Barry Shaw | The View from Israel | Oct 30, 2026
There are few moments in history that create the destiny of a nation. For Israel and the Jews, that moment was 1917.
This moment of history touched the imagination and sympathy of the world repairing two millennia of injustice to the Jewish people by restoring them to their ancestral homeland.
By retelling the critical events that took place a hundred years ago we seek to right many of the injustices being practised against Israel today.
This book recalls the spirit of Zionism, a spirit of self-sacrifice and determination that led to the birth of the one liberal democracy in the Middle East.
This book covers the embryonic stage of that struggle. The territory known insultingly as Palestine became a critical crucible of World War One. It swung the tide of war in favor of the Allied forces against the Ottoman Turks and the Germans in the pivotal Middle East.
Without this victory there would be no Israel and there certainly would be no Palestinian state. It would have remained under Ottoman rule. Today it would be a Turkish outpost, part of a Turkish empire.
History, a clash of empires, took place, and a Jewish state emerged out of the ashes.
The battlefields in Ottoman Palestine were the backdrop to the realisation of a two thousand year dream by passionate Jews to establish a national homeland in the land of their forefathers. Jews who developed the land under the suffrage of Ottoman cruelty.
This book draws you back a century into a kaleidoscope of swirling events that changed our world. You will be sucked into the maelstrom of a Middle East in turmoil, feel the passions, share the motives of the heroes and the villains that placed their stamp on current events.
The world is what it is today due to the visions, the victories and the mistakes of the characters you will meet in an epic journey back in time.
Among the remarkable cast of characters are Lawrence of Arabia, General Edmund Allenby, Lord Arthur Balfour, Richard Meinertzhagen, Aaron and Sarah Aaronsohn, Ze’ev Jabotinsky, Chaim Weizmann, Joseph Trumpeldor, Colonel John Patterson, Prince Feisal, Winston Churchill, David Ben-Gurion, and the Three Pashas.
You will read the heroism and the initiatives of Jews who fought and died alongside the British, ANZAC and Indian troops in liberating this land west of the River Jordan.
Significantly, no Arab force volunteered to fight and die to liberate the land west of the River Jordan. The part they now claim as theirs. Only the Jews did that. The Arabs joined to fight against the Turks east of the River Jordan only if they were rewarded by British gold and plunder. Without this incentive the Arabs returned to their tents and villages, and the few Arabs that fought west of that river were conscripted by the Turks.
Too few people know that the British fought two battles in Gaza – and lost both of them.
Read how a Jew countered the advice of the British military and intelligence officers and turned the tide of victory for the British and a return to their ancient homeland for the Jews who fought and died alongside the British against a common enemy.
Available from Amazon in paperback and Kindle.
Israpundit is entirely dependent on readers support. Please help me continue educating people with the truth about what is going on in Israel and around the world.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.