In his comment about Benny Morris, Shmuel Ben-Gad (Gelman Library,
George Washington University) referred to Efraim Karsh's 1997 book,
"Fabricating Israeli history: the 'new historians'", as having
"challenged the worth of at least some of [the new historians'] work.
Most reviews of Professor Karsh's book have been relatively short, and
not written by those with expertise in the field and experience in
working with the archival sources used by the "new historians" and by
Karsh in criticising them.
But there was an 11 page review in the fall of 1997 by Ian K. Lustick,
then chair of Political Science at the University of Pennsylvania, a
scholar with the requisite expertise and experience. It was published in
"Survival", the journal of the highly respected International Institute
for Strategic Studies in London, and it was entitled, "Israeli history,
who is fabricating what?" There also was a subsequent exchange of letters
between Karsh and Lustick published in the next issue (winter, 1997-98).
Both the review-essay and the letters clearly set out Karsh's own many
errors, misleading comments and underlying purpose in vilifying Benny
Morris and his colleagues. Lustick sums up his view of Karsh's book as
follows:
Errors, inconsistencies and over-interpretation there may
be in some of the the new Israeli histories, but nothing
in them can match the howlers, contradictions and distor-
tions contained in this volume... In fact it is Karsh's
volume, especially given the solem invocation of scholarly
norms it contains, which comes perilously close to falling
within the category of a hoax.
When I read Karsh's book, not having the knowledge to determine whether
his charges were correct or not, I checked several reviews and found that
Karsh was not to be trusted. Such is the dificulty we face as librarians
who have to make choices and select books for our readers. It is no doubt
one of the most difficult and intellectualy challenging tasks we do!
Shabbat shalom,
Bernard Katz, former Head, Special Collections and Library Development
McLaughlin Library, University of Guelph
and founding Treasurer, AJL - Ontario Chapter
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