Benny Morris
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Benny Morris ( he, בני מוריס; born 8 December 1948) is an Israeli historian. He was a professor of history in the Middle East Studies department of
Ben-Gurion University of the Negev Ben-Gurion University of the Negev (BGU) ( he, אוניברסיטת בן-גוריון בנגב, ''Universitat Ben-Guriyon baNegev'') is a public research university in Beersheba, Israel. Ben-Gurion University of the Negev has five campuses: the ...
in the city of
Beersheba Beersheba or Beer Sheva, officially Be'er-Sheva ( he, בְּאֵר שֶׁבַע, ''Bəʾēr Ševaʿ'', ; ar, بئر السبع, Biʾr as-Sabʿ, Well of the Oath or Well of the Seven), is the largest city in the Negev desert of southern Israel. ...
, Israel. He is a member of the group of Israeli historians known as the "
New Historians The New Historians ( he, ההיסטוריונים החדשים, ''HaHistoryonim HaChadashim'') are a loosely defined group of Israeli historians who have challenged traditional versions of Israeli history, including Israel's role in the 1948 Pal ...
," a term Morris coined to describe himself and historians
Avi Shlaim Avraham "Avi" Shlaim (born 31 October 1945) is an Israeli-British historian, Emeritus Professor of International Relations at the University of Oxford and fellow of the British Academy. He is one of Israel's New Historians, a group of Israeli ...
,
Ilan Pappé Ilan Pappé ( he, אילן פפה, ; born 1954) is an expatriate Israeli historian and socialist activist. He is a professor with the College of Social Sciences and International Studies at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom, direc ...
and
Simha Flapan Simha Flapan (1911–1987) was an Israeli historian and politician. He is known for his book ''The Birth of Israel: Myths And Realities'', published in the year of his death. Biography Simha Flapan was born on 27 January 1911 in Tomaszów Mazowi ...
. Morris's work on the
Arab–Israeli conflict The Arab–Israeli conflict is an ongoing intercommunal phenomenon involving political tension, military conflicts, and other disputes between Arab countries and Israel, which escalated during the 20th century, but had mostly faded out by the ...
and especially the
Israeli–Palestinian conflict The Israeli–Palestinian conflict is one of the world's most enduring conflicts, beginning in the mid-20th century. Various attempts have been made to resolve the conflict as part of the Israeli–Palestinian peace process, alongside other ef ...
has won praise and criticism from both sides of the political divide.Shlaim, Avi. "The Debate about 1948", ''International Journal of Middle East Studies'', Vol 27, No. 3 (1995), pp. 287–304. Regarding himself as a
Zionist Zionism ( he, צִיּוֹנוּת ''Tsiyyonut'' after ''Zion'') is a nationalist movement that espouses the establishment of, and support for a homeland for the Jewish people centered in the area roughly corresponding to what is known in Je ...
, he writes, "I embarked upon the research not out of ideological commitment or political interest. I simply wanted to know what happened."


