Books Sent in Asia: Middle East: Israel and Lebanon

Pumpkinflowers: A Soldier’s Story of a Forgotten War, by Matti Friedman (2016)

In the Israeli military language, casualties in war are called flowers, and deaths are known as oleanders.  These euphemisms are deemed to take away some of the ugliness of war.

Pumpkinflowers describes the author’s involvement in Israel’s military presence in southern Lebanon during the late 1990s.  Pumpkin was the name of the Israeli outpost in the Lebanon Security Zone.  During the period that Israel maintained these outposts to protect the communities in northern Israel from Hezbollah’s growing presence in the area.

In the late 1990s, the author was drafted into the Israeli army and sent to Outpost Pumpkin (it was never referred to as The Pumpkin).  Shortly before the author was sent to Pumpkin, two Israel helicopters, filled with young soldiers, collided on their way to Pumpkin.  There were 73 oleanders.  Israel’s support for continuing these outpost began to wane after this event.  It was about this time that Friedman arrived at Pumpkin.  Brief skirmishes continued unto 2000, when Israel withdrew from the security zone.

The soldiers could look down on the Lebanese village of Nabatieh.  In particular, they observed a small restaurant.  They would joke about how they would like to have a meal at the restaurant someday.

The First section of the book focuses on a young soldier, Avi, who was a bit of a rebel.  He was also a talented writer, who served at Pumpkin before the author’s arrival.  The Second section describes Friedman’s days at Pumpkin.

The final sections of the book describe life after Pumpkin.  Years later, Friedman traveled to Lebanon as a tourist.  After traveling throughout the country, he hired a cab to take him to the southern part of the country.  He stopped at the restaurant he had observed as a young soldier from the Pumpkin and enjoyed a meal.  He convinced his driver to take him up the hill where the outpost had been, ostensibly to take photos, but to feel the place again where he has spent 3 years in a forgotten military command.

Read:  August 6, 2020

4 Stars

Books Set in the Middle East: Israel, Syria and Lebanon

Spies of No Country: Secret Lives at the Birth of Israel, by Matti Friedman (2019)

This book focuses on the beginning of the Israeli intelligence force that began before the creation of the State of Israel.  The book focuses on four spies who were born and grew up in the Arab countries and were familiar with Muslim customs, culture and language.  They were of families who had lived in the Middle East long before the European Jews began to migrate to what would become the Land of Israel.

Gamliel Cohen was the most educated of the four spies.  He was a Syrian Jew from Damascus.  Isaac Shoshan was also Syrian, from Aleppo.  Havakuk Cohen was a Yemeni Jew and Yakuba Cohen was a wild “street child” from Jerusalem.  They were recruited by Palmach to be a part of the Arab Section ~ Jews who could “pass” for Arabs while gathering intelligence.  They were deep undercover in Syria and Lebanon for a country that had yet to exist.

The author emphasizes that the State of Israel could not have been built without the Middle-Eastern Jews.  It is hubris to believe that Israel was solely the creation of European Jews. After Israel became a State, Jews from around the Arab world were suddenly expelled from their homes and found their way to Israel.  Today over 50% of Israeli Jews have roots in the Arab world.  This is what makes Israel so unique and so difficult for Western countries to fully appreciate and understand Israel.

The author carefully researched this book, poring over archival materials and oral histories.  Isaac Shoshan was an old man in his 90s when the author wrote this book.  He met with the author several times and provide his recollection of his days in Palmach’s Arab Section.

This book was very enlightening on the beginnings of the State of Israel.  The author, Matti Friedman, also wrote the Aleppo Codex, which I read in February 2013.

Read: April 29, 2019

4 Stars

Books Set in the Middle East

The Aleppo Codex, by Matti Friedman (2012)

Read: February 10, 2013