The road to Jerusalem : Glubb Pasha, Palestine and the Jews / Benny Morris.

This book examines the personal vision of General Sir John Glubb, British pro-Consul in the Middle East and commander of the Arab Legion between 1936-1956. It offers the first in-depth account of Glubb's thinking and actions during 1948, as he led his small army into Palestine and war against Israel. His aims and actions, which lie at the very heart of the controversy between ""Old"" and ""New"" historians of the Arab-Israeli conflict, are carefully detailed using, for the first time, contemporary British, Arab Legion, and Israel Defence Forces intelligence sources.

Author Notes

Benny Morris is Professor at Ben-Gurian University.

Reviews (3)

Publisher's Weekly Review

Morris is one of the leading figures of the "post-Zionist" school of history, challenging what he sees as untenable myths regarding Israel's nature and founding. He is best known for asserting, in The Birth of Palestinian Refugee Problem 1947-1949, that systematic dispossession of Palestine Arabs was, at the time of Israel's founding, a conscious Israeli policy. The second intifada has seemingly altered his views on Israeli culpability in the current political situation, as a recent series of colloquies between Morris and former Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak, published in the New York Review of Books, makes clear, but this book continues his revisionist historical work. John Bagot Glubb, better known as Glubb Pasha, was a British officer who commanded Jordan's Arab Legion, the best Muslim fighting force in the Middle East, between 1936 and 1956. He has a corresponding reputation, fuelled by his post-retirement writings and speeches, as pro-Arab and anti-Israel, to the point of being seen as anti-Semitic. Morris makes sophisticated use of primary sources to present a more nuanced evaluation of Glubb as someone simultaneously loyal to the British government and the state of Jordan. He finds that Glubb accepted on pragmatic grounds the agreement King Abdullah made in principle with Israel's Golda Meir for the partitioning of Palestine. According to Morris, however, when Glubb and Abdullah entered the 1948 war, they did not seek the annihilation of Israel. Instead they waged limited war for limited objectives previously conceded by the Yishuv. Morris contends that Arab policy as a whole during the war followed on this action: it was designed to hurt the Jews, score domestic political points and compensate for Jordan's projected gains, but not to destroy Israel as a state. (Oct. 7) Forecast: Expect this book to generate national review coverage, and discussions of Morris's work in general. Since this book's orientation seemingly contradicts Morris's take on the current situation, expect a plethora of political weekly column inches devoted to finger pointing and calls for clarification a process that will itself make news. (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Guardian Review

