J OSEPH H ELLER , The Birth of Israel, 1945–1949: Ben-Gurion and His Critics (Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2000). Pp. 379. $49.95.

Joseph Heller, associate professor of international relations at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem who has previously written about the transition from the Palestine Mandate to Israel (including a study of the Stern Gang and of Zionist politics in the pre-state period), examines a period of great interest to students of contemporary Middle Eastern history and politics, as well as to those who focus on Zionism, Israel, and the Arab–Israeli conflict. He analyzes the internal decision-making of the Zionist Yishuv (Jewish community in Palestine) leadership in Jerusalem from the end of World War II until the armistice agreements at the termination of the first Arab–Israeli War (the Israeli War of Independence; al-Nakba for the Arabs)—in other words, the events leading to and immediately following the creation of the State of Israel.