Biography

Morris was born on 8 December 1948 in
kibbutz A kibbutz ( he, קִבּוּץ / , lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania. Today, farming h ...
Ein HaHoresh Ein HaHoresh (, ''lit.'' "the plower's spring" / "the plowman's fountain") is a kibbutz in central Israel. Located to the north of Netanya, it falls under the jurisdiction of Hefer Valley Regional Council. In it had a population of . History I ...
, the son of
Jewish Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...
immigrants from the
United Kingdom The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, commonly known as the United Kingdom (UK) or Britain, is a country in Europe, off the north-western coast of the continental mainland. It comprises England, Scotland, Wales and North ...
.Shavit, Ari. "Survival of the fittest":, . '' Ha'aretz Friday Magazine'', 9 January 2004. His father, Ya'akov Morris, was an Israeli diplomat, historian, and poet, while his mother, Sadie Morris, was a journalist. According to ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'', Benny Morris "grew up in the heart of a left-wing pioneering atmosphere." His parents moved to
Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...
when Morris was a one-year-old. He later accompanied his parents to New York, where his father was an envoy in Israel’s foreign service. Morris served in the
Israel Defense Forces The Israel Defense Forces (IDF; he, צְבָא הַהֲגָנָה לְיִשְׂרָאֵל , ), alternatively referred to by the Hebrew-language acronym (), is the national military of the Israel, State of Israel. It consists of three servic ...
as an infantryman, including in the
Paratroopers Brigade The 35th Brigade ( he, חֲטִיבַת הַצַּנְחָנִים, ''Hativat HaTzanhanim''), also known as the Paratroopers Brigade, is an infantry brigade unit of paratroopers within the Israel Defense Forces (IDF), and forms a major part of ...
, from 1967 to 1969. He saw action on the
Golan Heights The Golan Heights ( ar, هَضْبَةُ الْجَوْلَانِ, Haḍbatu l-Jawlān or ; he, רמת הגולן, ), or simply the Golan, is a region in the Levant spanning about . The region defined as the Golan Heights differs between di ...
front during the
Six-Day War The Six-Day War (, ; ar, النكسة, , or ) or June War, also known as the 1967 Arab–Israeli War or Third Arab–Israeli War, was fought between Israel and a coalition of Arab world, Arab states (primarily United Arab Republic, Egypt, S ...
and served on the
Suez Canal The Suez Canal ( arz, قَنَاةُ ٱلسُّوَيْسِ, ') is an artificial sea-level waterway in Egypt, connecting the Mediterranean Sea to the Red Sea through the Isthmus of Suez and dividing Africa and Asia. The long canal is a popular ...
during the
War of Attrition The War of Attrition ( ar, حرب الاستنزاف, Ḥarb al-Istinzāf; he, מלחמת ההתשה, Milhemet haHatashah) involved fighting between Israel and Egypt, Jordan, the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) and their allies from ...
. He was wounded in 1969 by an Egyptian shell in the Suez Canal area and was discharged from active service four months later, but continued to serve in the military reserve until 1990. He completed his undergraduate studies in history at the
Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; he, הַאוּנִיבֶרְסִיטָה הַעִבְרִית בִּירוּשָׁלַיִם) is a public research university based in Jerusalem, Israel. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Dr. Chaim Weiz ...
and received a doctorate in modern European history from the
University of Cambridge , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...
. Morris served in the
1982 Lebanon War The 1982 Lebanon War, dubbed Operation Peace for Galilee ( he, מבצע שלום הגליל, or מבצע של"ג ''Mivtsa Shlom HaGalil'' or ''Mivtsa Sheleg'') by the Israeli government, later known in Israel as the Lebanon War or the First L ...
as an army reservist, taking part in the
Siege of Beirut The siege of Beirut took place in summer 1982, as part of the 1982 Lebanon War, which resulted from the breakdown of the ceasefire effected by the United Nations. The siege ended with the Palestinian Liberation Organization being forced out of Bei ...
in a mortar unit.Remnick, David
Blood and Sand: A revisionist Israeli historian revisits his country's origins
. ''
The New Yorker ''The New Yorker'' is an American weekly magazine featuring journalism, commentary, criticism, essays, fiction, satire, cartoons, and poetry. Founded as a weekly in 1925, the magazine is published 47 times annually, with five of these issues ...
'', 5 May 2008.
In 1986, he did reserve duty in the
West Bank The West Bank ( ar, الضفة الغربية, translit=aḍ-Ḍiffah al-Ġarbiyyah; he, הגדה המערבית, translit=HaGadah HaMaʽaravit, also referred to by some Israelis as ) is a landlocked territory near the coast of the Mediter ...
. In 1988, when he was called up for reserve duty in
Nablus Nablus ( ; ar, نابلس, Nābulus ; he, שכם, Šəḵem, ISO 259-3: ; Samaritan Hebrew: , romanized: ; el, Νεάπολις, Νeápolis) is a Palestinian city in the West Bank, located approximately north of Jerusalem, with a populati ...
, he refused to serve on ideological grounds, as he viewed Israeli withdrawal from the occupied territories as a necessity and did not want to take part in suppressing the
First Intifada The First Intifada, or First Palestinian Intifada (also known simply as the intifada or intifadah),The word ''intifada'' () is an Arabic word meaning "uprising". Its strict Arabic transliteration is '. was a sustained series of Palestinian ...
. He was sentenced to three weeks in military prison and was imprisoned for 19 days, with the remaining two deducted for good behavior. He was subsequently discharged from reserve service. From 2015–18, Morris served as the Goldman Visiting Israeli Professor in
Georgetown University Georgetown University is a private university, private research university in the Georgetown (Washington, D.C.), Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789 as Georg ...
's Department of Government. He lives in
Srigim Srigim ( he, שריגים. lit. ''Shoots''), also known as Li On ( he, לִי אוֹן), is a community settlement in central Israel. Located to the south of Beit Shemesh. It falls under the jurisdiction of Mateh Yehuda Regional Council. In it ha ...
(Li On) and is married with three children.


Journalism career

After graduation from the University of Cambridge he returned to Jerusalem and worked as a correspondent for ''
The Jerusalem Post ''The Jerusalem Post'' is a broadsheet newspaper based in Jerusalem, founded in 1932 during the British Mandate of Palestine by Gershon Agron as ''The Palestine Post''. In 1950, it changed its name to ''The Jerusalem Post''. In 2004, the paper w ...
'' for 12 years. He covered the
1982 Lebanon War The 1982 Lebanon War, dubbed Operation Peace for Galilee ( he, מבצע שלום הגליל, or מבצע של"ג ''Mivtsa Shlom HaGalil'' or ''Mivtsa Sheleg'') by the Israeli government, later known in Israel as the Lebanon War or the First L ...
for ''The Jerusalem Post'', a war he also fought in as a reservist. While working at ''The Jerusalem Post'' in the 1980s, Morris began reading through Israeli government archives, at first looking at the history of the '' Palmach'', then turning his attention to the origins of the
1948 Palestinian exodus In 1948 Estimates of the Palestinian Refugee flight of 1948, more than 700,000 Palestinians, Palestinian Arabs – about half of prewar Mandatory Palestine, Palestine's Arab population – Causes of the 1948 Palestinian exodus, were expelled ...
. Mainstream Israeli
historiography Historiography is the study of the methods of historians in developing history as an academic discipline, and by extension is any body of historical work on a particular subject. The historiography of a specific topic covers how historians ha ...
at the time explained the 1948 Palestinian exodus from their towns and villages as having been driven by fear, or by instructions from Arab leaders. Morris found evidence that there had been expulsions in some cases. Another event that Morris revealed for the first time based on his archive study was the contacts between the Israeli officials and the Lebanese
Kataeb Party The Kataeb Party ( ar, حزب الكتائب اللبنانية '), also known in English as the Phalanges, is a Christian political party in Lebanon. The party played a major role in the Lebanese Civil War (1975–1990). In decline in the lat ...
figures, including
Elias Rababi Elias Rababi (1913–1999) was a Lebanese journalist and politician who served as the general secretary of the Kataeb Party. He was also Lebanese ambassador to Germany and Argentine. His other significant post was the editor-in-chief of the Katae ...
, in the period 1948–1951. The related news reports were also published in ''The Jerusalem Post'' in 1983.


