Research Guides: Current Events & Issues : Israel-Palestine Conflict

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Library Databases

CQ Researcher
CQ Researcher is noted for its in-depth, unbiased coverage of health, social trends, criminal justice, international affairs, education, the environment, technology and the economy. Each single-themed, 12,000-word report is researched and written by a seasoned journalist. The consistent, reader-friendly organization provides researchers with an introductory overview, which includes three pro-con debates; a background and chronology on the topic; an assessment of the current situation; tables and maps; a pro/con debate by representatives of opposing positions; and bibliographies of key sources.
Diversity Studies (Gale)
A must-have for social science, history and liberal arts coursework, Diversity Studies explores cultural differences, contributions and influences in the global community. This collection includes more than 2.7 million articles from 150 journals, updated daily.
JSTOR
Contains full text back issues of journal titles in the humanities, social sciences, and life sciences. Also contains 500+ open-access ebooks.
Opposing Viewpoints (Gale)
Opposing Viewpoints is an engaging online experience for those seeking contextual information and opinions on hundreds of today's hottest social issues. Drawing on the acclaimed Greenhaven Press series, the solution features continuously updated viewpoints, topic overviews, full-text magazines, academic journals, news articles, primary source documents, statistics, images, videos, audio files and links to vetted websites organized into a user-friendly portal experience.
Project Muse
Project MUSE is a leading provider of digital humanities and social science content for the scholarly community. MUSE is the trusted source of complete, full-text versions of scholarly journals from many of the world's leading university presses and scholarly societies, with over 120 publishers currently participating.
Taylor & Francis Online
Provides access to full-text peer-reviewed academic journals in many subject areas.
World History In Context (Gale)
World History In Context is an engaging online experience for those seeking contextual information on hundreds of the most significant people, events and topics in World History. The new solution merges Gale's authoritative reference content with full-text magazines, academic journals, news articles, primary source documents, images, videos, audio files and links to vetted websites organized into a user-friendly portal experience.

Videos

Radio & Podcasts

State of the World From NPR

Unsettled
A space for conversation and diverse viewpoints on Israel-Palestine and the Jewish diaspora.
The Times of Israel Podcast
A 15-minute update on what’s happening in Israel and the Jewish world, from Sunday through Thursday.
Palestinian's Podcast
Palestinians Podcast, created by Dr. Nadia Abuelezam, is a forum for Palestinians to share their own narratives.
This is Palestine
Highlights people, issues, and events around Palestine

