Mess-o-potamia (title brazenly stolen from 'The Daily Show' without permission)

I thought about replying individually to all the great comments about the book but I think my thoughts became too long so I posted separately.

First, I will join all of you in the opinion that most of the first part of the book is puffery. In my head the first few chapters translated to "Since everyone agrees that I'm a clairevoyant, genius or something, here's what all of you are practically begging me to say and by the way you're right in thinking my opinions are candy-coated, gold bullion daisies." In a way, he needs to do this to supplement the gaps in his reasoning.

Frank, religion has always been enough to fight over, especially over THAT particular piece of crappy land. Remeber the story where Abraham is told to sacrifice his son then God says, "just kidding, I just wanted to see if you'd do it?" Abraham takes his son Isaac whose mother was Sarah, right? Well, most Muslims believe that Ibrahim takes his other son Ismail whose mother was Hagar. Ismail was born first but his mom was their servant. On the other hand Isaac was the younger brother but his mother was proper first wife. Jewish tradition holds that Isaac was the true heir, and regard Ismail as sort of wicked but repentant son. Muslims hold Ismail as a great prophet and among his descendants are Mohammed the prophet. At some point, Sarah became jealous and couldn't have Ismail and Hagar around so she talked Abrahim/Ibrahim into kicking them out into the desert (granted Abraham had a vision that they'd be not only OK but would start a great nation-Arabs).

While religion could be enough, it's supplemented by a political nightmare. After being persecuted in Russia, Germany, etc, Jew's wanted to go home to the land they were promised. Often referred to as the Zionist movement which started about 1900 or so, Jews began to buy up land in the area from the Ottoman empire (pre WWI) and the British (who controlled the area after WWI) and begin to re-settle the promised land. This pissed off the Arabs who were living there at the time, violence erupticed, and escalated to the point where the British were being targeted as well. After WWII, The Brits wanted out of that mess so they turned the thing over the UN who carved out separate states, one Arab and one Jewish and called them Israel and Palestine. The Jews thought it was a great idea and declared independance. The Arab Palestinians somehow didn't want to accept that their land could be sold out from under them and then have it ratified by the UN. So, enter the line that your dad quoted, "They've always been fighting and they always will."

So, in Israel, you have the land promised to the jews through Abraham (if you are jewish/christian and believe that the birthright went through Isaac and Jacob aka 'Israel'), the land actually possessed by Arab Palestinians, and the site revered by Christians as the site of Christ's execution (recall the Crusades) along with all the other holy sites that each faction doesn't want under the control of the others.

Nick, I agree with you that Rosenberg writes with unwarrantable boldness when he claims there is "no doubt" Ezekiel was referring to "what we know as Russia. (p32) I have more to say on this subject but I'm going to save that for after I talk to my brother in law about it. If you guys didn't know Emily married a Russian. He was fascinating stories about growing up in the Union, but that's stuff for another post.