The Making of an Alliance
The Origins and Development of the US-Israel Relationship

A critical overview and re-evaluation of the origins and development of the 'special' relations between Israel and the United States.

David Tal (Author)

9781108427197, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 6 January 2022

320 pages
23.5 x 15.6 x 2.9 cm, 0.74 kg

'… a very significant addition to the literature about the ties that have bound the United States and the Jewish state to each other. [This] book, in short, can be read with great profit by anyone, expert or layperson alike, with an interest in this relationship.' David Rodman, Israel Affairs

Laying the foundation for an understanding of US-Israeli relations, this lively and accessible book provides critical background on the origins and development of the 'special' relations between Israel and the United States. Questioning the usual neo-realist approach to understanding this relationship, David Tal instead suggests that the relations between the two nations were constructed on idealism, political culture, and strategic ties. Based on a diverse range of primary sources collected in archives in both Israel and the United States, The Making of an Alliance discusses the development of relations built through constant contact between people and ideas, showing how presidents and Prime Ministers, state officials, and ordinary people from both countries, impacted one another. It was this constancy of religion, values, and history, serving the bedrock of the relations between the two countries and peoples, over which the ephemeral was negotiated.

Introduction
1. The sources of the American support for Zionism
2. Friendship: from Woodrow Wilson to Harry S. Truman
3. Friendly impartiality, 1949–1958
4. Strategic change 1958–1968
5. From friendship to strategic alliance, 1969–1989
6. Friendship and strategic alliance.

Subject Areas: International relations [JPS], 20th century history: c 1900 to c 2000 [HBLW], History of the Americas [HBJK], Middle Eastern history [HBJF1]