The Maccabaean

NORMAN BENTWICH, Palestine of the Jews, Past, Present and Future. With an Appendix. The Redemption of Judæa and Other Articles on The British Advance. London. Kegan, Paul Trench, Trubner & Co., Ltd., pp. 288.

MR. BENTWICH has chosen an ambitious title for his book. In the preface, however, he hastens to assure us that he has not attempted to cover as broad a field as the title would seem to indicate. In his account of the Jewish colonies, he states he has made no attempt to be exhaustive, but has given only his personal experiences. The book is based, we are told, on notes jotted down on several visits to Palestine previous to the war, and was composed in the spare hours of the campaign of 1916 and 1917, in which the author formed part of the Egyptian Expedi- tionary Force as an officer in the Camel Transport Corps.

"Like the camels I was leading over the desert," he tells us, "I would chew the cud of memory when the day's work was done and the gentle evening breathed peace and tranquility."

quality. His book is not a work of reference or a guide book, but rather a series of essays on "Palestine of the Jews."

Few indeed are better qualified than the author to write on the subject he has chosen. A graduate of an English university and a resident of Egypt for a number of years he brings to his task a learning and experience possessed by few.

Mr. Bentwich deals with a variety of matters. The opening chapters on “Palestine in Jewish History” and “The Modern Zionist Movement” are purely historical in their approach. The chapters on the “Colonies” based on notes taken from personal observation made before the outbreak of war describes the life of these little farming communities which though comparatively unimportant in numbers typify so much of the aspiration of the past and of the hope for the future. Of interest in the same chapter is a discussion of the Vaad, that most characteristic embodiment of popular government in the colonies.

While Mr. Bentwich is full of enthusiasm for the colonies, he does not endeavor to delude himself or the reader as to what has been accomplished. "The new Judæa will be achieved," we are told, "when colonies like Katra are a hundred times multiplied and linked together in one continuous area."

Of Jerusalem, we are informed, there are already two cities, one the city of the storied past, crammed with monuments and sacred sites, the other the city of the restless present teaming with philanthropic institutions and religious foundations. All who have visited Jerusalem will agree with Mr. Bentwich's characterization of the architecture of the German Hospice on the Mount of Olives, and will be inclined to concur that of the many Jewish settlements in Jerusalem, the most attractive is that of the Jews of Bokhara, a stately and dignified people who bring from their distant homes a fine appreciation of the beautiful.

“They are rentiers,” he states, “mostly older men who, having secured material ease in their native homes, come to Jerusalem to devote themselves to study and mystic contemplation. . . . . Physically, too, they are fine figures of all men, tall and unstanding with shaven polls, clad in splendid raiment from the bazaars. They tower like Saul above their brethren and show what the Jew may be when he is not crushed by persecution.”

Mr. Bentwich is peculiarly at home in his analysis of the educational problems of Palestine. The aspirations of the people for a common Hebraism instead of a collection of Russian-Jewish, Franco-Jewish and German-Jewish atoms are convincingly set forth, and the author makes clear the ideal of the educational revival in Palestine which aims to be free from the trammels of the Ghetto, and to keep in touch with the best of science and European thought.

Reference to American activity in Palestine is of interest. At page 93 we are informed that the most hopeful development in Modern colonization has been the American plantation of Poria, and the author adds:

LGLaAViL Vi ı u } Gi LIIL GLALLLVE ANAND . “The few American settlers who are already in the land have brought an energy and“an initiative which are often larkinz 'n tha anlannicte fram Foactern Tuırnna ”

Perhaps that part of the book to which the Zionist will turn by preference is the chapter entitled "The Future of the Land and the People." Mr. Bentwich, it would appear, is of the opinion that the Jewish people should have special rights in Palestine, not simply freedom of immigration and settlement, which have been denied them under the Ottoman government, but the right of self-government and the right to develop the country's resources without let or hindrance. "State sovereignty," he asserts, "is not essential to the Jewish national ideal. Freedom of the Jew to develop according to his own tradition, in his own environment, is the main, if not the whole demand."

While the author states that it is a spiritual promise that Palestine holds out for mankind, he feels confident, nevertheless, that the resources of Palestine are such as to warrant great hopes for its material development. “Thesoil,” we read, “is ore like California than any other part of the world.” }

Were Mr. Bentwich an American, familiar with the development of the southern part of California during the past forty years, it would not be difficult for him to draw a close parallel with that development and the expected development in Palestine. The two countries are much alike in climate and in the products of the soil, as well as in the attraction they have for the tourist, and for residential purposes. In the early days of California the same doubts were raised, that lack of sufficient rainfall and of fuel for manufacturing purposes would prevent the growth of the country. Yet in scarcely a generation we have seen that part of our country rise from a condition no more hopeful than that of the Palestine of the present to a prosperity greater than that which is anticipated for Palestine by the most sanguine Zionists.

In my opinion it is entirely within reason for Zionists to hope for a similar development in Palestine, and indeed to share in the confidence which Mr. Bentwich has in its future. To one visiting the country it is plain that with a decent government, insuring security of life and property, with an absence of bachshish and with fair taxes, with good roads, many of which have already been built by the English, with adequate railroad facilities to the attainment of which the military exigencies of the situation have already contributed, with markets for the products of the country, which are an incident of good roads and railroads, with modern sanitation and scientific methods, and with a supply of European labor and a spirit of enlightened business enterprise, such