Political views

Critics allege that Morris's first book,''The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947—1949'', is biased. Morris believes they failed to read his book with moral detachment, assuming that when he described Israeli actions as cruel or as atrocities, he was condemning them. In fact, he supports Israeli actions during 1948 such as the uprooting of 700,000 Palestinian Arabs, claiming that the only alternative to expelling them was the genocide of the Jewish population in Israel. In a 2004 interview with ''
Haaretz ''Haaretz'' ( , originally ''Ḥadshot Haaretz'' – , ) is an Israeli newspaper. It was founded in 1918, making it the longest running newspaper currently in print in Israel, and is now published in both Hebrew and English in the Berliner f ...
'' conducted by
Ari Shavit Ari Shavit (; born 16 November 1957) is an Israeli reporter and writer. Shavit was a senior correspondent at the left-of-center Israeli newspaper ''Haaretz'' before he resigned when a pattern of sexual misconduct came to public attention. A sel ...
, Morris said that Israel was justified in uprooting the Palestinian '
fifth column A fifth column is any group of people who undermine a larger group or nation from within, usually in favor of an enemy group or another nation. According to Harris Mylonas and Scott Radnitz, "fifth columns" are “domestic actors who work to un ...
' after the Arabs attacked the infant state, and that proportion should be employed when considering the "small war crimes" committed by Israel. In the interview, Morris stated that:
There is no justification for acts of rape. There is no justification for acts of massacre. Those are war crimes. But in certain conditions, expulsion is not a war crime. I don't think that the expulsions of 1948 were war crimes.
When Shavit called the
1948 Palestinian exodus In 1948 Estimates of the Palestinian Refugee flight of 1948, more than 700,000 Palestinians, Palestinian Arabs – about half of prewar Mandatory Palestine, Palestine's Arab population – Causes of the 1948 Palestinian exodus, were expelled ...
"ethnic cleansing", Morris responded, " ere are circumstances in history that justify ethnic cleansing. I know that this term is completely negative in the discourse of the 21st century, but when the choice is between ethnic cleansing and
genocide Genocide is the intentional destruction of a people—usually defined as an ethnic, national, racial, or religious group—in whole or in part. Raphael Lemkin coined the term in 1944, combining the Greek word (, "race, people") with the Latin ...
—the annihilation of your people—I prefer ethnic cleansing." Morris criticised
David Ben-Gurion David Ben-Gurion ( ; he, דָּוִד בֶּן-גּוּרִיּוֹן ; born David Grün; 16 October 1886 – 1 December 1973) was the primary national founder of the State of Israel and the first prime minister of Israel. Adopting the name ...
for not carrying out such a plan, saying: "In the end, he faltered. ... If he had carried out a full expulsion—rather than a partial one—he would have stabilized the State of Israel for generations." He expressed sympathy for the refugees but argued that after the Palestinians and Arab states had attacked, there was no choice but to expel them: "I feel sympathy for the Palestinian people, which truly underwent a hard tragedy. I feel sympathy for the refugees themselves. But if the desire to establish a Jewish state here is legitimate, there was no other choice. It was impossible to leave a large fifth column in the country. From the moment the
Yishuv Yishuv ( he, ישוב, literally "settlement"), Ha-Yishuv ( he, הישוב, ''the Yishuv''), or Ha-Yishuv Ha-Ivri ( he, הישוב העברי, ''the Hebrew Yishuv''), is the body of Jewish residents in the Land of Israel (corresponding to the s ...
was attacked by the Palestinians and afterward by the Arab states, there was no choice but to expel the Palestinian population." Morris told Shavit that his views changed in 2000 after the Palestinian rejection of President Clinton's peace accords and the beginning of the
Second Intifada The Second Intifada ( ar, الانتفاضة الثانية, ; he, האינתיפאדה השנייה, ), also known as the Al-Aqsa Intifada ( ar, انتفاضة الأقصى, label=none, '), was a major Palestinian uprising against Israel. ...
. He had originally viewed the
First Intifada The First Intifada, or First Palestinian Intifada (also known simply as the intifada or intifadah),The word ''intifada'' () is an Arabic word meaning "uprising". Its strict Arabic transliteration is '. was a sustained series of Palestinian ...
as a legitimate uprising against foreign occupation, and was imprisoned for refusing to serve in the occupied territories as a reservist. In contrast, he has characterized the Second Intifada as a war waged by the Palestinians against Israel with the intention of bringing Israeli society to a state of collapse. According to Morris, "The bombing of the buses and restaurants really shook me. They made me understand the depth of the hatred for us." Morris told Shavit that he still describes himself as being
left-wing Left-wing politics describes the range of political ideologies that support and seek to achieve social equality and egalitarianism, often in opposition to social hierarchy. Left-wing politics typically involve a concern for those in soci ...
because of his support for the
two-state solution The two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict envisions an independent State of Palestine alongside the State of Israel, west of the Jordan River. The boundary between the two states is still subject to dispute and negotia ...
, but he believes his generation will not see peace in Israel. He has said, "I don't see the suicide bombings as isolated acts. They express the deep will of the Palestinian people. That is what the majority of the Palestinians want." On the subject of "people the Palestinian society sends to carry out the terrorist attacks," he calls them "serial killers" and "barbarians who want to take our lives". In the same interview, Morris called Israeli Arabs "a time bomb," claiming that "their slide into complete Palestinization has made them an emissary of the enemy that is among us. They are a potential fifth column." On the subject of the potential expulsion of Israeli-Arabs, he stated that "in the present circumstances it is neither moral nor realistic. The world would not allow it, the Arab world would not allow it, it would destroy the Jewish society from within. But I am ready to tell you that in other circumstances, apocalyptic ones, which are liable to be realized in five or ten years, I can see expulsions. If we find ourselves with atomic weapons around us, or if there is a general Arab attack on us and a situation of warfare on the front with Arabs in the rear shooting at convoys on their way to the front, acts of expulsion will be entirely reasonable. They may even be essential." Morris called the Israel–Palestinian conflict a facet of a global clash of civilisations between
Islam Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...
and the Western World in the ''Haaretz ''interview, saying, "There is a deep problem in Islam. It's a world whose values are different. A world in which human life doesn't have the same value as it does in the West, in which freedom, democracy, openness and creativity are alien...Revenge plays a central part in the Arab tribal culture. Therefore, the people we are fighting and the society that sends them have no moral inhibitions." He sees the Jews as the greater victims. His work has been criticised by Arab writers for failing to act on the evidence he found of forced evictions. In an
op-ed An op-ed, short for "opposite the editorial page", is a written prose piece, typically published by a North-American newspaper or magazine, which expresses the opinion of an author usually not affiliated with the publication's editorial board. O ...
piece in ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' in July 2008, Morris wrote: "Iran's leaders would do well to rethink their gamble and suspend their nuclear program. Bar this, the best they could hope for is that Israel's conventional air assault will destroy their nuclear facilities. To be sure, this would mean thousands of Iranian casualties and international humiliation. But the alternative is an Iran turned into a nuclear wasteland." In an interview with the Austrian newspaper ''
Der Standard ''Der Standard'' is an Austrian daily newspaper published in Vienna. History and profile ''Der Standard'' was founded by Oscar Bronner as a financial newspaper and published its first edition on 19 October 1988. German media company Axel Springe ...
'' Morris argues that a
pre-emptive nuclear strike In nuclear strategy, a first strike or preemptive strike is a preemptive surprise attack employing overwhelming force. First strike capability is a country's ability to defeat another nuclear power by destroying its arsenal to the point where t ...
on Iran may have to be used as a last resort to stop the Iranian nuclear program. In July 2019, Morris has sharply criticized the restrictions under the Netanyahu government of access to historical documents related to the 1948 Palestinian Arab exodus, referring to them as "totalitarian." In a 2019 interview with ''Haaretz'', Morris took a pessimistic view of Israel's future, arguing that the Palestinians would not compromise and that ultimately "a situation in which we rule an occupied people that has no rights cannot persist in the 21st century, in the modern world". He claimed that as soon as the Palestinians did have rights, Israel would no longer be a Jewish state, and that it would descend into intercommunal violence with Jews ultimately becoming a persecuted minority and those who can emigrating. According to Morris, "the Palestinians look at everything from a broad, long-term perspective. They see that at the moment, there are five-six-seven million Jews here, surrounded by hundreds of millions of Arabs. They have no reason to give in, because the Jewish state can't last. They are bound to win. In another 30 to 50 years they will overcome us, come what may."


