshod over doves and turning away from negotiations and compromise toward bellicose overreaction. Tyler’s well-researched account illuminates an ugly and troubling dimension of Israeli policy and politics. He ascribes Israeli policy to factional maneuvering and a “sabra”—native-born Israeli—culture of toughness and militarism while underplaying factors like public opinion and the rejectionism of Palestinians and Arab regimes. In assuming that there always is a clear-cut peace program to be pursued, he underestimates the intractability of the Middle East deadlock. Photos. Agent: Peter Bernstein, Peter W. Bernstein Corp. (Sept.)