This book offers a reappraisal of David Ben-Gurion's role in Jewish-Israeli history from the perspective of the twenty-first century, in the larger context of the Zionist 'renaissance', of which he was a major and unique exponent. Some have described Ben-Gurion's Zionism as a dream that has gone sour, or a utopia doomed to be unfulfilled. Now - after the dust surrounding Israel's founding father has settled, archives have been opened, and perspective has been gained since Ben-Gurion's downfall - this book presents a fresh look at this statesman-intellectual and his success and tragic failures during a unique period of time that he and his peers described as the 'Jewish renaissance'. The resulting reappraisal offers a new analysis of Ben-Gurion's actual role as a major player in Israeli, Middle Eastern, and global politics.
Introduction; 1. The intellectual origins of Ben-Gurion's Zionism; 2. The Holocaust and its lessons; 3. Ben-Gurion between left and right; 4. Ben-Gurion and the Israel Defense Forces - from its formation to the Suez-Sinai campaign of 1956; 5. From the 1956 war to the 'Lavon Affair'; 6. From 'the Affair' to the Six-Day War; Conclusion: the waning of an age and its leader.