Criticisms of Morris' post-2000 views

Commenting on the post-2000 reversal of position by Morris,
Shlomo Ben-Ami Shlomo Ben-Ami ( he, שלמה בן עמי; born 17 July 1943) is a former Israeli diplomat, politician, and historian. Biography Shlomo Benabou (later Ben-Ami) was born in Tangiers, Morocco. He immigrated to Israel in 1955. He was educated at T ...
, former Israeli Minister of Foreign Affairs, wrote that Morris' more recent "thesis about the birth of the Palestine refugee problem being not by design but by the natural logic and evolution of war is not always sustained by the very evidence he himself provides: 'cultured officers ... had turned into base murderers and this not in the heat of battle ... but out of a system of expulsion and destruction; the less Arabs remained, the better; this principle is the political motor for the expulsions and atrocities' uoting from Morris' major 2004 work: 'The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited'.
Ari Shavit Ari Shavit (; born 16 November 1957) is an Israeli reporter and writer. Shavit was a senior correspondent at the left-of-center Israeli newspaper ''Haaretz'' before he resigned when a pattern of sexual misconduct came to public attention. A sel ...
, senior correspondent at ''Haaretz'', commented on Morris' justification for the expulsion of the Arabs in 1948 by contrasting (the more recent) "citizen" Morris with (the earlier) "historian" Morris, and noting that, at times "citizen Morris and historian Morris worked as though there is no connection between them, as though one was trying to save what the other insists on eradicating."


