For over a hundred years Arabs and Jews have engaged in the modern world's most embittered, intractable dispute. This conflict has engendered five interstate wars and innumerable low-level clashes. As a source of media attention, UN resolutions, and public debate, the conflict has no equal. This course assesses the origins, dynamics, and amazing, chameleon-like persistence of the conflict. How did the Arab-Zionist rivalry begin? Why did none of the wars produce a stable solution? What arguments does each use to justify its position? How have recent diplomatic developments affected the conflict? Where is it headed? We welcome students who know nothing at all about the conflict as well as those who already have some knowledge. The course considers a variety of views -- pro-Palestinian, pro-Israeli, neutral -- in sympathetic fashion. It invites dialogue between people from different religious and political backgrounds, and it presents readings by very diverse authors. The goal is not to indoctrinate, rather to have students develop their own perspectives based on informed understandings. All views are welcome. This open-ended, free interplay is what makes the course exciting, the most popular course in the History Department, and indeed one of the most popular in the University.

Class Format:

Two weekly lectures and one section, one midterm exam, one final, and an entirely optional term paper. Testing will be asynchronous and will consist of essay questions and short identifications. Students can access lectures synchronously or by listening at any convenient time to a recording after each lecture is over (asynchronously). Students can combine these modes to fit their individual schedules.