On February 7 1948, some three months before the ending of Britain's Palestine mandate, Ernest Bevin, the foreign secretary, welcomed to his Whitehall office Tewfiq Abul Huda and John Bagot Glubb. Abul Huda was prime minister to Abdullah, ruler of the Hashemite kingdom of Transjordan. "Glubb Pasha" had in 1939 been appointed commander of Abdullah's "Arab Legion". Abul Huda and Glubb put to Bevin an interesting scenario: that as the British left Palestine, the Arab Legion would march into it in order to assure law and order. Abul Huda assured Bevin that the legion would only enter Jewish areas if the Jews invaded Arab areas. Following the meeting, the British government let it be known that as long as the Hashemite kingdom stuck to this assurance, its financial support would remain intact. And so it was. In due course the Arab Legion marched into Arab Palestine and conquered the provinces of Judea and Samaria, including the Old City of Jerusalem. Abdullah then incorporated the West Bank within his kingdom, an annexation recognised only by Britain and Pakistan. The Palestinian Arab state, sanctioned by the UN in 1947 to coexist alongside the Jewish state, was thus throttled at birth. In Zionist eyes Glubb Pasha was a public enemy. Indeed, growing up in a Jewish household, I can recall his name being uttered with scarcely less opprobrium than Hitler's. Not only had his legion beaten the Israel Defence Forces (IDF), not only had his military machine, funded by British subsidies, appeared to threaten the very existence of the re-established Jewish state. He was viewed as nothing less than a servant of the British government, the last of the great military pro-consuls foisted by the British on corrupt and despotic regimes as instruments of imperial control. Ironically, this was also how he came to be viewed by Arab nationalists. Benny Morris has done a com-prehensive if somewhat laboured job in debunking these myths. During the first world war Glubb had fallen in love with the Arab world. As head of the Arab Legion he was closer to Abdullah than any other Briton. Reluctantly, he had by 1947 come round to the view that western Palestine (from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean) should be partitioned. But he feared the tub-thumping pro-Nazi nationalism of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, regarding it both as a perversion of Arab values in itself and as a threat to the feudalistic regime over which Abdullah presided in Transjordan. Abdullah's desire to conquer the West Bank had, in fact, already received the blessing of the Zionists. At a secret meeting with Golda Myerson (Meir), of the Jewish Agency, on November 17 1947, Abdullah announced his desire to "attach" the Arab part of Palestine to Transjordan. Myerson indicated that this would be acceptable to the Jews provided "you don't hamper us in establishing our state". In war, of course, matters do not always go exactly as expected. The Arab Legion's military engagements with the IDF came about, it is true, more by accident than by design. Glubb was terrified of over-committing the limited forces at his command, desperately short as they were of ammunition and of mechanised transport. IDF commanders never believed Glubb had any plan to conquer all of Jerusalem, still less to march on Tel Aviv. Morris proves this, but omits to point out sufficiently forcefully that, in the fog of war, perception invariably counts for more than reality. In his more flamboyant moments Abdullah had indeed waxed lyrical on the possibility of ruling over the whole of Palestine. The IDF was right not to take any chances. Glubb emerges from this study a capable and wise military strategist, but no Machiavelli. He lent himself to shameless exploitation by Whitehall but failed to appreciate the social and political fragility of the Hashemite regime. That regime, in turn, failed to heed his warnings about the fragility of its military hold on the West Bank. In 1956 King Hussein of Jordan ordered him out of the country. In the course of a few days, in 1967, all that he had won for the ungrateful Hashemites was thrown away. Geoffrey Alderman is the author of Modern British Jewry (OUP). To order The Road to Jerusalem for pounds 21.50 plus p&p call Guardian book service on 0870 066 7979. Caption: article-glub.1 [Benny Morris] has done a com-prehensive if somewhat laboured job in debunking these myths. During the first world war [John Bagot Glubb] had fallen in love with the Arab world. As head of the Arab Legion he was closer to [Abdullah] than any other Briton. Reluctantly, he had by 1947 come round to the view that western Palestine (from the Jordan river to the Mediterranean) should be partitioned. But he feared the tub-thumping pro-Nazi nationalism of the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, regarding it both as a perversion of Arab values in itself and as a threat to the feudalistic regime over which Abdullah presided in Transjordan. Abdullah's desire to conquer the West Bank had, in fact, already received the blessing of the Zionists. At a secret meeting with Golda Myerson (Meir), of the Jewish Agency, on November 17 1947, Abdullah announced his desire to "attach" the Arab part of Palestine to Transjordan. Myerson indicated that this would be acceptable to the Jews provided "you don't hamper us in establishing our state". - Geoffrey Alderman.

Library Journal Review

Gen. Sir John Glubb was a highly significant figure in the Middle East during the 20th century. As the British proconsul in the region and commander of the Arab Legion between 1936 and 1956, General Glubb became a controversial soldier-politician as commander of a small Arab army against Israel during the 1948 war that led to the establishment of the Jewish state. In this highly original book, Morris, a prominent revisionist Israeli historian at Ben-Gurion University whose numerous publications have challenged many of the basic Israeli assumptions about the Arab-Israeli conflict and the birth of the Palestinian refugee problem, gives a thorough account of Glubb's ambiguous political agenda and his involvement in the early years of the Arab-Israeli conflict. Relying on British, Arab Legion, and Israeli Defense Forces intelligence sources, the author offers students and scholars of the Middle East an evenhanded, meticulously researched analysis of some of the important developments in the early phases of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Highly recommended for large public and academic libraries.-Nader Entessar, Spring Hill Coll., Mobile, AL (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Introduction

Glubb on Arabs and Jews

The Arab Revolt 1936-39

World War II and its Aftermath

The Road to Jerusalem

The Invasion

The Border Wars, 1949-1956

Conclusion (After 1956)

Available:*

Bound With These Titles

On Order