Published works

*''The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947–1949'', Cambridge University Press, 1988. *'' Israel's Secret Wars: A History of Israel's Intelligence Services'', with Ian Black, New York, Grove Weidenfeld, 1991. *'' Israel's Border Wars 1949–1956: Arab Infiltration, Israeli Retaliation, and the Countdown to the Suez War'', Oxford, Clarendon Press, 1993. *'' 1948 and after; Israel and the Palestinians'', Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1994. *
Righteous Victims: A History of the Zionist–Arab Conflict, 1881–1999
'. New York:
Alfred A. Knopf Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. () is an American publishing house that was founded by Alfred A. Knopf Sr. and Blanche Knopf in 1915. Blanche and Alfred traveled abroad regularly and were known for publishing European, Asian, and Latin American writers in ...
. 2001 riginal in 1999 *'' Correcting a Mistake: Jews and Arabs in Palestine/Israel, 1936-1956'', Am Oved Publishers, 2000. *''The Road to Jerusalem: Glubb Pasha, Palestine and the Jews''. New York: I.B. Tauris, 2003. *''The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited'',
Cambridge University Press Cambridge University Press is the university press of the University of Cambridge. Granted letters patent by Henry VIII of England, King Henry VIII in 1534, it is the oldest university press A university press is an academic publishing hou ...
, 2004. **It is a revised edition of the 1988 book, which was the first comprehensive monograph on the subject. The updates in second edition are based on the opened Israeli state archives for the relevant period. *''Making Israel'' (ed), University of Michigan Press, 2008. *'' 1948: A History of the First Arab–Israeli War'', Yale University Press, 2008. *''One State, Two States: Resolving the Israel/Palestine Conflict'', Yale University Press, 2009. *''
The Thirty-Year Genocide ''The Thirty-Year Genocide: Turkey's Destruction of Its Christian Minorities, 1894–1924'' is a 2019 history book written by Benny Morris and Dror Ze'evi. They argue that the Armenian genocide and other contemporaneous persecution of Christians i ...
: Turkey's Destruction of Its Christian Minorities, 1894-1924'' (co-authored with
Dror Ze'evi Dror Ze'evi (born 1953, Haifa) is an Israeli historian who studies political, social and cultural history of the Ottoman Empire, Turkey and the Levant. Ze'evi's father, , was deputy head of Mossad, and his mother, Galila, is an interior design ...
), Harvard University Press, 2019. *''Sidney Reilly: Master Spy'', Yale University Press, 2022.


''The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem, 1947–1949''

In his book ' (1988), Morris argues that the 700,000 Palestinians who fled their homes in 1947 left mostly due to Israeli military attacks; fear of impending attacks; and expulsions. He argues that there was no centralised expulsion policy as such, but expulsions were ordered by the Israeli high command as needed. The official position in Israel was that the Palestinians had left voluntarily, or under pressure from Palestinian or other Arab leaders. At the same time, Morris documents atrocities by the Israelis, including cases of rape and torture. The book shows a map of 228 empty Palestinian villages, and attempts to explain why the villagers left. In 41 villages, he writes, the inhabitants were expelled by the IDF; in another 90, residents fled because of attacks on other villages; and in six, they left under instructions from local Palestinian authorities. He was unable to find out why another 46 villages were abandoned. In his updated ''The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem Revisited'' (2004), Morris answers critics of the first version and adds material from the opening of new Israeli government archives. He writes that the contents of the new documents substantially increase both Israeli and Palestinian responsibility for the refugee problem, revealing more expulsions and atrocities on the Israeli side, and more orders from Arab officials to the Palestinians to leave their villages, or at least to send their women and children away. Morris writes that his conclusions are unlikely to please either Israeli or Palestinian propagandists, or "black-or-white historians".


''1948 and After''

'' 1948 and After: Israel and the Palestinians'' is a collection of essays dedicated to the Palestinian exodus of 1948 and subsequent events. It analyses
Mapai Mapai ( he, מַפָּא"י, an acronym for , ''Mifleget Poalei Eretz Yisrael'', lit. "Workers' Party of the Land of Israel") was a democratic socialist political party in Israel, and was the dominant force in Israeli politics until its merger in ...
and Mapam policy during the exodus, the
IDF IDF or idf may refer to: Defence forces * Irish Defence Forces * Israel Defense Forces *Iceland Defense Force, of the US Armed Forces, 1951-2006 * Indian Defence Force, a part-time force, 1917 Organizations * Israeli Diving Federation * Interac ...
report of July 1948 on its causes, Yosef Weitz's involvement in the events, and some cases of expulsions that occurred in the fifties. Although Morris dismisses the claim that the Palestinians were systematically expelled due to orders from Israeli officials, he nevertheless cites an IDF Intelligence Report that concludes that 70% of the exodus was caused by Israeli forces and 'Jewish dissidents. The IDF report lists: 'the factors that precipitated the exodus in order of importance— # direct, hostile Jewish aganah/IDFoperations against Arab settlements. # the effect of our aganah/IDFhostile operations on nearby Arab settlements # Operations of the Jewish dissidents he Irgun Z'va'i Leumi and Lohamei Herut Yisrael Collectively these 3 factors were considered to be responsible for causing 70% of the exodus, according to the IDF report. Furthermore, Morris states 'the report makes no mention of any blanket order issued over Arab radio stations or through other means, to the Palestinians to evacuate their homes and villages' despite as Morris states the IDF 'monitoring Arab radio transmissions'.


''Righteous Victims'' (1999)

''Righteous Victims: A history of the Zionist–Arab Conflict, 1881–2001'' is based largely on secondary works and gives a synthesis of existing research on the various subjects and periods covered. Morris writes "a history of this subject, based mainly on primary sources is, I suspect, beyond the abilities of a single scholar. There are simply too many archives, files, and documents. Nonetheless, parts of the present book-the coverage of the 1948 war and the decade after it, and of certain episodes that occurred during the 1930s and the 1982–85 Lebanon War—are based in large measure on primary sources."


