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Intifada, by Ze'ev Schiff and Ehud Ya'ari
- Abstract
A word to start with concerning the credentials, resources, and politics of the authors of this book.
Ze’ev Schiff for decades has been the military correspondent at Ha’aretz, the Israeli equivalent of the New York Times. He is the paper’s Drew Middleton, who knows everything there is to know about the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), including the thinking and complaints of its general staff, serving and retired. As well as being his own man, Schiff is a creature of his place of employment. The owners and editors set a Left-liberal tone at Ha’aretz. They can often be found, in and out of the pages of the paper, pleading with Deputy Prime Minister Shimon Peres to be a man, censuring Defense Minister Yitzhak Rabin for his callousness, and simply throwing their hands up over Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir. On occasion Schiff does it too.
The junior author, Ehud Ya’ari, has for the last fifteen years been the chief Arabist at Israel TV’s news department. This is an organization the members of which, to hear an Israeli cabbie tell it, always put their dovish, not to say unpatriotic, sentiments above their public and national duties—Israel TV, unlike Ha’aretz, is paid for out of taxes. Let it be noted that the cabbie is wrong. The TV reporters, most of whom indeed are Left-liberal in their hearts, are sufficiently professional and solicitous of their jobs not to let their feelings glare in their work. And this includes Ya’ari, who has contacts in the Shin Bet (Internal Security) and among Palestinians second to none.
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