Analysis Of The Lemon Tree By Sandy Tolan

The Lemon Tree by Sandy Tolan is a non-fiction novel about the battle between the Arab’s and the Jews, for the land of Palestine. The author talks about events that take place in the early 1900s to the 20th century, catching the struggles of both sides and the facts relative to their situations. Before the mid 1900s, Palestine was known as the British ruled homeland for Arabs. They lived and farmed there for many centuries, and were inhabited throughout all of Palestine. In 1917, the Balfour declaration was signed by England, establishing that they would help create “a ‘national homeland for the Jewish people’ in Palestine.” (9) After that, rebellions on both sides fought for the land they believed was theirs. The novel also revolves around the growing friendship between an Arab man, Bashir Al-Khairi, and a Jewish woman, Dalia Eshkenazi.

Most people think Israel always belonged to the Jews but it wasn’t always a safe, holy place where Jews could roam freely. Along with Palestine, it was actually forcefully taken from the Arabs who originated there. The main purpose of this novel is to inform an audience about the conflicts that Arabs and Jews faced. Tolan’s sources are mainly from interviews, documentations and observations. He uses all this information to get his point across, and all the quotes he uses is relevant to his points. The author uses both sides to create a non-biased look at the facts at hand. The novel starts in the year 1967 when Bashir Al-Khairi and his cousins venture to their childhood home in Ramallah. After being forced out of their homes by Jewish Zionists and sent to refuge for twenty years. Bashir arrives at his home to find a Jewish woman named Dalia Eshkenazi. She invites them into her home and later the...

... middle of paper ...

...figure out their importance. It is a slightly tough read for this reason, but it is very informational and has important ideas that people should be aware of. I would recommend that professors assign this book to students when teaching this specific topic, but I wouldn’t recommend it further.

Terrorism can be generally defined as using threats or actions to intimidate a certain nation; most of the time it is just to induce fear on those nations. In the novel, terrorism is used in this way. It’s a word used a lot within the novel and its important to mention because each side claims the other to be terrorist.

Bashir was known as a terrorist because he attacked

“Eight hundred Palestinians behind bars” (192) for proclaimed terrorism

Zionism is a group of individuals that believe they deserve a Jewish homeland, a place of sanctuary where they would live freely.