Inheriting the Holy Land: An American's Search for Hope in the Middle East [Hardcover]

Jennifer Miller grew up in a family where the politics of the Middle East consumed the dinner table conversation. AS a teenager, she became involved in Seeds of Peace, an organization dedicated to conflict resolution by bringing young Israelis and Palestinians together each summer for two weeks of often wrenching dialogue at a camp in Maine. This book is her tribute to Seeds the group, and to the seeds, the young people on both sides of the tragic struggle, whom she has come to know and love. She wants their voices, rarely if ever heard, to become a part of the discussion among the elderly men who time and again, have led their nations into battle and death.

A lunch scene with Yassir Arafat is worth the price of admission to Jen Miller's book alone. And I think that scene is emblematic of the difference in perspective of generations. Most cynical old-timers would have waved the episode away as "typical Arafat, what would you expect?" etc. We might never even mention the dissimulation and lies in our own narratives. But so much is still fresh and new to Jen, including her sense of outrage, which I hope won't abrade too much over the years. We need to be reminded again that leaders of all stripes try to literally feed us a line, and we simply accept this shabby reality as one of the axioms of modern politics. But Jen won't be pushed off her stride by the Palestinian brand of baloney, and is willing to call them as she sees them.

Frankly, it also takes someone of youthful age to use "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" as a metaphor for the Middle East conflict. Some people might consider it a blasphemous stretch, but my 21-year-old son got it right away. And, frankly, when a conflict has been going on this long, you do begin to look for the absurdist side of it.

When I was growing up, my family's involvement in Israel was limited to the purchase of a couple of Israel Bonds and the presence of a tin United Jewish Appeal pushke (collection box)on a table near the front door. I learned much of what I know about Israel in somewhat the same way Jen did, minus the globetrotting parents, by which I mean I was indoctrinated in Sunday school and Jewish youth organizations. As I grew older, I read less and less about the Middle East except in the daily papers and weekly newsmagazines - maybe a book every other year. So I found that even in the short compass of fewer than 250 pages, Jen has some interesting and useful things to say about topics I should know more about but haven't bothered to acquaint myself with further, the issue of Palestinian textbooks being a prime example. And the fact that she writes as one separated by only a few years, not decades, from the readers of those texts makes her contribution all the more worthwhile. That is true in terms of the specific topic, and true as well for the entire book.

Inheriting the Holy Land by Jennifer Miller is simply an amazing story and synthesis of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict based on her experience with Camp Seeds of Peace, relationships with young people from a wide variety of viewpoints, and interviews with regional leaders young and old. It also illustrates how important a sense of identity is to people who must make peace. How does the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, in an oil-less part of the Middle-east, and involving only a couple million people, attract so much attention and passion worldwide? Besides the ramifications of this conflict across the muslim world, I believe there is something more. If Israelis and Palestinians can resolve their problems and achieve peace, it would give such hope that larger societies in the world might also be able to resolve other conflicts across cultural and ethnic divides now and in the future. Miller's perspective and analysis is not available in the daily and brief newspaper reports on this conflict. Although I have read a few other books on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, I now feel much more educated and updated than before having read Miller's balanced, critical and brilliant book.

I've read a lot of books on the Arab-Israeli conflict and have even written one myself. It's fair to say that some set out to be biased (and are) while others try not to be biased (but still are). While there is no gold standard for objectivity on such an emotional and contentious issue, if there were, I'd have to say that Jennifer Miller's book comes pretty damn close. For that reason alone I recommend people from all levels of interest and background in the Middle East read this first-rate, well-written book.

Inheriting the Holy Land really does seek out the narratives, hopes, fears, and aspirations of Israelis and Palestinians--young and old--by allowing their unique voices to be heard. The author does intrude in the narrative, but then again, this is her story (and it is an interesting one at that) of her own journey from Washington, DC to Israel and Palestine.

And she tells that story with a rare clarity and honesty, which makes this book an accessible entry point for experts and non-experts alike. We learn much here about the educational systems for young Israelis and Palestinians and a great deal more about the Israeli Defense Forces and what it is like to be Palestinian living under Israeli occupation. Every time I began to think Miller's prose was edging toward unfairness or bias, I turned the page only to (surprisingly) find she had conveyed the other side's point of view on these issues with a remarkable objectivity rare in someone so young (no doubt the influence of her father, Aaron David Miller, who negotiated with the confidence of both Arabs and Israelis and served as an advisor to six secretaries of state until his 2003 retirement from the State Department).

Miller's journey makes for a great story, too, which she tells quite well: from her experiences interviewing Arafat in his headquarters (the lunch scene is priceless) to her interview with the family of a suicide bomber to her discussion with the former Israeli head of Shin Bet.

Finally, Miller leaves the reader and all Americans interested in self-introspection on this issue with plenty to learn and think about. Steering clear of politics and diplomacy, Inheriting the Holy Land is an American story of how optimism and pragmatism confront the sober realities of an existential conflict driven by religious ideology, the struggle over land, and the search for national identity. While I would have liked to have heard more about how domestic American politics and biased/one-sided American diplomacy have facilitated this human calamity, that is another story to be told, perhaps by her father.

For now, students of the conflict can finally hear Miller's story of the grassroots "next generation" of Israelis and Palestinians. It is they, after all, who will ultimately have to live with, deliver, and implement any peace agreement.