A HIGH PRICE by Daniel L. Byman ( 9780195391824 ) - Books & Audio Books at Pickabook.co.uk

Item Details

Title:

A HIGH PRICE
THE TRIUMPHS AND FAILURES OF ISRAELI COUNTERTERRORISM

By:

Daniel L. Byman

Format:

Hardback

List price:

£26.49

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£23.18

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12.5% off

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£3.31

ISBN 10:

0195391829

ISBN 13:

9780195391824

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Publisher:

OXFORD UNIVERSITY PRESS INC

Pub. date:

15 June, 2011

Pages:

496

Description:

Over the course of its existence, Israel has suffered more from terrorism than perhaps any other country in the world. The second intifada, to name only one of Israel's recent terrorism challenges, has led to over 1,000 Israeli deaths. And the Palestinians have lost far more, as Israel responded to the intifada with frequent and devastating force. In A High Price, Daniel Byman provides an authoritative dual history of terrorism against Israel and the state's oftendisproportionate responses to it. This is not just an Israeli and Palestinian story, however; the techniques terrorists have used against Israel have often been harbingers of new forms of international terrorism. When Palestinian leftists first hijacked several airplanes flying to Israel, the worlddismissed it as a problem that only Israelis would have to deal with. Over a decade later, suicide bombing was invented as a weapon to fight Israel and its perceived allies in Lebanon. Israel's counterterrorism efforts are also rich in lessons for other nations, both in what to do and in what to avoid. Israel often displays dazzling creativity and innovation in fighting terrorists. Too often, however, it ignores the long-term implications of its tactics, often perpetuating problems rather thansolving them. America and other democratic states can gain insight into one of the essential issues of counterterrorism: the tradeoff between killing, arresting, and otherwise prevailing over terrorists seeking to kill you today, and the risks of alienating swathes of the population the terroristsseek to lead. A High Price explores Israeli counterterrorism policy since the state's creation, focusing both on the accomplishments of the Jewish state and where it has fallen short.

Synopsis:

In the sixty-plus years of the Jewish state's existence, Israeli governments have exhausted almost every option in defending their country against terror attacks. Israel has survived and even thrived-but both its citizens and its Arab neighbors have paid dearly. In A High Price, Daniel Byman breaks down the dual myths of Israeli omnipotence and-conversely-ineptitude in fighting terror, offering instead a nuanced, definitive historical account of the state's bold but often failed efforts to fight terrorist groups. The product of painstaking research and countless interviews, the book chronicles different periods of Israeli counterterrorism. Beginning with the violent border disputes that emerged after Israel's founding in 1948, Byman charts the rise of Yasir Arafat's Fatah and leftist groups such as the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine-organizations that ushered in the era of international terrorism epitomized by the 1972 hostage-taking at the Munich Olympics. Byman follows how Israel fought these groups and new ones, such as Hamas, in the decades that follow, with particular attention to the grinding and painful struggle during the second intifada.Israel's debacles in Lebanon against groups like the Lebanese Hizballah are also examined in-depth, as is the country's problematic response to Jewish terrorist groups that have struck at Arabs and Israelis seeking peace. In surveying Israel's response to terror, the author points to the coups of shadowy Israeli intelligence services, the much-emulated use of defensive measures such as sky marshals on airplanes, and the role of controversial techniques such as targeted killings and the security barrier that separates Israel from Palestinian areas. Equally instructive are the shortcomings that have undermined Israel's counterterrorism goals, including a disregard for long-term planning and a failure to recognize the long-term political repercussions of counterterrorism tactics. Israel is often a laboratory: new terrorist techniques are often used against it first, and Israel in turn develops innovative countermeasures that other states copy. Ultimately, A High Price expertly explains how Israel's successes and failures can serve to inform all countries fighting terrorism today.

Publication:

Imprint:

Oxford University Press Inc

Returns:

Returnable

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