Yitzhak Laor writes:

In his excellent book, which reads like a Bildungsroman of a generation that lost its soul, Tom Segev accurately depicts Israel’s 1967 politicians and generals as irrational, aggressive and hungry for power. His research took in an immense quantity of minutes from contemporary meetings and even he seems disappointed at what he discovered. There are numerous examples of the generals’ push for land appropriation. Moshe Dayan, minister of defence during the war, ruled out ‘occupation of the Golan Heights, including the Banias, for fear of a Soviet response. Political considerations also motivated him not to approach the Suez Canal.’ But as everyone knows, the IDF did reach the Suez Canal and it occupied the Golan Heights. Was it the army’s innate inability to follow orders that drove the generals to take decisions and change their plans while running down the enemy?

(LRB 1 November 2007)

Little Brown | hardback 673 pp. |ISBN: 9780316724784