The One-State Condition: Occupation and Democracy in Israel/Palestine

Azoulay (The Civil Contract of Photography), a scholar of photography and society, and Ophir (The Order of Evils: Toward an Ontology of Morals), a professor of philosophy and political theory at Tel Aviv University, assert that the Israeli Occupation (of the West Bank and security control of the Gaza Strip) is an integral and seemingly permanent part of "the fundamental matrix in which Israel's various branches of government function." According to the authors, the occupying authorities regularly violate the rule of law and use "withheld violence," via segregation, constraining personal movement, denial of basic political rights, and home demolitions. The book's tone is dry and almost exclusively conceptual, with few anecdotes or data, and offers few details about the many ways in which Palestinians encounter, negotiate, and defy the occupation. The authors do state that "Since [Israel's founding], its idea of peace has been a slave to "%E2%80%98security' logic". While Israel has faced threats, the authors make a point that Israel's granting citizenship to the Palestinians it rules would "enable the state to free itself of the logic of ethnic nationalism." (Nov.)