''Making Israel''

Edited by Morris, this collection of articles was written by "traditionalists and revisionists who openly and directly lay out their key insights about Israel's origins". The articles can be downloaded from the website of the University of Michigan Press.


''1948: A History of the First Arab–Israeli War''

In '' 1948'', Morris gives a detailed account of the war between various factions that year that caused the creation of the modern state of Israel.
Yoav Gelber Yoav Gelber ( he, יואב גלבר; born September 25, 1943) is a professor of history at the University of Haifa, and was formerly a visiting professor at The University of Texas at Austin. He was born in Mandatory Palestine in 1943 and studied ...
writes, "''1948'' is a praiseworthy achievement of research and analysis, the work of a historian unwilling to rest on his already considerable laurels." Gelber disagrees with some of Morris's analysis, in particular with the idea that the 1948 war was more a "clash of civilizations" between the West and Islam than a nationalist struggle. He also argues that Morris overestimates Israel's military strength, and disagrees with Morris about the aims of King Abdullah of Jordan.
Yoav Gelber Yoav Gelber ( he, יואב גלבר; born September 25, 1943) is a professor of history at the University of Haifa, and was formerly a visiting professor at The University of Texas at Austin. He was born in Mandatory Palestine in 1943 and studied ...

"The Jihad That Wasn't"
, ''Azure'', Autumn 2008, No. 34.


''One State, Two States''

Morris contends that there is no
two-state solution The two-state solution to the Israeli–Palestinian conflict envisions an independent State of Palestine alongside the State of Israel, west of the Jordan River. The boundary between the two states is still subject to dispute and negotia ...
to the Middle East crisis, and that the
one-state solution The one-state solution, sometimes also called a bi-national state, is a proposed approach to resolving the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, according to which one state must be established between the River Jordan and the Mediterranean. Propone ...
is not viable because of Arab unwillingness to accept a Jewish national presence in the Middle East and cultural differences including less Arab respect for human life and
rule of law The rule of law is the political philosophy that all citizens and institutions within a country, state, or community are accountable to the same laws, including lawmakers and leaders. The rule of law is defined in the ''Encyclopedia Britannica ...
. He suggests the possibility of something like a
three-state solution The three-state solution, also called the Egyptian–Jordanian solution or the Jordan–Egypt option, is an approach to peace in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict by returning control of the West Bank to Jordan and control of the Gaza Strip to Eg ...
in the form of a Palestinian confederation with Jordan.Goldberg, Jeffrey
No Common Ground
, ''The New York Times'', 20 May 2009.


''The Thirty-Year Genocide, Turkey's Destruction of its Christian Minorities, 1894-1924''

The book describes the Ottoman\Turkish destruction of the Armenian, Greek and Assyrian communities by the successive Ottoman, Young Turks' and Atatürk regimes, in which some two million Christians were murdered by their Muslim neighbors.


