Sandy Tolan's thoroughly researched and documented book reveals the complicated story behind the Israel-Palestine conflict. He puts a face on the history--two faces, actually. Bashir grew up in Ramla, a Palestinian town where his father had built their home (and planted a lemon tree) before the influx of Jewish refugees after World War II. Dalia was one of the newcomers; her parents had emigrated from Bulgaria when she was very young. When Bashir's family and thousand of other Palestinians were forced to leave their villages to make room for the new Israelis, Dalia's parents moved into Bashir's "abandoned" home, while unknown to them, his people marched through the desert to new villages where they started life again with nothing but resentment.
Dalia learns the history of her home almost twenty years later when Bashir, a lawyer (and possibly a terrorist) fighting for his people's "right to return," goes to Ramla to visit the home he lost. When she invites him in and hears his story, Dalia opens the door to a fragile friendship that will last for decades and motivate her to work for peace. She must reconcile her love of Israel with her growing understanding of the price paid by the Palestinians and the reasons for their uprisings. The friendship between Dalia and Bashir offers hope that someday the two nations can live together in peace, but the history Tolan lays out, so full of oppression, tragic mistakes, and ironies, makes it hard to believe there will ever be a happy ending to this story.
As sobering as it is, I highly recommend Tolan's book to anyone who wants to understand the powder keg that is Israel/Palestine today. Your eyes and heart will be opened.
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