Books & eBooks Highlight

Chances for Peace by Elie Podeh
ISBN: 9781477305607
Publication Date: 2015-11-15
Drawing on a newly developed theoretical definition of "missed opportunity," Chances for Peace uses extensive sources in English, Hebrew, and Arabic to systematically measure the potentiality levels of opportunity across some ninety years of attempted negotiations in the Arab-Israeli conflict.
A Half Century of Occupation by Gershon Shafir
ISBN: 9780520966734
Publication Date: 2017
The Israel-Palestine conflict is one of the world's most polarizing confrontations. Its current phase, Israel's "temporary" occupation of the West Bank, Gaza, and East Jerusalem, turned a half century old in June 2017. In these timely and provocative essays, Gershon Shafir asks three questions--What is the occupation, why has it lasted so long, and how has it transformed the Israeli-Palestinian conflict?
Historical Dictionary of the Arab-Israeli Conflict by P. R. Kumaraswamy
ISBN: 1442251697
Publication Date: 2015-10-08
Competing Jewish and Arab national claims over the Holy Land form the core of the Arab-Israeli conflict, thereby transforming it into the most intensely-fought struggles in the history of humanity. The conflict evokes unparalleled passion and hostility not only among its immediate participants and neighbors but also in the wider international community. The involvement of three principal monotheistic religions makes the conflict a truly universal contestation.
Israel, Palestine, and the Quest for Middle East Peace by Dennis Deeb
ISBN: 9780761860990
Publication Date: 2013-06-13
After the U.S.-led invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, Pakistan's then President Pervez Musharraf declared: "The Palestinian front is affecting the entire Muslim world. All terrorists and militant activity in the world today has been initiated because of the Palestinian problem. This is because of the sense of hopelessness, alienation, and powerlessness."
The Israel-Palestine Conflict by Elizabeth Matthews (Editor)
ISBN: 9780415434799
Publication Date: 2011-04-20
The conflict between the Israelis and the Palestinians is considered intractable by many, and is frequently characterised by the violence between the two sides. In attempts at peace, the starting point for negotiations is a cessation of violence; beneath this, however, lies a plethora of other issues to be addressed. This unique text brings together Israeli and Palestinian viewpoints on a number of key issues and topics, making clear the points of agreement as well as the views that divide. The chapters deal first with three issues that require compromise and resolution for a peace treaty to be realized - water, refugees, and borders, territory and settlements - and then with three important concepts that can either impede or promote peace: democracy, human rights, and peace culture and education.
Israel and Palestine: Competing Histories by Greg Philo; Mike Berry
ISBN: 9780745325668
Publication Date: 2006-11-20
Following on from their acclaimed book Bad News from Israel, Greg Philo and Mike Berry present a concise guide to the Israel-Palestine conflict. This uniquely accessible book will appeal to anyone looking for an approachable introduction. Uniquely, the authors show how there are many different, competing histories. They offer an overview of the wide range of contending viewpoints, and indicate those which are based on the most considered historical research.
The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict by Dale Hanson Bourke
ISBN: 0830864555
Publication Date: 2013-03-27
A finalist in Digital Book World's 2014 Digital Book Awards (ebook flowable adult non-fiction) Granted the Digital Book World QED Seal for quality in ebook design With all of the heat surrounding the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, even the most basic facts can be hard to grasp. How do we make sense of what we read in the Bible--and what we read in the news?
Our Way to Fight by Michael Riordon
ISBN: 9781569767788
Publication Date: 2011-05-01
The news coming out of the Israel-Palestine conflict remains grim. The region remains a symbol of instability fueled by violence and hatred. In Our Way to Fight, journalist and author Michael Riordon offers a different perspective, exploring the conflict through local Israeli and Palestinian peace activists who break all stereotypes.
Politico-Ideological Mobilisation and Violence in the Arab World by Ahmed Ajil
ISBN: 9781003281665
Publication Date: 2022-09-06
This book presents a study of politico-ideological mobilisation and violence by focusing on the life stories, trajectories and narratives of individuals who mobilised for causes and conflicts in the Arab World. It provides a greater understanding of the biographical, sociological, political and historic factors pertinent for their radicalisation processes. What makes individuals identify with suffering and injustice, often of others and elsewhere? Why do individuals feel the need to stand up in the first place and how does violent action become a justifiable or necessary course of action? Why and how do they disengage from violence?
The Power of Dialogue Between Israelis and Palestinians by Nava Sonnenschein; Tamar Saguy (Introduction by); Deb Reich (Translator, Editor)
ISBN: 9780813599250
Publication Date: 2019-01-08
In The Power of Dialogue between Israelis and Palestinians, scholar and activist Nava Sonnenschein shares a collection of twenty-five powerful interviews she conducted with Palestinian and Jewish Israeli alumni of peacebuilding courses, a decade after their graduation. Participants with diverse personal and professional backgrounds completed a series of conflict transformation workshops using the model developed by the School for Peace at the world's only intentional Jewish-Palestinian community, Neve Shalom-Wahat al-Salam ("Oasis of Peace" in Hebrew and Arabic). Critically, the interviews vividly demonstrate that peacebuilding does not end with the courses. Most of the graduates choose to work professionally in roles that contribute to peace-building.
Prefiguring Peace by Michelle I. Gawerc
ISBN: 1280657421
Publication Date: 2012-01-01
Prefiguring Peace: Israeli-Palestinian Peacebuilding Partnerships, a longitudinal study of more than ten years (1993 2008), focuses on the major peacebuilding initiatives with an educational encounter-based approach in Israel and Palestine. It examines how non-governmental peacebuilding initiatives adapt to radically changing environments, the challenges they face, and why some are able to adapt and survive while others do not. Michelle I. Gawerc explores two aspects of adaptation the ability to maintain resources and legitimacy with critical constituencies outside the organization, and the ability to continue to function effectively as an organization.
Recognition As Key for Reconciliation: Israel, Palestine, and Beyond by Yoram Meital (Volume Editor); Paula Rayman (Volume Editor)
ISBN: 9789004345614
Publication Date: 2017-11-16
In these times of growing insecurity, widening inequities and deepening crisis for civilized governance, Recognition as Key for Reconciliation offers meaningful and provocative thoughts on how to advance towards a more just and peaceful future. From the intractable Israeli-Palestinian conflict we learn of "thin" and "thick" recipes for solutions. Beyond the Middle East region we learn from studies around the globe: South Africa, Northern Ireland and Armenia show the challenges to genuine recognition of our very human connection to each other, and that this recognition is essential for any sustainable positive security for all of us. Contributors are Deina Abdelkader, Gregory Aftandilian, Dale Eickelman, Amal Jamal, Maya Kahanoff, Herbert Kelman, Yoram Meital, Victoria Montgomery, Paula M. Rayman, Albie Sachs and Nira Yuval-Davis.
