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Holy Land: Yesterday and Today, The | |
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by David, R.A. Roberts,Fabio Bourbon,Antonio Attini
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Memoirs Engraved in Stone: Palestinian Urban Mansions | |
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by Diala Khasawneh
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In the Holy Land | |
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by D. Roberts
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Voyage to the Holy Land, The | |
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by Jean-Claude Simoen
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Irreverent Pilgrims: Melville Browne and Mark Twain in the Holy Land | |
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by Franklin Dickerson Walker
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Somewhat shallow by a Reader from Washington, DC, posted on Sunday, Jan 4, 2009 This book reviews the trips that three American writers made in the mid 19th century to the Holy Land. I found the book somewhat shallow as it offers little more than a biography of each writer and a summary of the books they had written about their trips. Though this background is helpful in understanding their writing, it contains little in terms of analysis or comparative critique. | ||
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PACE Tour Guide of the West Bank & Gaza Strip "Palestine" | |
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by Dr. Adel Yahya (Editor), Dr. Munin Sadeq, and Dr. Hanna Abdel Nour Published by the Palestine Association for Cultural Exchange, this book can be ordered from PACE, PO Box 841, Ramallah, Palestine. See also the book review inThis Week in Palestine | ||
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Indispensable Tour Guide by a Reader from Maryland, posted on Tuesday, Sep 30, 2003 It is very hard to find a good tour book for Palestine, considering it is not officially recognized as a country by the United States. Before my recent trip there, I had browsed several copies of some well-known tour guides to "Israel". Those guides, however, lacked considerably in their presentation of material on the Arab or non-Jewish parts of the country. Some are outright wrong and misleading. For example, a leading guide mentioned that the languages spoken are "Hebrew and English", and the main religion "Judaism", neglecting that nearly half the population under Israel's control speak Arabic and follow Islam or Christianity. Most of those "Israel" guides extol the Jewish history and the Jewish areas of the country while glossing over the other cultures. Of course, none of the other guides prepare you for the real encounter: that the taxi drivers in Jerusalem are more likely to be Arabs, or that the chap you stop in the old city to ask for directions will more likely speak Arabic than Hebrew. Most importantly for me, the Christian Holy places in Bethlehem and the West Bank did not get the coverage they deserved. Enter this book. As soon as I discovered it in a bookstore in Ramallah, I dumped my other travel books into the trash can where they belong. Very detailed and meticulous, this book divides the West Bank and Gaza into regions, then provides a refreshing and in-depth exposition of each. We get not only a listing of the usual sites, but a wealth of background material: travel tips, historical outlines, maps, etc. It is not easy getting around in occupied Palestine, particularly due to the frequent road closures, new Israeli settlements and roads, and other obstacles to the way of life. These difficulties are treated well enough to equip the reader with the know-how to navigate these obstacles and to find one's way. A lot of attention is paid to the particular difficulties foreigners may face in this place. The geographic coverage is broad and detailed at the same time. Though I have grown up in that region, there are many facts that I have learned for the first time from that book, and many places I did not know even existed. My only reservation about this tour guide is the fact that it tries to be politically correct and does not cover the rest of Palestine. Thus the Palestinian areas of Yafa, Nazareth, Akka, and Haifa, under occupation since 1948 are disadvantaged. Neither Palestinian tour guides like this nor Israeli tour guides grant them adequate coverage. To really learn about the 418 ancient Palestinian villages depopulated and demolished by the Israelis in 1948, I have to pick up a book such All That Remains by Walid Khalidi, a great book that is unfortunately too thick to be a practical tour guide. | ||
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