In the Years 1989-1991 Israel renewed its diplomatic relations with the USSR, Bulgaria, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Poland and Czechoslovakia, relations which were severed subsequent to the Six- day- war. Albania was added to the above, with which Israel established diplomatic relations for the first time. In these years Israel's representatives held talks with envoys from East Germany towards establishing diplomatic relations. This was never fulfilled due to East Germany's refusal to recognize its part in paying restitutions to Israel for its part in the persecution of Jews during the Nazi rule and due to the approaching German reunification process. The Author, who served in those years as Deputy Director General of Israel's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, in charge of East and Central Europe, and who took part in these processes, documents, for the first time, the chain of contacts between Israel and the countries of East-Central Europe (except for the USSR) which lead up to renewing diplomatic relations between them. The book also deals with their hostile policies towards Israel in the international and Middle Eastern arena, Anti-Semitism against the Jewish minority living among them, and the status of the Jewish Communities in these countries during the break in Diplomatic relations and in the time that followed. The Political and Economic motivations of each of these countries to improve relations with Israel are also dealt with from the mid-eighties of the previous century towards a gradual renewal of diplomatic relations together with their liberation from their dependence on the USSR and their transition from their Communist regime to a liberal one.

André Chouraqui fut-il un traducteur, un « passeur », un homme politique, un poète ? Sans doute fut-il tout cela, mais peut-être aussi et surtout « un homme qui aidait à vivre » comme l’aurait dit Camus qu’il connaissait bien. Perspectives a tenu à lui rendre hommage, un an après sa disparition, en s’arrêtant à chacune des grandes étapes d’un itinéraire hors du commun.

This book describes the changes that took place among the various different sectors of society in the FSU regarding their attitudes towards the Jews and Israel.

For many years Hannah Arendt (1906-1975) has been the object of intense debate. After her bitter critiques of Zionism, which seemed to nullify her early involvement with that movement, and her extremely controversial "Eichmann in Jerusalem" (1963), Arendt became virtually a taboo figure in Israeli and Jewish circles. Challenging the "curse" of her own title, "Hannah Arendt in Jerusalem" carries the scholorly investigation of this musch-discussed writer to the very place where her ideas have been most conspicuosly ignored. Sometimes sympathetically, sometimes critically, these distinguished contributors reexamine the crucial aspects of Arendt's lfe and thought: her complex identity as a German Jew; her commitment to and critique of Zionism and the State of Israel; her works on totalitarianism, Nazism and the Eichmann trial; her relationship to key twentieth-century intellectuals, from Gershom Scholem to Martin Heidegger; her intimate and tense connections to German culture; and her reworkings of political thought and philosophy in the light of the experience of the twentieth century.

"A catastrophe has befallen us!" - these were the words expressed by the secretary of the Arab League following the decision by the Arabs to invade Palestine on 15 May 1948. Who caused the Arab countries to participate in a war in which they had no interest, and why did they fight? What did King Abdallah say to Golda Meir during their secret conversation in Amman on the eve of the war? Why did the Arab efforts to release the Egyptian soldiers from the siege at Faluja fail? How did the Jewish prisoners live in the prisoners' camp in Trasnjordan and how they were finally released? Both these and other questions are answered in the book: Cooperation and Hostility: Abdallah, the Arab Legion and the 1948 War, which examines the rule of the Arab Legion during 1948 war. The book explains King Abdallah's intentions towards Palestine as well as considering his political and military moves. The book also analyses the cooperation between the Arab armies during the war, and the British aid to Transjordan and especially to the Arab Legion during this war. With the aid of British, Israeli and Jordanian documents the author presents in a clear and comprehensive manner the establishment and development of the units of the Arab Legion including the military intelligence and the Air force which were exposed for the first time in this book.

Metropolitan reforms have been implemented in Canada at a scale and frequency greater than anywhere else in the democratic world. Recent Canadian metropolitan reforms are setting precedents and their fate could influence metropolitan agendas worldwide. This edited collection deals with local government reforms in major Canadian metropolitan areas and provides comparative insights from other countries. Steps undertaken by Canadian provinces have seemingly preferred in some cases 'old regionalism' territorial reforms over 'new regionalism' horizontal networks of governance. Canadian experiences indicate that both weak metropolitan mechanisms and neighborhood-level governments tend to be unstable, often not fulfilling expectations. Moreover, it seems that only old regionalism deals effectively with sharing fiscal burdens, whereas new regionalism approaches can be effective in development. The cross-national case studies provide a perspective on the role of different political systems and political cultures in determining the metropolitan governance agenda and the reforms undertaken, revealing considerable similarities in the agenda and diversity in responses.

What was the balance of power in the battles of Judas Maccabaeus and in Israel's War of Independence? Were they, as is commonly assumed, wars of the few against the many? These questions were discussed in a conference organized by the School of History of the Hebrew University in December 1999. The participants were in general agreement that the discussion of the balance of power must not be confined to the number of troops and that other variables must be taken into account. Nevertheless the numbers of troops is important. Conflicting views were presented on the battles of Judas Maccabaues whereas on the number of troops in Israel's War of Independence there was general agreement. Published in this collection, for the first time, are a General Staff document from 1952 and a research paper by Yehosuha Ben Arie for the IDF History Branch from 1955. Both conclude that in the matter of the number of troops the War of Independence on the whole was not an instance of the few against the many. Other articles, based on lectures delivered at the conference include Bezalel Bar Kochva and Israel Shatzman on the battles of Judas Maccabaeus; Beni Morris and Amitzur Ilan on the balance of forces in the War of Independence, Eyal Nave and Mordechai Bar-On on the evolution of Israeli collective memory of the balance of power and on possible ways of representing the facts of the case in school books; Shmaryahu Ben-Pazi, Moshe Erenwald and Nimrod Hagiladi on three case studies: Safad, The Jewish Quarter in the Old City of Jerusalem, and Rechovot; and Joseph Heller's essay on the centrality of the 'few against many' theme in David Ben Gurion's thought which widens the scope of the discussion in the conference.

This book illustrates the close link between the development of the national ideal in Egypt, and the development of the new written Arabic, and studies the Academic activities in Cairo following the historical and social changes in the Arab world in the 20th Century.

Rich and multiform, French influence in the Levant and Palestine was predominant until the end of World War I. While conferring a particular importance upon its religious establishments, France has also always invested in the development of its economic, scientific, and technological relations with the countries in the region. Marking the beginning of France's political disengagement from the Holy Land, the British Mandate period saw, notably, the gradual disappearance of the French language from the cultural life of Palestine. France's return in force to the region would have to await the foundation and decolonization of the State of Israel, first as a close friend of Israel, then, after the Six-Day War, as Europe's most active political power in the Middle East. Series Editor: Amnon Cohen