"In this groundbreaking account of the origins of the Arab-Israeli conflict, Yardena Schwartz tells a compelling story of how one American's tragic life converged with a seminal moment in history. Focusing on the ancient city of Hebron,
Ghosts of a Holy War masterfully weaves together past and present, the historical and the personal. With a keen reporter's eye, Schwartz reveals the best and the worst in both sides of the conflict. If you are going to read one book to help you understand the current Middle East tragedy, this is it."
--Yossi Klein Halevi, senior fellow, Shalom Hartman Institute, and author of the
New York Times bestseller
Letters to My Palestinian Neighbor "With meticulous archival research and journalistic skill, and aided by a fascinating trove of letters left by a doomed young American, Yardena Schwartz gives us a valuable account of one of the key tragedies in the meeting between Jews and Arabs in Palestine.
Ghosts of a Holy War fills in a missing piece in our understanding of a conflict that continues to echo worldwide, reminding us of the human characters at the heart of global dramas."
--Matti Friedman, author of
Who by Fire: Leonard Cohen in the Sinai "The Hebron massacre is a pivotal event in the history of the Jewish-Arab confrontation, one with profound resonance with our own troubled time. Yardena Schwartz has written an engaging, accessible, and deeply personal account of the massacre and its enduring legacy in the post-10/7 Middle East."
--Oren Kessler, author of
Palestine 1936: The Great Revolt and the Roots of the Middle East Conflict, winner of the 2024 Sami Rohr Prize for Jewish Literature
"Important, timely, deeply researched, and beautifully written. Yardena Schwartz has made a key contribution to understanding the roots of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. A family story is seamlessly woven into the political narrative, which explains comprehensively the present sad state of affairs."
--Martin Fletcher, former NBC News Bureau Chief in Tel Aviv and author of
Promised Land: A Novel of Israel "Hebron is the epicenter of the extremism that has fueled a century of conflict between Arabs and Jews. Yardena Schwartz's deep dive into the city's violent past and disturbing present is moving and incredibly timely."
--Gershom Gorenberg, author of
War of Shadows: Codebreakers, Spies, and the Secret Struggle to Drive the Nazis from the Middle East 
