Benny Morris - Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist-Arab Conflict, 1881-2001

Acclaim for Benny Morriss

RIGHTEOUS VICTIMS

A masterly account: detailed but always readable, authoritative but strenuously objective. If you want to understand the Arab-Israeli conflict, rather than sound off about it, the book is essential.

Contemporary Review

Crisply written, balanced and comprehensive, this is an indispensable work of history.

Publishers Weekly (starred review)

Remarkably objective. Compelling.

Financial Times (London)

Morris does a wonderful job. [He] describes Jewish-Arab relations evenhandedly and in great detail. Men like him, who can see things from more than one perspective, are sorely needed to prepare the ground for what will hopefully be a peaceful and relatively just settlement of Jewish-Arab problems. Austin Chronicle

Superb. [Morriss] narrative skill and meticulous attention to historical detail as he shifts from one battleground to another make for absorbing reading. National & Financial Post (Toronto)

This comprehensive and balanced work is mandatory reading for anyone interested in the long and bitter history of this conflict.

Booklist

B ENNY M ORRIS

RIGHTEOUS VICTIMS

Benny Morris is Professor of History at Ben-Gurion University, Beersheba, Israel, and is the author of a number of books on Middle Eastern history, including The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 19471949.

A LSO BY B ENNY M ORRIS

The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 19471949

1948 and After; Israel and the Palestinians

Israels Secret Wars: A History of Israels Intelligence Services
(with Ian Black)

The Roots of Appeasement:
The British Weekly Press and Nazi Germany During the 1930s

Israels Border Wars, 19491956:
Arab Infiltration, Israeli Retaliation and the Countdown to the Suez War

FIRST VINTAGE BOOKS EDITION, AUGUST 2001

Copyright 1999, 2001 by Benny Morris

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions.
Published in the United States of America by Vintage Books, a division of Random House,
Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited,
Toronto. Originally published in hardcover in the United States by Alfred A. Knopf, a
division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 1999.

Vintage and colophon are registered trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Grateful acknowledgment is made to the following for permission to reprint
previously published material:
Random House, Inc. and Faber and Faber Ltd.: Excerpt from September 1, 1939, from
W. H. Auden: Collected Poems by W. H. Auden, edited by Edward Mendelson, copyright
1940 by W. H. Auden. Rights in the United Kingdom from The English Auden, edited
by Edward Mendelson, administered by Faber and Faber Ltd., London. Reprinted by
permission of Random House, Inc., and Faber and Faber Ltd.
University of Arkansas Press: Excerpts from Keeping Faith: Memoirs of a President by
Jimmy Carter, copyright 1982, 1995 by Jimmy Carter. Reprinted by permission of the
University of Arkansas Press.

The Library of Congress has cataloged the Knopf edition as follows:
Morris, Benny.
Righteous victims: a history of the Zionist-Arab conflict, 18812001 / by Benny Morris.
p. cm.
I. Arab-Israeli conflict. 2. Jewish-Arab relationsHistory1917-1948. 3. Arab-Israeli
conflict1993Peace. I. Title
DS119.7.M657 1999
956dc2l 98-42774

eISBN: 978-0-307-78805-4

Author photograph Elena Seibert

www.vintagebooks.com

v3.1_r1

For Jeff and Evelyn Abel,
Dubbie and Dvorka Harel,
Mike and Jana Robinson,
Yaron and Nadine Tsur,
With thanks

I and the public know
What all schoolchildren learn,
Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return.

W. H. A UDEN, September 1, 1939

I owe a very large debt to Ben-Gurion University, and principally Prof. Jimmy Weinblatt, the dean of Humanities and Social Sciences, as well as to Prof. Nahum Finger, the rector, for a succession of grants that made possible the shortening and shaping of the text of this work to its present size.

I would like to thank Prof. Naomi Chazan and Prof. Moshe Maoz, the successive directors of the Truman Institute of the Hebrew University, Jerusalem, for grants, a room, and facilities in the course of the 1990s that helped me carry out the research and write this book. I would also like to thank Prof. Gabriel Sheffer and Prof. Amnon Sela, the successive directors of the Davis Institute of the Hebrew University, and Merle Thorpes Foundation for Middle East Peace for grants that enabled me to carry out much of the research for , which deals with Yishuv-Lebanese relations and the Lebanon War of 198285. I also spent an enlightening two weeks in the archives of the French Foreign Ministry, assisted by a grant from the cultural attach of the French Embassy, Tel Avivfor which I thank him.

I owe a debt to Prof. David Ruderman and the board of directors of the Center for Judaic Studies, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, for hosting me for a month in early 1997, in which I managed to put final touches to this work.

I also owe a great debt to the Rockefeller Foundation, which hosted me for a month at its estate in Bellagio, Italy, making possible some additions to the manuscript in incomparably wonderful surroundings.

I also owe an incalculable debt to my friend Jeff Abel, who throughout the years of composition was always helpful and available to solve the succession of computer-linked problems that always proved beyond my ken. Evelyn and David also lent an occasional hand.

I am deeply indebted to Pieter Louppen and the Department of Geography and Environmental Development, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Beersheba, Israel, for producing the books fine maps.

As usual, I am also indebted to the staffs of various archives and libraries in which I did much of my researchthe Israel State Archives and the Central Zionist Archives in Jerusalem; the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) Archive in Givatayim, Israel; the National Library in Jerusalem; the Public Record Office in London; and the National Archives in Washington, D.C. I owe a paramount debt to Ronnie Hope, who gently abridged and edited this workand much of its readability and smoothness is due to his highly competent efforts. Deborah Harris and Beth Elon, my agents, made this book possible and held my hand through the various ups and downs that accompanied its maturation; Susan Ralston was my editor at Knopfand I thank them all from the bottom of my heart.

I would also like to extend heartfelt thanks to my former teacher and current blood brother, Prof. Benjamin Z. Kedar, of the Hebrew University, who read through the hardcover edition of