Praise and criticism

Avi Shlaim Avraham "Avi" Shlaim (born 31 October 1945) is an Israeli-British historian, Emeritus Professor of International Relations at the University of Oxford and fellow of the British Academy. He is one of Israel's New Historians, a group of Israeli ...
, retired professor of international relations at the
University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...
, and himself a New Historian, writes that Morris investigated the 1948 exodus of the Palestinians "as carefully, dispassionately, and objectively as it is ever likely to be", and that ''The Birth of the Palestinian Refugee Problem'' is an "outstandingly original, scholarly, and important contribution" to the study of the issue. Many of Morris's critics cling to the tenets of "Old History", the idea of an Israel born untarnished, a David fighting the Arab Goliath, Shlaim writes. He argues that these ideas are simply false, created not by historians but by the participants in the 1948 war, who wrote about the events they had taken part in without the benefit of access to Israeli government archives, which were first opened up in the early 1980s. Another group of Morris's critics such as
Avraham Sela Avraham Sela is an Israeli historian and scholar on the Middle East and international relations. __TOC__ Education and Career Sela studied at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, gaining a BA in 1971, an MA in 1974 and a PhD in 1986. He currently ...
, as well as historians on the left such as
Ilan Pappé Ilan Pappé ( he, אילן פפה, ; born 1954) is an expatriate Israeli historian and socialist activist. He is a professor with the College of Social Sciences and International Studies at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom, direc ...
, argue that he has relied too heavily on Israeli sources and hardly at all on the Arabs. Norman Finkelstein,
Nur Masalha Nur-eldeen (Nur) Masalha ( ar, نور مصالحة ''Nūr Maṣālḥa''; born 4 January 1957) is a Palestinian writer and academic. He is a historian of Palestine and formerly professor of religion and politics and director of the Centre for R ...
and others argue that Morris has been too soft on the Israelis, often ignoring the force of his own evidence. Efraim Karsh alleges that Morris has distorted source material, an allegation not accepted by other historians. Lustick, Ian
Israeli History: Who is Fabricating What?
, ''Survival'', Volume 39, Issue 3 Autumn 1997, pp. 156–166.
;Efraim Karsh
Efraim Karsh Efraim Karsh ( he, אפרים קארש; born 1953) is an Israeli–British historian who is the founding director and emeritus professor of Middle East and Mediterranean Studies at King's College London. Since 2013, he has served as professor of p ...
, professor of Mediterranean Studies at
King's College London King's College London (informally King's or KCL) is a public research university located in London, England. King's was established by royal charter in 1829 under the patronage of King George IV and the Duke of Wellington. In 1836, King's ...
, writes that Morris engages in what Karsh calls "five types of distortion". According to Karsh, Morris "misrepresents documents, resorts to partial quotes, withholds evidence, makes false assertions, and rewrites original documents... etells of statements never made, decisions never taken, events that never happened ... at times edoes not even take the trouble to provide evidence..... He expects his readers to take on trust his assertions that fundamental contradictions exist between published accounts and the underlying documents.....he systematically falsifies evidence. Indeed, there is scarcely a document that he does not twist. This casts serious doubt on the validity of his entire work." In addition he claimed to expose a serious gap between Morris' text and the original diary of Ben-Gurion, the first prime minister of Israel.
Yezid Sayigh Yezid Sayigh ( ar, يزيد صايغ) (b. 1955) is a senior associate at the Carnegie Middle East Center in Beirut, Lebanon. Previously, he was a professor of Middle East Studies at the Department of War Studies at King's College London, a member ...
, professor of Middle East Studies in the Department of War Studies at King's College London, writes of Karsh's criticism, " is is not the first time that Efraim Karsh has written a highly self-important rebuttal of revisionist history. He is simply not what he makes himself out to be, a trained historian (nor political/social scientist)." (Karsh responds that he has an undergraduate degree in modern Middle Eastern history, and Arabic language and literature, and a doctorate in political science and international relations.) Sayigh urges academics to compose "robust responses o Karshthat make sure that any self-respecting scholar will be too embarrassed to even try to incorporate the Karsh books in his/her teaching or research because they can't pretend they didn't know how flimsy their foundations are".Karsh, Efraim
The Unbearable Lightness of my Critics
, ''Middle East Quarterly'', Summer 2002.
Morris responds that Karsh's article is a "mélange of distortions, half-truths, and plain lies that vividly demonstrates his profound ignorance of both the source material (his piece contains more than fifty footnotes but is based almost entirely on references to and quotations from secondary works, many of them of dubious value) and the history of the Zionist–Arab conflict. It does not deserve serious attention or reply."
Anita Shapira Anita Shapira ( he, אניטה שפירא, born 1940) is an Israeli historian. She is the founder of the Yitzhak Rabin Center, professor emerita of Jewish history at Tel Aviv University, and former head of the Weizmann Institute for the Study of ...
, Dean of
Tel Aviv University Tel Aviv University (TAU) ( he, אוּנִיבֶרְסִיטַת תֵּל אָבִיב, ''Universitat Tel Aviv'') is a public research university in Tel Aviv, Israel. With over 30,000 students, it is the largest university in the country. Locate ...
, argues "thirty of arsh'sreferences actually refer to writings by Shlaim and Morris, and fifteen others cite primary sources, and the rest refer to studies by major historians...." Morris elsewhere argues that Karsh "belabor minor points while completely ignoring, and hiding from his readers, the main pieces of evidence" and argued, "... Karsh, while claiming to have 'demolished' the whole oeuvre, in fact deal with only four pages of ''Birth''. These pages tried to show that the Zionist leadership during 1937–38 supported a 'transfer solution' to the prospective Jewish state's 'Arab problem.'" Commenting on the ''Revisited'' version of Morris'work, Karsh states that in "an implicit acknowledgement of their inaccuracy, Morris has removed some of ''The Birth'''s most inaccurate or distorted quotations about transfer." ;Finkelstein and Masalha Morris has also been criticised by
Norman Finkelstein Norman Gary Finkelstein (; born December 8, 1953) is an American political scientist, activist, former professor, and author. His primary fields of research are the Israeli–Palestinian conflict and the politics of the Holocaust. He is a g ...
and
Nur Masalha Nur-eldeen (Nur) Masalha ( ar, نور مصالحة ''Nūr Maṣālḥa''; born 4 January 1957) is a Palestinian writer and academic. He is a historian of Palestine and formerly professor of religion and politics and director of the Centre for R ...
. They argue that Morris's conclusions have a pro-Israeli bias, in that: * Morris did not fully acknowledge that his work rests largely on selectively released Israeli documentation, while the most sensitive documents remain closed to researchers. * Morris treated the evidence in the Israeli documents in an uncritical way, and did not take into account that they are, at times, apologetics. * Morris minimised the number of expulsions: Finkelstein asserts that in the table in which Morris summarises causes of abandonment, village by village, many cases of "military assault on settlement (M)" should have been "expulsions (E)". * Morris's conclusions were skewed with respect to the evidence he himself presents, and when the conclusions are harsh for the Israelis he tended to give them a less incriminating spin. Both Finkelstein and Masalha prefer the conclusion that there was a transfer policy. In a reply to Finkelstein and Masalha, Morris answers he "saw enough material, military and civilian, to obtain an accurate picture of what happened", that Finkelstein and Masalha draw their conclusions with a pro-Palestinian bias, and that with regard to the distinction between military assault and expulsion they should accept that he uses a "more narrow and severe" definition of expulsions. Morris holds to his conclusion that there was no transfer policy. Shlomo Ben Ami states that Benny Morris' conclusion is not supported by the evidence that he himself (Morris) presents such as his statement that, "cultured officers . . . had turned into base murderers and this not in the heat of battle . . . but out of a system of expulsion and destruction; the less Arabs remained, the better; this principle is the political motor for the expulsions and the atrocities". ;Ilan Pappé Benny Morris wrote a review critical of Ilan Pappé's book ''A History of Modern Palestine'' for ''
The New Republic ''The New Republic'' is an American magazine of commentary on politics, contemporary culture, and the arts. Founded in 1914 by several leaders of the progressive movement, it attempted to find a balance between "a liberalism centered in hum ...
''. Morris called Pappé's book "truly appalling". He says it subjugates history to political ideology, and "contains errors of a quantity and a quality that are not found in serious historiography". Replying, Pappé accused Morris of using mainly Israeli sources, and disregarding Arab sources, which he cannot read. ;Michael Palumbo Michael Palumbo, author of ''The Palestinian Catastrophe: The 1948 Expulsion of a People from Their Homeland'', reviewing the first edition of Morris's book on Palestinian refugees, criticises Morris's decision, which Palumbo thinks characteristic of Israeli revisionist historians generally, to rely mainly on official, "carefully screened" Israeli sources, especially for radio transcripts of Arab broadcasts, while disregarding unofficial Israeli sources such as transcripts from the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
and
CIA The Central Intelligence Agency (CIA ), known informally as the Agency and historically as the Company, is a civilian intelligence agency, foreign intelligence service of the federal government of the United States, officially tasked with gat ...
, many of which point to a policy of expulsion. He says Morris failed to supplement his work in Israeli archives, many still classified, by U.N., American, and British archival sources that Palumbo considers objective on such issues as
IDF IDF or idf may refer to: Defence forces * Irish Defence Forces * Israel Defense Forces *Iceland Defense Force, of the US Armed Forces, 1951-2006 * Indian Defence Force, a part-time force, 1917 Organizations * Israeli Diving Federation * Interac ...
atrocities, as well as oral testimonies of Palestinians and Israelis, which can be reliable if their substance can be independently verified. Palumbo says:
Morris' regard for documentation is indeed commendable, were it not for his tendency to choose sources which support his views, while avoiding those document collections which contain information inconsistent with his principal arguments. His decision not to use the testimony of Israeli veterans is unfortunate, since some of them have spoken candidly about Israeli atrocities and expulsion of civilians at Deir Yassin, Lydda–Ramle and Jaffa.


