This book analyzes Israel's leadership from the rise of the Zionist movement to the present. That leadership, Abadi holds, has been declining since David Ben Gurion, the founder and first prime minister of the state, retired from politics. Not only were the early leaders of Zionism more charismatic, the author argues, but later leaders have faced domestic and external constraints that tied their hands regarding the economy, the need to absorb immigrants, and the demand to expand and modernize the army. Contemporary leaders have proven to be unequal to the task of dealing with these problems. In addition, the book mentions the erosion of the Zionist dream and the inability of native-born Israelis to provide a new ideology. Abadi concludes with possible solutions and prospects for the future.

Today new and ever more pernicious forms of terrorist violence threaten the world. Because these new forms of violence are so often linked to religious radicalism, modern terrorism has challenged the secular ethics of contemporary civil society. There is a pressing need to understand modern religious movements that have added militancy and belligerence as fundamental elements of religious practice. Contributors to this volume painstakingly tackle the question of how to define the contours of current religious fundamentalism as they examine the private and public postures of fundamentalist rhetoric, the importance of its regional variants, and the damage it can do to regional and national education systems. Their analysis tracks trends in religious movements that aspire to radicalize, reform, and violently topple governments and nations, while highlighting the difference between fundamentalist interpretations and other longstanding juridical, political, and intellectual traditions.

This title represents a comprehensive study of Israel's attempts to build diplomatic relations with countries on the Asian continent. The author argues that, despite the persistence of the Arab Israeli conflict, the Israeli Foreign Ministry was remarkably successful in gaining recognition in most Asian countries. He provides an overview of Israel's relations with Asian countries from 1948 until the present, and analyses the political, social and economic factors in each country and the role that each played in the process of rapprochement with Israel. He explores the reasons for Israel's successes as well as its failures, and analyses the flaws in Israeli diplomacy.