Rhetorics of Belonging by Anna Bernard
ISBN: 9781846319433
Publication Date: 2014-03-01
An Open Access edition of this book is available on the Liverpool University Press website and the OAPEN library. The crisis in Israel/Palestine has long been the world's most visible military conflict. Yet the region's cultural and intellectual life remains all but unknown to most foreign observers, which means that literary texts that make it into circulation abroad tend to be received as historical documents rather than aesthetic artefacts.
Struggle and Survival in Palestine/Israel by Mark Levine (Editor); Gershon Shafir (Editor)
ISBN: 1283571528
Publication Date: 2012-01-01
Too often, the study of Israel/Palestine has focused on elite actors and major events. "Struggle and Survival in Palestine/Israel "takes advantage of new sources about everyday life and the texture of changes on the ground to put more than two dozen human faces on the past and present of the region. With contributions from a leading cast of scholars across disciplines, the stories here are drawn from a variety of sources, from stories passed down through generations to family archives, interviews, and published memoirs. As these personal narratives are transformed into social biographies, they explore how the protagonists were embedded in but also empowered by their social and historical contexts.
Understanding Israel/Palestine by Eve Spangler
ISBN: 9004394133
Publication Date: 2019-05-29
The Israeli/Palestinian conflict is the longest on-going hot-and-cold war in the 20th and 21st century. In this book the author argues that human rights standards are the key to a just and sustainable solution and that, tragically, no one has ever made serious use of them in trying to end the conflict. The reader will have a comprehensive view of the conflict, its relationship to surrounding world events, and its similarities to and differences from other conflicts, especially those embedded in American race relations.
Unholy Land by Witt Raczka
ISBN: 9780761866725
Publication Date: 2015-11-30
Traveling major highways and secondary roads, walking unpaved paths, the author recites contradictions of the land between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River, the Holy Land. Here, religion uneasily confronts politics and democracy, sublime nature undergoes militarization, and hospitality and empathy mix with brutality, hatred and violence. Everything becomes security: not just borders and relations with the neighbors, but also water and archaeological evidence, demography and voting Arabs. Control of holy sites, perception of illegal immigrants, separate highway networks and built-up hilltops are all viewed through the prism of threat and security.
Creating Space for Democracy by Timothy J. Shaffer (Editor); Nicholas V. Longo (Editor)
ISBN: 9781620369296
Publication Date: 2019-10-16
Published in Association with and We live in divisive and polarizing times, often remaining in comfortable social bubbles and experiencing few genuine interactions with people who are different or with whom we disagree. Stepping out and turning to one another is difficult but necessary. For our democracy to thrive at a time when we face wicked problems that involve tough trade-offs it is vital that all citizens participate fully in the process. We need to learn to listen, think, and act with others to solve public problems. This collaborative task begins with creating space for democracy.
Critical Dialogues by Clarke
ISBN: 9781447350996
Publication Date: 2019-07-03
In this engaging and original book, John Clarke is in conversation with 12 leading scholars about the dynamics of thinking critically in the social sciences. The conversations range across many fields and explore the problems and possibilities of doing critical intellectual work in ways that are responsive to changing conditions. By emphasising the many voices in play, in conversation with as well as against others, Clarke challenges the individualising myth of the heroic intellectual. He underlines the value of thinking critically, collaboratively and dialogically. The book also provides access to a sound archive of the original conversations.
Failing Peace by Sara M. Roy
ISBN: 9781849642408
'Unique.' Edward W. Said Leading Harvard scholar chronicles 20 years of conflict in Gaza.
The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict by Marcia Amidon Lusted
ISBN: 9781532151194
Publication Date: 2017-12-15
The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict covers the history of the Middle East, the perspectives on each side of the conflict, and the efforts that have been made to bring peace to the region. Features include essential facts, a glossary, selected bibliography, websites, source notes, and an index. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Essential Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.
Moral Reasons by Charles K. Fink
ISBN: 9780761868439
Publication Date: 2017-01-01
Distinguished by its readability and scope, Moral Reasons explains how to think critically about issues in ethics and political philosophy. After a detailed overview of moral reasoning―including dozens of exercises―the text guides readers through the theories and arguments of philosophers from Plato to Peter Singer. Among the topics explored are moral skepticism, abortion, euthanasia, vegetarianism, political authority, punishment, and war. Ideal as a main text for courses in introductory or applied ethics or as a supplemental text for courses in political philosophy, this book offers one of the most diverse investigations of moral philosophy there is to date.
Sacred Space in Israel and Palestine by Marshall J. Breger (Editor); Yitzhak Reiter (Editor); Leonard Hammer (Editor)
ISBN: 9780203137925
Publication Date: 2013-06-19
Religion and religious nationalism have long played a central role in many ethnic and national conflicts, and the importance of religion to national identity means that territorial disputes can often focus on the contestation of holy places and sacred territory. Looking at the case of Israel and Palestine, this book highlights the nexus between religion and politics through the process of classifying holy places, giving them meaning and interpreting their standing in religious and civil law, within governmental policy, and within international and local communities.
Zionist Israel and the Question of Palestine by Tamar Amar-Dahl; Olga Thierbach-McLean (Translator)
ISBN: 9783110498806
Publication Date: 2016-11-07
After half a century of occupation and tremendous costs of the conflict, Israel is still struggling with the idea of a Palestinian state in what is often perceived as the Biblical Eretz Israel. Mapping Zionism, enemy images, peace and war policies, as well as democracy within the Jewish State, the present study offers original insights into Israel's role in this conflict. By analyzing Israeli history, politics and security-oriented political culture as it has been evolving from 1948 on, this book reveals the ideological and political structures of a Zionist-oriented state and society. In doing so, it uncovers the abyss between the Zionist vision of Eretz Israel on the one hand and the aspiration to achieve normalization, peace and security on the other. In view of this conflict-laden bi-national reality, the Palestinian question is identified as the Achilles' heel of Jewish statehood in the Land of Israel.

