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PART ISAN REVIEW
Ge rmany fo r centuri es, some but no t all we re secula r; they li ved in a
number of nea rby vil lages and towns, in Al sace and Lo rraine, and in
Si lesia; a few had emi grated
to
the U .S. and even to Ru ss ia. Most were
well-educated ; a number had served in the Ge rman Army during World
W ar One. Th ey were stro ngly identifi ed w ith Ge rmany and th us believed
th at the N azis w o u ld spare th em . H e co rrec ts, amo ng o ther thin gs, the
taken-fo r- granted no ti o n that all teachers in Ge rmany we re sadists and
ty rants, by reca lling those w ho had been in flu enced by th e
Wa ll dervogel,
a
maj o rity of w hom we re " in favo r of o pting o ut of thi s sinful world alto–
ge ther. Bo th Left and Ri ght [of th e
Wa
11
derlliige /J
w ere hosti le to soul–
destroying capitalism , materi alism , the ali enati o n of man. " Laqueur him–
self j o ined this movement in 1933, at the age o f twe lve. In 1938, after he
graduated from the Gymn asium and was no t all owed either
to
work or
study in Ge rmany, o r
to
emi grate to England , he j o ined the
Werklellte
(a
fac ti o n of th e
Wa
11
derlliigel)
in Frankfurt - to prepa re h imsel f for life in
Palestine. Ultimately, he ma naged to leave o n the eve of w hat has come
to be known as
Krista//ll acht.
In the subsequ ent pages, Laq ueur recounts his experi ences - as a uni–
ve rsity student , a kibbutzn ik , an empl oyee in a worksho p - during the
British M andate befo re partiti on, the fo rmati o n of th e J ewish state, and
during the 1948 Arab-I sraeli wa r whi ch fu eled the te nsio ns that fo rm the
bac kdro p of th e current nego ti ati o ns fo r peace. His cool assessment of
daily occurrences, w hi ch he manages to reconstruct vividly wi th the help
o f his own dispatches as J fo reign co rrespondent (beginnin g in 1946), and
hi s tho ro ugh resea rch in archi ves o ught to be consulted by anyo ne in–
volved in the present medi ati o ns. Fo r Laqueur stays away from global as–
sessm ents and theori es of fo reign relati ons. Instead, he p rovides the his–
tory,
including the petty and fa r-reaching q uarrels am o ng the multicul–
tural J ews and the equall y multi cultural Arabs; he exp lains his own early
pro-Arab stance; the gradual pola ri za ti o n under the British M andate; how
the border to Syria, " little mo re than an abstracti o n" in 1938, became
"in
later yea rs . . . a dange ro us, dead ly rea li ty." Al o ngside accounts of the
deteri o rating politi cal climate, we read abo ut the inte ll ec tual ferment of
the Pilegesh circle, w hi ch included members such as Geo rge Lichtheim,
H ans Lewy, Gershom Scholem , and H ans J o nas.
In
1943, Laqu eur writes, "open confli ct betwee n J ews and Arabs had
virtually di sa ppeared " in J eru sa lem . But the ac ti viti es of the Irgun (who
decla red wa r on the British in 1944) and th e Stern gang were disruptive,
and Laqueur " foun d their views re pulsive and dangerous." H e covered
the conference of the chi ef pro tJgonists ofJ ewish-Arab cooperation, "the
guardians of the fl ame o f humani sm , th e mo ral conscience of the com–
muni ty," am o ng them Martin Uuber and J ehudJ Magnes, who advocated
