A Heartfelt Lament
A Feature Review of
Israel: What Went Wrong?
Omer Bartov
Hardcover: Farrar, Strauss and Giroux, 2026
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Reviewed by Diane M. Roth
This book is a lament. It is a secular lament because Dr. Bartov is a secular Jew as well as an Israeli-American and because the notions of Zionism he grew up with were from his father, to whose memory he dedicates his book, and whom he calls “the last Zionist.” Dr. Bartov was born on a kibbutz. He grew up in Tel Aviv and served in the Israeli Defense Forces during the Yom Kippur War. He is Professor of Holocaust and Genocide Studies at Brown University. All of this makes it especially painful for him to see and name Israel’s flaws.
I come to this book as a Christian who grew up in a community with a strong Jewish presence and identity. I understand the Zionist longing for a safe refuge and homeland, although not as deeply as my Jewish friends. However, I am neither a “Christian Zionist” who believes that the modern state of Israel is the fulfillment of ancient end-times prophecies, nor a supercessionist who believes that the promises of God to Israel have been “superseded” by God’s promises to the church. I come to this book also in a spirit of lament.
The question “What went wrong?” is at the heart of the lament. Some will say nothing went wrong because Israel, while not perfect, is not wrong. They are simply defending themselves from enemies who want them dead. Others will say that nothing went wrong because Zionism was an oppressive movement from its inception, depending both on settler-colonialism and on the removal and violent subjugation of those living there. But for Bartov, it is more complicated. He sees both high ideals (a movement that sought to emancipate European Jewry from oppression and persecution) and the reality of the “endless war” necessary to secure that emancipation. He laments how ethno-nationalism and violent domination of Palestinians have emerged. He points out the high ideals of Israel’s Declaration of Independence, giving “complete equality of social and political rights to all its citizens irrespective of religions, race or sex” and its lack of a constitution, which would enforce those ideals. (David ben Gurion refused to specify Israel’s borders in the Declaration of Independence as well.)
The heart of the book, for me, is in its chapter “Antisemitism and Zionism.” Bartov traces both the long history of antisemitism (first called Judeophobia) and of Zionism. In ancient times, Judaism was reviled because of the Jews’ insistence on worshiping one God, as well as their self-identification as a chosen people. He tells the story of the Maccabean rebellion in 166 BCE, as well as the Great Jewish Revolt of 66-73 CE, which ended with the destruction of Jerusalem and the Zealots’ last stand at the fortress of Masada. Interestingly, he compares these Zealots with the extremists in the current Israeli government. There was no interest in politics or compromise: only victory or death. The defeat at Masada unleashed a historical process that eventually sent the Jewish community into exile. This exile brought about a new Jewish civilization in the diaspora but also many kinds of oppression and persecution. He notes the complicated relationship between Jews in diaspora with Christians — both in judgment of one another’s religion and spirituality, but also in the ways that Christians came to depend on the Jews for tasks forbidden to them. He highlights the ways the Jewish communities were scapegoated in times of crisis and tragedy and the lies told about them throughout history (the “blood libel” that accused Jews of ritual murder on Passover, for example).
The term “antisemitism” emerged at the same time as industrialization and the Enlightenment. Forces for liberal democracies co-existed with the darker forces of intolerant nationalism, racism, xenophobia, and populism. The Jews were cast in suspicion as outsiders at a time when nation-states were being formed from different indigenous populations. Zionism was one response to antisemitism. The Holocaust was the final and incontrovertible proof that the Zionist project was necessary. Bartov also notes that after the Holocaust “the Jewish masses the Zionists had hoped to bring to Palestine to make it into a Jewish-majority had been murdered.”
To Bartov, Israel has never achieved what it sought for so long. Seeking a safe haven for Jews around the world, it has become the most unsafe spot for Jews anywhere. It has claimed to be the answer to antisemitism but has also become the best excuse for antisemitism in the world. Because it sees itself as a righteous response to the Holocaust, it cannot accept any responsibility for the injustice of the Nakba and the occupation.
All this is part of this long lament for a place which (for him) held the ideals of his grandparents and his parents. He cares about Israel and its inhabitants, Israeli and Palestinian. He sees Israel as a country that has become addicted to violence. As he admits that both Palestinians and Israelis have contributed to this violent cycle and that Israel has often acted out of vulnerability and fear (feeling surrounded by enemies), he also knows that now Israel holds most of the power.
The ongoing occupation of the West Bank territories have made it easier for many in Israel to de-humanize and demonize Palestinians. The current government of Israel weaponizes any criticism of Israel as antisemitic, blunting our awareness of how real antisemitism continues to exist around the world.
Bartov believes that Israel is now on a course of self-destruction. He does not believe that the country can self-correct. It needs outside intervention. In his Coda, he imagines better outcomes for Israel, although he does not know what will prevail. But he believes that this present course cannot sustain itself. Finally, he hearkens back to the Zealots, seeing in their history a foreshadowing of destruction in the present. Antisemites may rejoice at this possibility.
The rest of us lament.
Diane Roth
Diane Rothis a retired pastor and spiritual director, practicing the presence of God, however imperfectly. She writes at https://dianeroth.substack.
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