MATTHEW HAWKINS applauds a psychotherapist’s disection of William Blake
Where Gaza came from
ALEX HALL is intrigued by a detailed history of Gaza that demonstrates its historic resilience and changing economy
The Old Town of Gaza (1862–1863)
[Francis Frith/CC] 
New releases from Christina Alden and Alex Patterson, Odette Michell, Clementine Lovell
JOHN GREEN is fascinated by a very readable account of Britain’s involvement in South America
Strip cartoons used to be the bread and butter of newspapers and they have been around for centuries. MICHAL BONCZA asks our own Paul Tanner about which bees are in his bonnet
GORDON PARSONS acknowledges the authority with which Sarah Kane’s theatrical justification for suicide has resonance today
RON JACOBS welcomes a timely homage to one of the IWW and CPUSA’s most effective orators
Late Ottoman Gaza: An Eastern Mediterranean Hub in Transformation
Yuval Ben-Bassat and Johann Buessow, Cambridge University Press, £85
YUVAL BEN-BASSAT and Johann Buessow are the sort of historians who like digging through archives for granular detail. Ben-Bassat’s previous work includes a study on petitions sent from Palestine to the Ottoman sultan at the end of the 19th century. Buessow’s CV includes the work Egyptian Rule in Syria through the Eyes of An Anonymous Damascene Chronicler 1831-1840.
This book is equally specific, delimited and detailed. This is not a history of heroes, this is what you can learn from, say, the 1905 Ottoman census in Palestine.
The manuscript was finished shortly before October 2023; the authors considered, and then rejected, updating it in the light of events since then which have plunged Gaza into the abyss. The tone is studiously academic and politically neutral, telling you what the evidence says and implies, and framing it within their particular expertise.
More from this author
ALEX HALL exposes the moral double standards peddled by Western media in name of political expediency when dealing with Hamas
ALEX HALL puts on asbestos gloves to handle a simple-minded ideological work of the ruling class
ALEX HALL recommends a meticulous and fascinating academic account of the development of Lebanon’s ‘Party of God’
ALEX HALL recommends a considered and unemotional evaluation of the history and strategic choices made by Hamas