Awards and recognition

* 2008:
National Jewish Book Award The Jewish Book Council (Hebrew: ), founded in 1944, is an organization encouraging and contributing to Jewish literature.Exodus of Palestinians in 1948 ** 1948 Palestinian exodus from Lydda and Ramle **
Causes of the 1948 Palestinian exodus During the 1948 Palestine War in which the State of Israel was established, around 700,000The exact number of refugees is disputed. See List of estimates of the Palestinian Refugee flight of 1948 for details. Palestinian Arabs or 85% of the tot ...
*
History of Israel Israel, also known as the Holy Land or Palestine, is the birthplace of the Jewish people, the place where the final form of the Hebrew Bible is thought to have been compiled, and the birthplace of Judaism and Christianity. In the course of ...
*
Palestinian refugee Palestinian refugees are citizens of Mandatory Palestine, and their descendants, who fled or were expelled from their country over the course of the 1947–49 Palestine war ( 1948 Palestinian exodus) and the Six-Day War ( 1967 Palestinian exo ...


References


External links


Claremont Review of Books on Benny Morris and 1948
*Morris, Benny
Camp David and After: An Exchange (1. An Interview with Ehud Barak)continued
''
The New York Review of Books ''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of i ...
'' 9 August 2001;
Benny Morris essay regarding a nuclear Iran, ''The Jerusalem Post'', January 18 2007
Benny Morris, Veteran 'New Historian' of the Modern Jewish State's Founding, Finds Himself Ideologically Back Where It All Began, by Scott Wilson, ''
The Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large nati ...
'' Foreign Service, 11 March 2007
'New Historian' Shifts from Old View of Israel
Israeli "new historian" Benny Morris was online Monday, 12 March, at 2 pm. ET to discuss his books and changing views that have driven him away from the critical perspective of Israeli history that he helped create.

*[https://web.archive.org/web/20090214023710/http://www.jewishliteraryreview.com/post/2008/06/Benny-Morris-First-Arab-Israeli-War.aspx Review of Benny Morris' book "1948: The First Arab-Israeli War" in Jewish Literary Review]
1 hour interview of Benny Morris about the ''1948 war'' (2008)

Journal of Palestinian Studies
Vol 21(1), p. 98–114 :Morris Response to Finklestein and Masalah

Ynetnews Ynet (stylized as ynet) is one of the major Israeli news and general-content websites, and is the online outlet for the '' Yedioth Ahronot'' newspaper. However, most of Ynet's content is original work, published exclusively on the website and wri ...
, November 2007
ISRAEL AT 60: From Dove to Hawk
''
Newsweek ''Newsweek'' is an American weekly online news magazine co-owned 50 percent each by Dev Pragad, its president and CEO, and Johnathan Davis (businessman), Johnathan Davis, who has no operational role at ''Newsweek''. Founded as a weekly print m ...
'' 8 May 2008 * On RT CrossTalk 21 May 2010
''Israel and the Palestinians'' (the Irish Times)
{{DEFAULTSORT:Morris, Benny 1948 births Living people Alumni of the University of Cambridge Ben-Gurion University of the Negev faculty Critics of Islam Hebrew University of Jerusalem alumni Israeli historians New Historians Anti-Islam sentiment in Israel Israeli Jews Israeli people of British-Jewish descent Israeli political writers Jewish historians People from Jerusalem Zionists Palestine ethnographers