Websites and Educational Resources

Institute for Middle East Understanding (IMEU)
"The Institute for Middle East Understanding (IMEU) is an independent non-profit organization that provides journalists with quick access to information about Palestine and the Palestinians, as well as expert sources, both in the United States and in the Middle East. Both through its website and its staff, the IMEU works with journalists to increase the public's understanding about the socio-economic, political, and cultural aspects of Palestine, Palestinians, and Palestinian Americans."
Israel Gaza war: History of the conflict explained
From the BBC. Gives a concise explanation of the history of the conflict leading to tensions today.

Resources for Educators

How to Talk to Kids About What’s Happening in Israel Right Now
Via Kveller
Israeli-Palestinian Conflict PBS NewsHour Classroom
Via PBS, find lesson plans
Violence in Israel and Gaza: Teaching Resources
Via Zinn Education Project, includes links to independent news sources and lesson plans.

National & International Online News Sources

Listed below are online news sources covering current events in Gaza. Try Lateral Reading when confirming information from one source.

Mental Health Resources

Resilience in a time of war: Tips for parents and teachers of elementary school children
Via the American Psychological Association
How to talk to your children about conflict and war
Via Unicef, provides 8 Tips
Psychiatrist provides helpful ways to cope amid Israeli-Palestinian war
Via CBS News Philadelphia
How to Talk to Kids About What’s Happening in Israel Right Now
Via Kveller

How Can You Help?

American Friends of Mogen David Adin
The Israeli equivalent of the Red Cross, providing emergency assistance and helping first responders throughout israel
American Friends Service Committee
AFSC works for a just, peaceful, and sustainable world free of violence, inequality, and oppression. We join with people and partners worldwide to meet urgent community needs, challenge injustice, and build peace.
International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies
The International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) is the world’s largest humanitarian network.
Medical Aid for Palestinians
This group has an emergency appeal to help with the distribution of essential drugs and health care supplies to hospitals in Gaza that are struggling with an influx of serious injuries from Israel's bombing campaign.
Muslim Global Relief
"[O]ur dedicated on-the-ground teams work to prevent loss of life and reduce suffering as much as possible for affected children, as well as their families and communities."